Media root for Obama to reject withdrawal timeline

Corporate media are cheering what they suggest are signs that President-elect Barack Obama will break his campaign promise and defy both U.S. and Iraqi public opinion to keep combat troops in Iraq for longer than his 16-month withdrawal timetable. Complicating these media efforts to find a shift in Obama's Iraq policy is that he has been saying virtually the same thing on Iraq withdrawal throughout the campaign: that he wants to have U.S. combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months of taking office, but that he would carry out this withdrawal in a "responsible" manner in consultation with his military advisers, and that an unspecified number of "residual" forces would be left in Iraq after that 16-month deadline. When he said at a press conference in July 2008 (7/3/08), "I've always said that the pace of our withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability," media pundits jumped on that as a (for them, hopeful) sign that Obama was backing away from withdrawal (FAIR Media Advisory, 7/15/08); Obama gave a second press conference the same day to insist he hadn't changed his position. The media establishment is now making similar claims about Obama's Iraq position, based mainly on Obama's retention of Robert Gates as defense secretary and his choice of Hillary Clinton as secretary of state. This has led some in the media to conclude that Obama's oft-stated pledge to withdraw most combat forces in 16 months will be modified. On Fox News Sunday (11/30/08), NPR reporter Mara Liasson declared: "I think choosing him [Gates] makes a lot of sense. I think if there was any concern during the campaign that Obama would somehow kind of reflexively and literally stick to this 16-month timetable, that's gone. I mean, he's a pragmatic guy. I mean, the war is ending mostly because of a surge he opposed, but worked." And San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders (12/3/08) asserted: "Obama's decision to keep on Defense Secretary Robert Gates has angered the anti-war left, as it signals that Obama is prepared to drop his pledge to withdraw U.S. combat troops from Iraq within 16 months--two brigades per month--of taking office.... Now the question is: When did Obama know he would not honor his hard timeline pledge--during the primary, as I suspect, or over time, as the Bush/Gates troop surge brought about increased security in Iraq? Either way, Obama is where he should be on the issue." The day before Saunders was citing Gates' reappointment as proof that Obama had seen the light on troop withdrawal, however, Gates was telling reporters (New York Times, 12/2/08), "I'm less concerned about that timetable," saying that Obama's oft-restated 16-month withdrawal formula was "exactly the position a president-elect should be in." (As secretary of state, Clinton will have less to say about troop decisions, but the position she took on combat troops during the campaign--"I hope to have nearly all of them out within a year," as she said in the January 31, 2008 Democratic debate--makes it unlikely that she will be persuading Obama that a 16-month timeframe is too hasty.) Journalists hoping for a signs of a flip-flop also took note of a December 1 news conference in which Obama reiterated: "I believe that 16 months is the right timeframe. But as I have said consistently, I will listen to the recommendations of my commanders. And my No. 1 priority is making sure that our troops remain safe in this transition phase and that the Iraqi people are well served by a government that is taking on increased responsibility for its own security." The New York Times (12/2/08) reported this by saying that "while he reaffirmed his desire to pull out combat brigades within 16 months, Mr. Obama emphasized his willingness to consider options put forth by the military." Despite the fact that Obama was reiterating the position he had staked out in the campaign, the Times portrayed Obama as calibrating his statements to leave room to maneuver, knowing that some senior military officers are wary of moving too quickly and that the defense secretary he just reappointed has cautioned about timetables. The impression left by the event at a downtown Chicago hotel ballroom was of a political leader converting to governance from electioneering. The Times made a more explicit--and more convoluted--case for an Obama shift on Iraq two days later (12/4/08), under the headline "Campaign Promises on Ending the War in Iraq Now Muted by Reality." The Times argued that while Obama's antiwar campaign rhetoric "electrified and motivated his liberal base," things have changed: "As he moves closer to the White House, President-elect Obama is making clearer than ever that tens of thousands of American troops will be left behind in Iraq, even if he can make good on his campaign promise to pull all combat forces out within 16 months." Obama's message, then, has changed--except that it doesn't seem to have, really. As the article noted: "There always was a tension, if not a bit of a contradiction, in the two parts of Mr. Obama's campaign platform to ''end the war'' by withdrawing all combat troops by May 2010. To be sure, Mr. Obama was careful to say that the drawdowns he was promising included only combat troops. But supporters who keyed on the language of ending the war might be forgiven if they thought that would mean bringing home all of the troops." If anyone's not being clear here, it's the New York Times; as the paper notes, Obama's withdrawal plan always focused specifically on combat troops--as both supporters (Media Matters, 12/4/08) and critics (Huffington Post, 12/5/08) of Obama on the left have pointed out--so it's hard to see the "contradiction" that is now revealing itself. Oddly, the paper's own editorial page declared on the December 2 that "Mr. Obama made it clear that his administration would follow a new course, reaffirming plans to remove American combat troops from Iraq within 16 months." If you rely for your news on the New York Times, it's far from clear what Obama has made clear. The Washington Post editorial page (12/2/08) combined a focus on Obama's nominees with a parsing of his press conference statements. Writing that Clinton and Gates (as well as national security adviser pick Gen. Jim Jones) have "all questioned Mr. Obama's 16-month timetable for withdrawing from Iraq," the Post asserted that: "Mr. Obama appears to be tacking toward their position: While he reaffirmed his 16-month timeline yesterday, he also said his "No. 1 priority is making sure that our troops remain safe in this transition phase and that the Iraqi people are well served by a government that is taking on increased responsibility for its own security." While it's possible those priorities could be upheld during a 16-month withdrawal, most likely Mr. Obama's own team will press him for greater flexibility." The context to all this tea-leaf reading is that the media establishment long ago decided (Extra!,11-12/07) that a rapid withdrawal from Iraq was a "nightmare scenario" (U.S. News & World Report, 1/22/07) and that the responsible position was to keep U.S. troops in Iraq as long as they were necessary to restrain violence there. (Never mind that Iraqis, when asked, have overwhelmingly responded that the presence of U.S. troops makes violence worse--D3/KA, 2/25-3/5/07, 2/12-20/08.) Of course, it remains to be seen what Obama's actual Iraq policy will turn out to be; he's always left himself room to back out of his 16-month timeline for withdrawal of combat troops, and still reserves that option. But the media pouncing repeatedly on any sign of ambiguity in Obama's plans seems to reflect wishful thinking on their part more than it does any particular insight into his strategy.