(crossposted at MeanRachel.com)

Here at the convention center, between rooms twelve and sixteen, there is a long hallway with panes of frosted glass on either side that allows a soft gray glow of light to come in from the outside.  Maybe that's why they've chosen to put the art project, I Got The News Today (IGTNT), in this hallway.

I think it's pretty clear that the recent fall in the price of oil on the world market has to do with the fact the the Bush Administration opened talks with the Iranians.  This caused a softening in tensions in that part of the world.  And to anyone who knows how the price of oil works, the softening of tensions in a major oil producing nation is a core issue among speculators.  

I'm not sure the Obama Drop is the best phrase to use for this.  But I do think it would be wise to come up with a phrase.  And maybe we could use that phrase even more once (and if) the price of oil dropping gets seen at the gas pump.  Wouldn't it be great if the MSM starting picking up on that phrase too?

Are there any Madison Ave types out there that could come up with a phrase for this?  

Quite a week for Obama.  He precipitates one of the biggest drops in the price of oil in history, and he shows the world a wise opening to end the American presence in Iraq, that gets the support of the leader of Iraq.

Wow!

OK, short and sweet folks. This appears to be the first AP video report on Obama's trip to Kuwait.

I recently gave an update on my PCS move to 82nd Airborne. I've learned that I am definitely deploying to Iraq "sometime around November."

We're about to leave for dinner so this Diary will be short and sweet.

I don't like conspiracy theories involving the leaders of our nation, in large part because I don't credit them with the intelligence to devise them or the ability to carry them out.  However, in reading the news over the past few days, I've had opportunity to revise that opinion, at least as it applies to a political conspiracy.

The current administration has never had any problem in developing and executing political action.  And the press has always been ready and waiting to help make it work.

"U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes." - Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki, Der Spiegel, 7/18/2008

With the words above, Barack Obama becomes the prohibitive favorite to win the White House in less than 4 months, if he wasn't before.

With today's news that Iraq's Prime Minister Maliki agrees with Barack Obama's plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq within 16 months, the McCain campaign has so far failed to comment on the story. But McCain did have something to say about it in 2004:

QUESTION: Let me give you a hypothetical, senator. What would or should we do if, in the post-June 30th period, a so-called sovereign Iraqi government asks us to leave, even if we are unhappy about the security situation there? I understand it's a hypothetical, but it's at least possible.

McCAIN: Well, if that scenario evolves, then I think it's obvious that we would have to leave because— if it was an elected government of Iraq— and we've been asked to leave other places in the world. If it were an extremist government, then I think we would have other challenges, but I don't see how we could stay when our whole emphasis and policy has been based on turning the Iraqi government over to the Iraqi
people.

Prepare yourself for spinning of Linda Blair-like proportions.

I guess McCain decided to go the "we're staying whether the Iraqis like it or not" route:

"His domestic politics require him to be for us getting out," said a senior McCain campaign official, speaking on the condition of anonymity. "The military says 'conditions based' and Maliki said 'conditions based' yesterday in the joint statement with Bush. Regardless, voters care about [the] military, not about Iraqi leaders."

The past few weeks have quietly validated some of Obama's foreign policy positions. It started a few weeks ago when the Bush administration was able to get key concessions from North Korea on their nuclear program through......wait for it..........diplomacy. After years of tough talk that only served to escalate tensions and destabilize the relationship, finally direct engagement made brought about a acceptable solution.

Which brings us to Iran. Funny how this week we learned that the US was having direct conversations with Iran on their nuclear program......Hmmmm think the lowering tensions in the middle east had anything to do with the drop in oil prices?

Direct engagement...... where have I heard that before? Not that there is anything wrong with talking tough, but without direct engagement it accomplishes NOTHING. Thankfully as the administration winds down they are feeling some urgency to do something.

So that's two wins for Obama advocated policies, none for John McCain.

That brings us to Afghanistan.

Normally, I write long Diaries - too long! some readers say - and I was prepared to crank one out today as well.

But, having read the news that Nuri al-Maliki thinks Senator Obama's withdrawal plan for Iraq has it about right, I've decided to keep it short. My contribution, in fact, is just three paragraphs, just to keep it FAQ-legal. I leave the heavy-lifting to someone else.

For years, the late, great, prescient Steve Gilliard blogged that the end of the American occupation would come in Iraq when the Iraqis kicked us out. That never stopped him from urging a withdrawal.

Here's what he wrote on September 30, 2003:

The US wants to hang about Iraq for years, writing a constitution and patronizing the Iraqis. Let's understand this: they will not tolerate it. The French know that one day, the Iraqis will kick the US out. They know the clock is running. And they are also revolted at the crony capitalism placed on the back of the Iraqis. ...

The Congress has to realize that we aren't going to get any help, or much money as long as Iraq serves as headquarters for a CPA which is totally isolated, crony capitalists who can't make anything work, and a US Army which kills indiscriminately. We can't "win" this war, as the pundits say. We don't even know what victory looks like. Bush assmued that Iraq was the first stop on his new crusade against the Mussulmen and well, it is turning out to be the last stop as well. It is time that Congress demand we start to leave Iraq and place the UN in charge.

And here is what he wrote on June 3, 2005:

It is time to end this war. End it, withdraw and let the Iraqis solve their own problems. We can only do ill in Iraq, not good. No matter how many schools we build, hospitals we restore, we will be hated as all invaders are hated until we leave. We have brought death and misery to Iraq and there is no hope of it ending until we leave. As long as we stay in Iraq, Iraqis will seek to kill and maim us.

We can kick around various plans, but at the end, the only solution is to leave, the question is how, orderly or in a fighting retreat to Kuwait.

And, one more, what he wrote on May 9, 2006:

American foreign policy has been addicted to power and fear for a long time, as our Central American neighbors can tell you. But we backed the torturers, we didn't take their place, unleash angry young men on them, ship them to places where torture was the rule of the day, then dump them in Albania as a mistake or because they have no place else to go.

Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush made a fatal error, not because we have to worry about Iraqis blowing up buildings years from now, but because we gave away the advantage of clean hands. It may not be much, but it gave us the moral high ground to save dissisents and press for human rights. Vietnam may have ben wrong, but it was based on real fears and was logical. There was an army and a government and we chose sides. Iraq had no sides, just exiles with a siren song only fools heard.

But now, they disdained what they should have held deeply. They thought they could act in any way, because 9/11 would brook no questions. Torture, aggressive war, it didn't matter because we were America, we ruled the world, and other people would follow along. ..

The excuse for violating what we once rejected was more than hubris. Every society has sadists. Most keep them under check, few allow them real power. Rumsfeld unleashed them, their worst instincts justified and it went from CENTCOM down to their field. Sadism is a controllable act, like any other act. Sadists can be controlled. But not when the allure of torture seems near, the ability to solve problems through force. Rumsfeld unleashed these people because he thought they had an easy solution to a difficult problem.

But instead, they allows children to be raped and the innocent murdered for no gain. None.

We had embraced what we had fought so hard to end, not because we were inherently evil, but because it was one more easy thing to do for a man who always chosen the easy, wrong path.

I would like to think we will redeem ourselves one day, that the sadists and their bosses will face justice, real justice, in a large court for the world to see, to redeem the promise of what was begun at Nuremberg.

Rest in peace, Steve. We miss your voice so very much.

[From the diaries - BarbinMD]

Stupid is as stupid does.

The White House this afternoon accidentally sent to its extensive distribution list a Reuters story headlined "Iraqi PM backs Obama troop exit plan - magazine."

The story relayed how Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told the German magazine Der Spiegel that "he supported prospective U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's proposal that U.S. troops should leave Iraq within 16 months ... ‘U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes,'" the prime minister said.

The White House employee had intended to send the article to an internal distribution list, ABC News' Martha Raddatz reports, but hit the wrong button.

My take: The WH was obviously freaking out after the announcement that al-Maliki supports Obama's plan, and of course was planning to email this around internally get some some advice from advisers and get their talking points together. This also ensures additional coverage of this issue. The Obama camp of course has already pounced on this:

The national security adviser to the Obama campaign, Susan Rice, said the senator welcomed Maliki's support.

"This presents an important opportunity to transition to Iraqi responsibility, while restoring our military and increasing our commitment to finish the fight in Afghanistan," Rice said in a statement Saturday.

This is just starting to hit the media; unlike McCain leaking Obama's travel schedule, this is just too big to ignore. The implications are huge, when you consider what would have happened had the opposite occurred:

To really understand the importance of Maliki's comments, you need to consider their opposite. Imagine if Maliki had walked in front of the cameras and said, "at this stage, a timetable for withdrawal is unrealistic, and we hope our American friends will not bow to domestic political pressures and be hasty in leaving Iraq just as the country improves." It would be a transformative moment in this election. John McCain would talk of nothing else. The cable shows would talk of nothing else. Magazines would run thousands of covers about "Obama's Iraq Problem." Obama would probably lose the race.

Indeed.

Update: I just had to relay this post on what the al-Maliki statement means for McCain (per Ambinder):

Via e-mail, a prominent Republican strategist who occasionally provides advice to the McCain campaign said, simply, "We're fucked." No response yet from the McCain campaign, although here's what McCain said the last time Maliki mentioned withdrawal: "Since we are succeeding, then I am convinced, as I have said before, we can withdraw and withdraw with honor, not according to a set timetable. And I’m confident that is what Prime Minister Maliki is talking about, since he has told me that for many meetings we’'ve had."

DIGG IT UP!!

Marc Ambinder is exactly right with this statement:

This could be one of those unexpected events that forever changes the way the world perceives an issue. Iraq's Prime Minister agrees with Obama, and there's no wiggle room or fudge factor. This puts John McCain in an extremely precarious spot: what's left to argue? to argue against Maliki would be to predicate that Iraqi sovereignty at this point means nothing. Obviously, our national interests aren't equivalent to Iraq's, but... Malik isn't listening to the generals on the ground...but the "hasn't been to Iraq" line doesn't work here.

Realizing, of course, that Obama can't make political hay of this fact now that he's overseas, I really hope his team is preparing a full court press upon his return.  Imagine Obama saying something as simple as this:

I know Maliki has already been diared.
But quotes were ommitted. I found a bombshell!

We know The Whitehouse, accidently e-mailed this Maliki article, to the wrong reporter list. But what else did he say.

I have the actual article from the German Magazine Der Spiegel., & Maliki's quotes. There's even more damaging stuff against Bush, McCain, and the whole gang guys. Check out this quote:

"So far the Americans have had trouble agreeing to a concrete timetable for withdrawal, because they feel it would appear tantamount to an admission of defeat," Maliki told SPIEGEL. "But that isn't the case at all. If we come to an agreement, it is not evidence of a defeat, but of a victory, of a severe blow we have inflicted on al-Qaida and the militias."

Wow!

Could Obama ever want more?

It seems the media, just focused on the timeline comment, and the accidental e-mail. But I tracked down the source (the article), read it, and found that juicy quote, above & article (below).

This is too good! No matter what McBush says. Here's the link below.

http://www.spiegel.de/...

As in:

Via e-mail, a prominent Republican strategist who occasionally provides advice to the McCain campaign said, simply, "We're fucked."

That's in response, in particular, to the news that Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki endorsed Obama's timeline for getting US troops out of Iraq.

This doesn't help their cause either:

I blinked. I had to rub my eyes.
Then I read it, again.

I could not believe what I saw.

http://www.newsweek.com/...

This enlargement is being improvised by conservative Republicans whose only doctrine is the theory of TBTF. The theory is that this or that institution is too big to (be allowed to) fail.

Today's surge of "conservative corporatism" began with the Bush administration's brokering of JPMorgan Chase's takeover of Bear Stearns.

Nevertheless, this looks like semi-socialism—keeping profits private, but socializing losses.

Sounds almost like a Kossack.

"Keeping profits private, but socializing losses" is one of our mantras: maybe he got it from reading us. :)

On Wednesday this week, I posted a diary about Rusul and her upcoming surgery.  I am happy to say that all went well!  Rusul is now back "home" - that is the Ronald McDonald House in Greenville, SC.  She reports no pain at this time, but she did say the IV hurt her arm.  I have an update from Ann Cothran, who is the National Community Coordinator for No More Victims.

John McCain takes credit for it. Lou Dobbs, red faced and finger pointing, insists on it. Blowhards and windbags of every political stripe repeat it at every opportunity. Even the usually clear-eyed and skeptical Gail Collins mindlessly repeats it in today’s column: the so-called "surge" is working in Iraq. The only problem with this comfortable meme? It’s a lie.

Read this and tell me who is driving the foreign policy agenda.