Penguin Zen
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The risk of Obama rapture
Conservatives to argue Obama's audience popularity ought to raise doubts
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25846466/
WASHINGTON - Barack Obama's weeklong foreign tour has gone so well for him that the only risk left is a rapturous reception in Europe. At least his critics are hoping to use such a response against him.
Obama's trip hasn't been entirely smooth. In several contentious television interviews, the presumptive Democratic nominee has struggled to explain why he thinks President Bush's troop surge in Iraq was a mistake, even though he praises its results. And Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, firmly signaled that he will continue to resist Obama's plan to withdraw all American combat forces within 16 months of the start of the next administration.
Yet Obama, who faces doubts from many voters about his commander-in-chief credentials, has looked and sounded confidently presidential as he has met with foreign leaders. And Obama received an incalculable boost when Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, after some hedging, reaffirmed his belief that U.S. forces should leave his country by 2010. That wasn't a precise endorsement of Obama's timeline, but it placed Maliki much closer to the Democrat than to John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, who has talked about a decades-long American presence in Iraq.
The risk of Obama rapture
Conservatives to argue Obama's audience popularity ought to raise doubts
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25846466/
WASHINGTON - Barack Obama's weeklong foreign tour has gone so well for him that the only risk left is a rapturous reception in Europe. At least his critics are hoping to use such a response against him.
Obama's trip hasn't been entirely smooth. In several contentious television interviews, the presumptive Democratic nominee has struggled to explain why he thinks President Bush's troop surge in Iraq was a mistake, even though he praises its results. And Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, firmly signaled that he will continue to resist Obama's plan to withdraw all American combat forces within 16 months of the start of the next administration.
Yet Obama, who faces doubts from many voters about his commander-in-chief credentials, has looked and sounded confidently presidential as he has met with foreign leaders. And Obama received an incalculable boost when Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, after some hedging, reaffirmed his belief that U.S. forces should leave his country by 2010. That wasn't a precise endorsement of Obama's timeline, but it placed Maliki much closer to the Democrat than to John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, who has talked about a decades-long American presence in Iraq.
