Decision ‘08

An Improving Iraq Forcing Dems To Reevaluate

Not even the Democratic presidential nominees can ignore the progress in Iraq any longer:

As violence declines in Baghdad, the leading Democratic presidential candidates are undertaking a new and challenging balancing act on Iraq: acknowledging that success, trying to shift the focus to the lack of political progress there, and highlighting more domestic concerns like health care and the economy.

Advisers to Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama say that the candidates have watched security conditions improve after the troop escalation in Iraq and concluded that it would be folly not to acknowledge those gains. At the same time, they are arguing that American casualties are still too high, that a quick withdrawal is the only way to end the war and that the so-called surge in additional troops has not paid off in political progress in Iraq.

But the changing situation suggests for the first time that the politics of the war could shift in the general election next year, particularly if the gains continue. While the Democratic candidates are continuing to assail the war — a popular position with many of the party’s primary voters — they run the risk that Republicans will use those critiques to attack the party’s nominee in the election as defeatist and lacking faith in the American military.

If security continues to improve, President Bush could become less of a drag on his party, too, and Republicans may have an easier time zeroing in on other issues, such as how the Democrats have proposed raising taxes in difficult economic times.

“The politics of Iraq are going to change dramatically in the general election, assuming Iraq continues to show some hopefulness,” said Michael E. O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who is a supporter of Mrs. Clinton’s and a proponent of the military buildup. “If Iraq looks at least partly salvageable, it will be important to explain as a candidate how you would salvage it — how you would get our troops out and not lose the war. The Democrats need to be very careful with what they say and not hem themselves in.”

Meanwhile, Syria has agreed to attend the Annapolis conference pushing for resolution of Palestinian statehood, angering (who else?) Iran:

In a move that could bolster the credibility of the Bush administration’s upcoming Mideast peace talks, Syria has decided to send a representative to attend the conference this week in Annapolis, Md., the country’s official news agency, Sana, reported today.

Deputy foreign minister Faysal Moqdad will attend Tuesday’s talks as head of a Syrian delegation, the news agency reported. Syria decided to attend after gaining confirmation that the disputed Golan Heights, which Israel seized in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, would be on the agenda, a ranking Syrian official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the press.

“We received what we have asked for, which is the schedule, and on it is the Syrian-Israeli track,” said the official. “Based on that, we decided to go.”

Fifteen Arab states and dozens more countries and international organizations plan to send officials to attend the one-day talks, which are meant as a springboard for future dialogue to resolve the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict, viewed as a source of radicalism throughout the Middle East.

Syria’s decision to attend the conference will please many U.S. and Israeli officials eager to make the talks appear successful. But it will likely upset Iran, which has become Damascus’ biggest ally at a time when the West and fellow Arab states have spurned the country of 19 million over its support for Iranian-backed militants in Lebanon, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Tehran has vehemently denounced the Annapolis conference.

“They [the U.S. and Israel] intend to deceive a bunch of people who are like themselves in a watery conference and make them give concessions to the criminal Zionists,” Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said today, according to the Fars News Agency.

Ah, that reasonable Ahmadinejad - how foolish I was to view him as an obstacle to peace in the Middle East!…