Clueless and Out of Touch

By Ron Beasley

E.J.Dionne writes today about a Democratic Tide on The Rise

At the moment, Barack Obama is winning a smaller share of Democrats than John Kerry did on Election Day four years ago. Yet Obama is beating John McCain by six points in the latest Gallup Poll. How can this be?

For all the talk this year about bipartisanship, a sharp shift in partisan loyalties toward the Democrats, visible in a series of polls this week, could prove the defining fact in November.

In a report released yesterday, Gallup found that where McCain was winning 85 percent of self-identified Republicans, Obama was winning only 78 percent of Democrats.

Yet Obama led McCain 48 percent to 42 percent in the survey, which was conducted June 5-10. Obama enjoyed a seven-point advantage among independents, but Gallup noted that even when independents were excluded, Obama still had a five-point lead because Democrats now outnumber Republicans 37 to 28 percent. When independents were asked their partisan leanings, the Democratic advantage reached 13 points.

To find out why this might be we have to go no further than Dionne's own paper and an Op-Ed by uber neocon Charles Krauthammer,  who suggests that McCain should make the election about the occupation of Iraq.  Krauthammer demonstrates that he is out of touch with the American People and the situation in Iraq.  He has a list of talking points he used to prove how much better things are in Iraq.

1. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki sent the Iraqi army into Basra. It achieved in a few weeks what the British had failed to do in four years: take the city, drive out the Mahdi Army and seize the ports from Iranian-backed militias.

2. When Mahdi fighters rose up in support of their Basra brethren, the Iraqi army at Maliki's direction confronted them and prevailed in every town -- Najaf, Karbala, Hilla, Kut, Nasiriyah and Diwaniyah -- from Basra to Baghdad.

Of course there are a number of problems here.  Number one, the Iraqi army that drove out the Mahdi Army is itself made up of Iranian-backed militias, the Badr Brigade/Organization.  He also fails to note that the Iraqi army was losing until both the British and Americans added air and artillery support.

3. Without any American ground forces, the Iraqi army entered and occupied Sadr City, the Mahdi Army stronghold.

The key here is " Without any American ground forces".  Without US air support the Iraqi army could not ave been successful.

5. The Iraqi parliament enacted a de-Baathification law, a major Democratic benchmark for political reconciliation.

Of course the new de-Baathification law made things even worse for the Sunnis and made unification even less likely.

Krauthammers's advice to McCain:

It is a position so utterly untenable that John McCain must seize the opportunity and, contrary to conventional wisdom, make the Iraq war the central winning plank of his campaign. Yes, Americans are war-weary. Yes, most think we should not have engaged in the first place. Yes, Obama will keep pulling out his 2002 speech opposing the war.

But McCain's case is simple. Is not Obama's central mantra that this election is about the future, not the past? It is about 2009, not 2002. Obama promises that upon his inauguration, he will order the Joint Chiefs to bring him a plan for withdrawal from Iraq within 16 months. McCain says that upon his inauguration, he'll ask the Joint Chiefs for a plan for continued and ultimate success.

But this proves just how clueless Krauthammer is:

� As for the Shiite extremists, the Mahdi Army is isolated and at its weakest point in years.

� Its sponsor, Iran, has suffered major setbacks, not just in Basra, but in Iraqi public opinion, which has rallied to the Maliki government and against Iranian interference through its Sadrist proxy.

He simply doesn't recognize that the al-Malaki government is itself an Iranian proxy and would be preferable over Sadr to the Iranians.  In fact as Ned Parker reported in the LAT prominent members of al-Malaki's own Dawa party are ready to tell the US to leave.

BAGHDAD -- Officials in Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's ruling coalition are questioning whether Iraq needs a U.S. military presence even as the two countries press forward with high-pressure negotiations to determine how long American forces will remain.

Some officials in Maliki's Islamic Dawa Party and his larger Shiite United Iraqi Alliance bloc, which has cooperated with the U.S., have spoken in favor of imposing severe restrictions on U.S. forces after the United Nations mandate authorizing their presence expires at the end of the year.

[....]

United Iraqi Alliance lawmaker Sami Askari, who is considered a member of Maliki's inner circle, said the changes in opinions in many cases are gradual.

"There is the camp who still believe that we need the Americans to stay and the other camp that says we don't need them anymore," Askari said. "You can't draw a line, even within the Dawa Party, even within" the alliance, he said.

Shiite officials like Askari have warned there is no way any Iraqi politician could back the current U.S. security agreement proposals.

"If I'm from the group that believes in the need for the Americans to stay, and then they face me with such a draft, then I'll say, look, I'd rather go with the others," Askari said.

Go ahead St John - make it about the occupation!

Update

Apparently even al-Malaki has decided that his puppet masters in Teheran have shorter strings than his puppet masters in DC.

Iraq says talks with U.S. on pact deadlocked

AMMAN (Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Friday talks with the United States on a long-term security pact were at a stalemate because of U.S. demands that encroached on Iraq's sovereignty.

Also Laney in comments makes a good point:

What is really going on here is that Krauthammer continues to do what he has always done -- dishing out whatever propaganda line he thinks will keep America fighting wars in the interests of Israel.

We have noted here before that the only definition of winning in Iraq seems to be not having to leave.  That may be all about the oil but I suspect it is equally all about having a large US force in the region for Israel's benifit.