Tuesday, April 07, 2009

Troops in Baghdad cheer Obama's surprise visit

On a surprise visit to a U.S. military base in Baghdad, President Obama told cheering American troops that now is the time for the Iraqis to take responsibility for their country.

Obama said that the next 18 months will be a
"critical period" in Iraq, referring to the August 2010 deadline for the withdrawal of all U.S. combat forces from Iraq. "You have given Iraq the opportunity to stand on its own as a democratic country. That is an extraordinary achievement and for that you have the thanks of the American people," Obama told about 700 U.S. service members, including Vice President Biden's son Beau, at Camp Victory the sprawling American camping that is a short car drive from Baghdad airport.
Read on.

Also,
read transcript of Obama's trip on White House website.

On a side note: CNN reports that Iraq's federal appeals court has reduced the sentence for Muntader al-Zaidi, the man who threw his shoes at Bush. Zaidi will now serve one year instead of three.

1 comment:

airJackie said...

Yes SPB the shoe man will soon be out of jail as Maliki knows this will hurt him in the election. Now I hope the young man runs for President of Iraq that would be sweet because he would win.

President Obama might be afraid to come home as he had the wrong picks in the NCAA game. Just kidding. Now I watched the troops great him and I know that made him happy. He's right Iraq needs to take care of themselves. I still don't trust General Petraeus at all. He's a Cheney snake puppet and you never know when he will strike.