Cheney's 'bad cop' act in Iraq: What's really going on

[seafan]

Cheney's 'bad cop' act in Iraq: What's really going on

By Ed Henry
CNN Washington Bureau

May 9, 2007


Vice President Cheney, right, delivered a tough message to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki when he visited Baghdad Wednesday

....

Journalists traveling with the vice president reported that aboard Air Force Two en route to Iraq, someone identified only as a "senior administration official" said Cheney's message to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki would be clear.

"We've got to get this work done. It's game time. ... Everybody's got to sit down, raise their game, redouble their efforts," the senior administration official said.

To say that it's finally "game time" more than four years into the war is a pretty startling statement.

"The administration is becoming increasingly desperate because they know time is running out," explained Lawrence Korb, a former Reagan Defense Department official who now works at the liberal Center for American Progress.

What's really going on here is a classic example of the White House's good-cop/bad-cop approach to thorny issues. For months, the president has been playing the good cop -- gently prodding and coaxing Maliki along.

But now that fellow Republicans are really turning up the temperature on the White House to turn the situation around, Cheney -- "The Enforcer" if you will -- is sent in to play bad cop and deliver the message in blunter fashion to Maliki face-to-face.

(It was quite interesting to me that reporters on the ground in Baghdad noted they were left cooling their heels for some 45 minutes waiting for the vice president to emerge from the Maliki meeting, which suggests to me it was a "frank exchange" as they say in diplomatic parlance).

In public, Cheney's comments were more tactful but still pointed in noting that U.S. patience is growing thin, especially with the Iraqi parliament planning a controversial two-month summer break.

.....

Nearly one year later, the future of Iraq is still in Maliki's hands -- but even Republicans admit privately the clock is ticking.

It's all about Getting. The. Oil. Contracts. Signed. Over.

If Bush/Cheney's imperialist ambitions fail to do that, they have lost it all.



Time is running out on this snake pit of thieves, liars and traitors occupying our White House.


(bold type added)

[mike_c]

1. they sent the undead one to snarl....

[mmonk]

2. Yep, its all about the oil and empire project.

Its also all about continued violence because the people don't want to turn over their national assets. It's also about continued attacks on US interests as long as this is how we operate in the world.

[gatorboy]

3. If Bush and Cheney are so worried.

Perhaps they should take over for the next two months...In Iraq.


It would be good for them. :)

[mmonk]

10. I'll second that.

[Marie26]

4. This always makes me laugh

When someone quotes an unnamed "senior Administration official" during a Cheney trip, it's Cheney. He's so paranoid & secretive that he refuses to be named in print. He does this even when he's talking about the Vice-President in the first person - it's beyond silly.

[hedda_foil]

8. The funniest thing is the press has gotten so tired of the "senior Administration official" ploy

that they've taken to making it abundantly clear that it's Cheney himself.

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

5. Aw hell,...ask a difficult question for cryin' out loud!!!

He's securing the damned oil,...DUH!!!!

[IChing]

6. Oil workers are gonna strike and the parliment voted for the US to leave.

almost in one day



somebody find me some links.

[Old and In the Way]

7. "Get that goddam hydrocarbon law passed, Maliki."

"I've spent the past 10 years planning for that oil and I'll be goddammed if you or any other Iraqi is going to keep my friends at Big Oil from acquiring it. Sign the law and you can take the rest of our term off, for all I care. Do it...or I'll take you quail hunting, Dick Cheney style."

[Canuckistanian]

9. Quail hunting - is that like "sleeping with the fishes"?

You dont mess with the Capo di tutti PNACi.

[cliss]

11. There Ya go.

Pressure, Cheney style.

[Bake]

12. Fourth quarter, minutes (seconds?) to go ...

Dammit, time to start playing! Finally? Not really.

Bake