[lit-ideas] Just for the record

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/09/undermining-mcc.html


Key paragraphs


Lending significant credence to Obama's response is the fact that -- though
it's absent from the Post story and other retellings -- in addition to Obama
and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki,*this July meeting was also
attended by Bush administration officials, such as U.S. Ambassador to Iraq
Ryan Crocker 
<http://www.zimbio.com/pictures/zDy8webPvw0/Barrack+Obama+Meets+Iraqi+President/4AzFpjHW2Bf/Ryan+Crocker>
*and the Baghdad embassy's legislative affairs advisor Rich Haughton, as
well as a Republican senator, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.

Attendees of the meeting back Obama's account, including not just Sen. Jack
Reed, D-R.I., but Hagel, and Senate Foreign Relations Committee staffers
from both parties. Officials of the Bush administration who were briefed on
the meeting by the U.S. embassy in Baghdad also support Obama's account and
dispute the Post story and McCain attack.

The Post story is "absolutely not true," Hagel spokesman Mike Buttry told
ABC News.

"Barack Obama has never urged a delay in negotiations," said Obama campaign
national security spokesperson Wendy Morigi, "nor has he urged a delay in
immediately beginning a responsible drawdown of our combat brigades."

Buttry said that Hagel agrees with Obama's account of the meeting: Obama
began the meeting with al-Maliki by asserting that the United States speaks
with one foreign policy voice, and that voice belongs to the Bush
administration.


-- 
John McCreery
The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
Tel. +81-45-314-9324
http://www.wordworks.jp/

Other related posts: