Obama: "Consensus" in Iraq for redeployment

Sen. Barack Obama said he found "a strong, emerging consensus" for the redeployment of U.S. combat forces from Iraq, with Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki telling Obama he hoped American combat troops will be gone in two years.

snip

"America has a strategic opportunity to build a new kind of partnership with Iraq," Obama and his colleagues said, "and to refocus our foreign policy on the many other pressing challenges around the world -- starting with the resurgence of al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan."

cnn

He went to Iraq, saw conditions on the ground, and found concensus for redeployment.

More, after the fold

"We are hoping that in 2010 that combat troops will withdraw from Iraq," the government spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, said Monday after Obama met with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Obama released a statement late Monday noting that Iraqis want an "aspirational timeline, with a clear date," for the departure of U.S. combat forces.

"They do not want an open-ended presence of U.S. combat forces. The prime minister said that now is an appropriate time to start to plan for the reorganization of our troops in Iraq — including their numbers and missions. He stated his hope that U.S. combat forces could be out of Iraq in 2010," Obama said in a joint statement with Sens. Chuck Hagel, a Republican from Nebraska, and Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island, who accompanied him to the war zone.

Obama visits former insurgent hotbed in Iraq

Here is a key point:

They [Obama, Reid, and Hegal] also expressed their view that legislatures in the United States and Iraq should approve any long-term security agreements between the two countries.

cnn

The choice is clear: McCain wants to stay in Iraq, continue the imperial project of Bush, over the wishes of the Iraqi people.  Obama respects the people of Iraq and the people of America and will redeploy the troops over a 16 month (more or less) period. Whatever your disappointments on other issues, like FISA or trade, nothing can be done for progressive change without ending our imperial project in Iraq.  That's why I gave some money today to elect Barack Obama.  He's not perfect, but he's right on this core issue.

barack obama.com