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Why? He'll have two years to play generalissimo  .

Evidently the plan is right out of the Center for American Progress' "Strategic Redeployment" paper written in 2005.

ShnickyShnack wrote:

Really? I was thinking it was bad for Obama. Kind of validates the "stay the course" approach, doesn't it?

Though I guess it does hurt pro-war people on the "conditions on the ground" line.

It just doesn't seem consistent with the "no timetable" mantra.

Awww...hell; let's just leave 'em a nice stockpile of WMD's and see what they do after we leave. Which should be this time next year.

Here's what Obama has said:

Campaigning Thursday in Virginia, Obama said, "They are working on a plan that looks, lo and behold, like the plan that I've been advocating. I will encourage the administration to move forward with it."

McCain campaign spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said, "We're monitoring closely and will have something to say when an agreement is finalized."

U.S. political activists seem uncertain how the proposal might affect the Obama-McCain race.

"At this point, Obama looks a little less reckless than he might have a few months ago," said Michael O'Hanlon, a military expert at the Brookings Institution. O'Hanlon, who once backed Obama, has often criticized him for refusing to acknowledge the achievements of the U.S. "surge" in troop numbers and for sticking to his 16-month withdrawal goal even as events in Iraq have changed.

O'Hanlon said the proposed agreement faces substantial political and military hurdles.

Polls suggest most U.S. voters are much more concerned about the economy than the war. The proposed agreement could make Iraq even less of an issue this fall.

Link.

To translate that into standard syntax...
Is this just a show by the Bush administration to get the "end the war" folks off their backs?

bratboy wrote:

Here's what Obama has said:

Campaigning Thursday in Virginia, Obama said, "They are working on a plan that looks, lo and behold, like the plan that I've been advocating. I will encourage the administration to move forward with it."

McCain campaign spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said, "We're monitoring closely and will have something to say when an agreement is finalized."

U.S. political activists seem uncertain how the proposal might affect the Obama-McCain race.

"At this point, Obama looks a little less reckless than he might have a few months ago," said Michael O'Hanlon, a military expert at the Brookings Institution. O'Hanlon, who once backed Obama, has often criticized him for refusing to acknowledge the achievements of the U.S. "surge" in troop numbers and for sticking to his 16-month withdrawal goal even as events in Iraq have changed.

O'Hanlon said the proposed agreement faces substantial political and military hurdles.

Polls suggest most U.S. voters are much more concerned about the economy than the war. The proposed agreement could make Iraq even less of an issue this fall.

Link.

Its not the plan Obama was advocating. Obama, along with the NYT and most of the dems was arguing that situations were so bad we had to get our people out so that they weren't targets. If we can actually get our troops out by 2011, then perhaps Iraq isn't quite the fubar, sky is falling situation that has been presented by the critics of the war. Nor the worst foreign policy disaster in the history of the world. Nor the worst war ever aside from vietnam which was the previous worst war ever.

But certainly, when arguing against the surge, Obama was arguing that it wouldn't work because the situation was so bad on the ground. It's the surge that has produced the situation on the ground that would allow for a withdrawal that would leave behind a stable Iraq as opposed to an Iraq falling apart and in the midst of genocide.

So is setting a timetable completely consistent with what Bush and McCain had said previously? 

The Iraqis wanted a timetable.  A majority of Americans wanted a timetable.  All of a sudden, we have the impossible....an "artificial" timetable!  Amazing.

Farmerkev wrote:

means conditions on the ground don't you.

I don't believe that Obama has ever said that conditions occurring contemporaneously to the withdrawal would be ignored. 

The line before was that NO timetable was possible.

Farmerkev wrote:

Was it or was it conditions on the ground will dictate how long we stay.
Looks to me like they gave a throwaway timeline to appease the antiwar crowd but left the big flashing neon sign that they are staying if it's still "bad".

What percentage of America makes up the "antiwar crowd," in your opinion?

Was it or was it conditions on the ground will dictate how long we stay.

?

jerwin wrote:

Was it or was it conditions on the ground will dictate how long we stay.

?

My memory is that the admin line was they couldn't give a firm withdrawal date and conditions on the ground would dictate how soon we could leave.
I don't think it's changed much with this loose timeline with the line about sooner or later depending on conditions.