Imagine my surprise early Saturday morning to discover, in my e-mail inbox, a news bulletin from the White House calling attention to an interview that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had just given to the German publication Der Spiegel. In that interview, Maliki made it quite clear that he likes the concept of a 16-month withdrawal timetable -- as proposed by the Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama. Well, as it turned out (and this tidbit would not be known for many hours), the Bush team messed up. The White House had intended to circulate the Der Spiegel story for internal use only; mistakenly, it had sent it out to the broader journalistic community. Thanks, guys. McCain's aides have been hammering at Obama, claiming that the 16-month timetable reflects ignorance of the facts on the ground. Yet here was Maliki, sounding supportive for a 16-month timetable, based on his own reading of the facts on the ground. It took the McCain people all day Saturday to come up with some kind of response. In the early evening, finally, they did. It was transparently weak: "John McCain believes withdrawal must be based on conditions on the ground. Prime Minister Maliki has repeatedly affirmed the same view, and did so again today." That spin wasn't very effective, since Maliki had essentially refuted almost every facet of McCain's Iraq policy. ...
Anytime
