that same news that everyone else is writing aboutd

"I've been too busy to write much the last week - a couple of big projects with suddenly looming deadlines, and a proliferating number of smaller ones (and of course watching Dr. Horrible and taking the kids to the pool!) are taking up all my time these days. But it's hard not to at least marvel at the rather remarkable changes in the official position of the Iraqi government culminating in Maliki's reported remarks favoring Obama's withdrawal plan and Bush's agreement on a 'time horizon.'

The best response thus far comes from an unidentified senior adviser to the McCain campaign, via Marc Ambinder: "voters care about [the] military, not about Iraqi leaders." That's a bit of 'straight talk' which I'm sure will play well with the Iraqis.

It's surprising, no doubt. I know that I'm not the only one who has generally assumed that Maliki and most of the ruling elite preferred McCain's vision of endless, unconditional American military support. Prevailing explanations as to why the change seem to divide into three main groups: one thinks that he doesn't really mean it and dismisses its significance; the second sees this as an outcome of Maliki's growing strength (real or perceived), after the last few months' military operations / spectacles and the wave of oil revenues; the third sees it as an outcome of Maliki's real political weakness, forcing him to bend before a rising public storm over the terms of the proposed agreement."
Abu Aardvark