Considering I’ve just been having a related discussion in the comments, I found this post from Ed Morrissey timely.
In three different appearances over the last two days, David Axelrod, Susan Rice, and Claire McCaskill all offered competing visions of Obama’s policy on Iraq.
(Former Captain) Ed is arguing that Obama’s surrogates are confused, and offers three different snippets as his proof.
In the first, he has David Axelrod saying that Obama would listen to commanders on the ground.
For those of you who have not been paying attention, or have been projecting your own positions onto Obama, this is an example of what I’ve been calling nuance.
Ed’s third example of “competing visions” comes from Susan Rice, who offers the view that Obama would listen to commanders on the ground. (Since her statement coincides with Axelrod’s, this is basically a supporting vision rather than a competing.)
Only the second of Ed’s examples is new, or different, and it’s the most interesting to me:
Monica Novotny: In this week’s New Yorker, George Packer writes about Obama’s original withdrawal plan in the context of what we’re now seeing as a relative stabilization in parts of Iraq. He writes about Obama, ‘He doubtless realizes that his original plan, if implemented now, could revive the badly wounded al Qaeda in Iraq, re-energize the Sunni insurgency, embolden Moqtada al-Sadr to recoup his militia’s recent losses to the Iraqi Army, and return the central government to a state of collapse. The question is whether Obama will publicly change course before November.’ Will he?
Sen. McCaskill: No. He will not.
Ed interprets this as, “Obama won’t change his plans at all.”
But the interviewer didn’t ask whether Obama will change his plans at all. The question was: will he publicly change course before November?
Claire McCaskill was asked a political strategy question — and it’s an interesting little tidbit.
I’ve noticed for some time that Obama’s website hasn’t been updated on this, and the Iraq war has not come up in speeches or discussion for a while. It’s been pretty clear that he’s playing the timeline out as far as possible, and her response confirms it.
I seriously doubt it will be November, though, before Obama begins explaining how the changes in Iraq affect statements that time has rendered moot.
And I agree fully with the gist of Neocon’s comment: Obama will have an enormous challenge explaining the situation to those who have ignored the nuance all along.