CUTTING AND RUNNING….A couple of days ago the Arab League and the Iraqi Interior Minister called for a timetable for withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq. That’s surprising enough, but Juan Cole passes along some even more suprising news from al-Hayat:
Sources at the conference….said that the withdrawal would be completed over a period of two years (i.e. November 2007). This timetable, al-Hayat says, appears actually to have been put forward by the Americans themselves. If that is true, we finally know exactly what George W. Bush means by “staying the course.” It is a course that takes us to withdrawal.
Since I’m roughly in favor of both a benchmark-based withdrawal plan as well as the approximate timeline outlined here, I don’t have a problem with the Bush administration putting forward this proposal. Still, if this really is their plan, isn’t it about time for Republicans to stop demonizing liberals who make the exact same proposal as a bunch of cut-and-run cowards? This is going to come back to bite them very firmly in the ass if they don’t change their tune pronto.
