Barack Obama: Hoping to change... (UPDATED)

... history before empowered to do so:

WHILE campaigning in public for a speedy withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama has tried in private to persuade Iraqi leaders to delay an agreement on a draw-down of the American military presence.

According to Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, Obama made his demand for delay a key theme of his discussions with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad in July.

"He asked why we were not prepared to delay an agreement until after the US elections and the formation of a new administration in Washington," Zebari said in an interview.

Obama insisted that Congress should be involved in negotiations on the status of US troops - and that it was in the interests of both sides not to have an agreement negotiated by the Bush administration in its "state of weakness and political confusion."

"However, as an Iraqi, I prefer to have a security agreement that regulates the activities of foreign troops, rather than keeping the matter open." Zebari says.

Though Obama claims the US presence is "illegal," he suddenly remembered that Americans troops were in Iraq within the legal framework of a UN mandate. His advice was that, rather than reach an accord with the "weakened Bush administration," Iraq should seek an extension of the UN mandate.

While in Iraq, Obama also tried to persuade the US commanders, including Gen. David Petraeus, to suggest a "realistic withdrawal date." They declined.

This, if true, ought to be front page news in every newspaper... instead, the people responsible are far too distracted trying to figure out who of Palin's friends were picked to serve in her administration, whether Troopergate will be the scandal that brings Palin down and what else people like Matt Damon and Whoopi Goldberg are saying about the election.

Amazing really.

If anyone can find me Joe Biden quotes related to the alleged "October Surprise" launched by Reagan before he became President, I'd love to use them.  Leave them in the comments or shoot me an e-mail.

In the mean-time, stand by for further developments.

Kim over at Wizbang is blogging about this and had these concluding comments:

It will be interesting to note whether the mainstream media pick up on this because if it had been a Republican candidate for president interfering with a sitting Democratic president's military and diplomatic efforts, they would be screaming in outrage about this from the mountain tops.

UPDATE: The Anchoress too has focused in on how the press will likely react... or more accurately, ignore this issue:

The press, of course, will yawn over this.  After all, it’s not like Obama paraphrased a Lincolnian prayer or did not ban books in a local library.  As with any story touching negatively on Obama, the press will display a spectacular indifference to this question.

Someone needs to ask Obama about this charge.  It is a “serious” one, so it’s game for questioning, don’t you think?

Thinking people do... the un-thinking do not.

Comments

[SpideyTerry]

Yeah, this should be front page news. If McCain or any Republican had tried to pull this kinda crap, we all know it would be.

If this can be verified as true, here's hoping McCain uses it to beat Obama silly.

[SpideyTerry]

Oops, forgot to put my name in that comment.

[Rick]

I fixed it Spidey... thanks for being here.

[docweasel]

Trackback for « It’s Over, It’s O O O O ver, It’s Obamover « docweaselblog said:

[...] As we've been chronicling, Obama continues to lose ground in "safe" blue states: never mind the battle ground states he hopes to make up where Kerry and Gore lost, if the Democrat ticket can't hold the blue states, all bets are off and we're talking McCain Landslide of epic proportions. Our early posts on the matter back in May now seem eerily prescient: the docweaselblog team should play the lottery this week.
[...]

[Mommynator]

This isn't only disgusting, it's sedition.

He had no right to try to negotiate anything except maybe the price of a felaffel.