PUNK'D: Did Al-Hakim Just Burn "W"?
I was shocked to read this in the New York Times about activities surrounding the Iraqi constitutional crisis:
As anyone who follows American diplomacy knows, it is a huge step for an American president to become personally and directly involved in a negotiation. Presidential prestige is put on the line and, for this reason, a president only becomes involved on a matter of huge importance, only if his involvement is absolutely needed in a final push to solve a problem and only if the presidential advisers are damn certain the president's involvement will bring about the desired result.
Failure after presidentiial involvement can be highly damaging to America's international diplomacy. Thus, its important for the parties to understand that failure to heed the President's intercession face significant consequences.
Yet, immediately after Bush's push to get the Shiites to compromise, not only did the Shiites not offer a compromise but they completely bailed on a planned negotiating session with the Sunnis. As the LA Times reported:
We then learned that, as of the close of business on Friday, the Shiites and the Kurds were pushing forward with their "winner-take-all" attitude and would not compromise with the Sunnis (and, though unstated in this article, Sadr's Shiite faction as well) but will attempt to bypass them by taking the draft constitution directly to the October 15 referendum.
What's happened here isn't being missed. Maureen Dowd shoved this mistake down Bush's throat with her late Friday night post:
You can almost hear the collective "Ouch!" being shouted by our diplomatic corps and in Washington.
Today we learn that the Shiites have finally made another offer to the Sunnis. I don't know what means were left after a direct call from the President; begging I suppose, because, in fact, it appears the new proposal contain only meaningless changes that do not substantively address the Sunnis concerns. As such, it appears to be more of a face saving move than an attempt at reaching a legitimate compromise. Indeed, the Sunnis quickly rejected the new proposal offering a 13 point counterproposal.
Al-Hakim blatantly thumbed his nose at Bush. So the only question is what, if any, consequence will there be? A united States draw down is the only thing I can think of any value. But if Bush is unwilling to do that (as he professes to be), what leverage did he have to place any pressure on Al-Hakim or the Southern Shiites. The fact that Bush took such a high risk gamble on this matter smacks of one thing --- desperation about Iraq in the Bush camp.
Talks over the Iraqi constitution reached a breaking point on Thursday, with a parliamentary session to present the document being canceled and President Bush personally calling one of the country's most powerful Shiite leaders in an effort to broker a last-minute deal.
Mr. Bush intervened when some senior Shiite leaders said they had decided to bypass their Sunni counterparts, as well as Iraqi lawmakers, and send the document directly to Iraqi voters for their approval.
As anyone who follows American diplomacy knows, it is a huge step for an American president to become personally and directly involved in a negotiation. Presidential prestige is put on the line and, for this reason, a president only becomes involved on a matter of huge importance, only if his involvement is absolutely needed in a final push to solve a problem and only if the presidential advisers are damn certain the president's involvement will bring about the desired result.
Failure after presidentiial involvement can be highly damaging to America's international diplomacy. Thus, its important for the parties to understand that failure to heed the President's intercession face significant consequences.
Yet, immediately after Bush's push to get the Shiites to compromise, not only did the Shiites not offer a compromise but they completely bailed on a planned negotiating session with the Sunnis. As the LA Times reported:
Thursday's talks at the Green Zone residence of Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani broke down around 10 p.m. when Sunni negotiators walked out, according to participants. The Sunnis had been waiting for the powerful Shiite parliamentary bloc to present a counterproposal on federalism but left when the top Shiite leaders didn't show. "What negotiations? There were no negotiations," said Iyad Samaraie, a senior Sunni negotiator.
We then learned that, as of the close of business on Friday, the Shiites and the Kurds were pushing forward with their "winner-take-all" attitude and would not compromise with the Sunnis (and, though unstated in this article, Sadr's Shiite faction as well) but will attempt to bypass them by taking the draft constitution directly to the October 15 referendum.
What's happened here isn't being missed. Maureen Dowd shoved this mistake down Bush's throat with her late Friday night post:
[Bush] did do a few minutes of work this month, calling a Shiite leader in Baghdad a few days ago to lobby him to reach a consensus with the Sunnis, so Iraq doesn't crack apart. But the Shiites and Kurds ignored the president and skewered the Sunnis.
Iraq, it turns out, is the one branch of American government that the Republicans don't control.
You can almost hear the collective "Ouch!" being shouted by our diplomatic corps and in Washington.
Today we learn that the Shiites have finally made another offer to the Sunnis. I don't know what means were left after a direct call from the President; begging I suppose, because, in fact, it appears the new proposal contain only meaningless changes that do not substantively address the Sunnis concerns. As such, it appears to be more of a face saving move than an attempt at reaching a legitimate compromise. Indeed, the Sunnis quickly rejected the new proposal offering a 13 point counterproposal.
Al-Hakim blatantly thumbed his nose at Bush. So the only question is what, if any, consequence will there be? A united States draw down is the only thing I can think of any value. But if Bush is unwilling to do that (as he professes to be), what leverage did he have to place any pressure on Al-Hakim or the Southern Shiites. The fact that Bush took such a high risk gamble on this matter smacks of one thing --- desperation about Iraq in the Bush camp.
posted by Macswain at
10:11 AM
1 Comments:
george w bush's handling of Iraq is not unlike a medical school dropout performing open heart surgery on a patient who had a sliver in his finger.
Infection has set in, the patient's unconscious, and the "doctor" is on a month vacation.
Since the patient is coding, "Dr." W. is making frantic and counterproductive phone calls.
While you're right Macswain that the calls reflect desperation, the real issue is how did this guy get the license to cut?
Frankly, given that this dunderhead has blundered into one of the biggest fiascos in our nation's history, nothing he or his cronies do from this point forward seems worth wasting our breath on.
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Anonymous, at 8:29 PM
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