It sure beats debating the distinction between "Perot helped out Clinton in only Montana and Colorado" and "Clinton would have lost Colorado and Montana without Perot."

Another argument that I thought was fairly persuasive from Obama is that McCain was arguing previously that we couldn't leave Iraq since violence was escalating but now that violence is down, we cannot leave anyway.  Those positions seem somewhat contradictory.  The McCain counterargument is that we would be sacrificing the gains that we have made if we left but then again, the counter to McCain's counter could be that we could lose Afghanistan to the Taliban or Al Qaeda, which is far more dangerous to American interests, if we don't redeploy some of our troops in Iraq to Afghanistan.

Politico.com posted in his article 'Obama to refine Iraq Plan'..

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Thursday backed off his firm promise to withdraw combat forces from Iraq immediately and instead said he could "refine" his plan after his trip to Baghdad later this month.

Earlier, a top Obama adviser had said that the senator is not "wedded" to a specific timeline.

Obama told reporters in Fargo, N.D., that he is "going to do a thorough assessment."

"When I go to Iraq and I have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I'm sure I'll have more information and will continue to refine my policies," he said, according to CBS News. "I have been consistent, throughout this process, that I believe the war in Iraq was a mistake."

Obama later said at a second news conference he still intends to stick to the timeline.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/070 8/11517.html

I personally think he'll take a sensible approach with his withdrawal plan. But Afghanistan is going to be problem as long as the Taliban/Al Qaida can hide in the Pashtun areas of Pakistan. Obama will have to do what Bush couldn't do..that is to get rid of the head of the Al-Qaida hydra which is Osama and Al-Zawahiri..

They should have reallocated troops to Afghanistan years ago.  I don't see why anyone would take issue with that idea.

Does he want a way out? Way out of what?

I've had the impression since the primary that Obama would back away from a timeline once he was in the general election, "refine" strikes me as the first step. Samantha Power's remarks confirmed my impression. I think only his deluded supporters ever took him seriously on an Iraq withdrawal deadline, he always added caveats.

He should stick to domestic policy .

Foreign policy isn't his strong suit.

Just pointing out here what some of the media is saying.  Here's what Rick Klein said at ABC's Political Punch:

There's been lots of speculation this week about whether Sen. Barack Obama has an Iraq problem. He does now.

His comments Thursday, saying that he will "continue to refine" his plan to withdraw combat troops from Iraq inside of 16 months, seems likely to leave the campaign on the defensive on this issue for days or weeks.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/ 2008/07/obamas-iraq-qua.html

The title of the piece?  "Obama's Iraq Quagmire"

To be fair, Iraq is going to be a no-win situation for whoever is there.  But though a strong Clinton fan, I always believed that the firm pull out date was the best approach, for a lot of reasons I won't go into here.  I think Obama should be sticking to the firm pullout date.

Could Obama argue that we have to begin a "careful," "responsible," and "gradual," withdrawal from Iraq so that we can send more troops to Afghanistan?

That is a very persuasive way out.  But if you want better ones, consider this:

1. Once president, Obama can have a full-scale review of the state of the war in Iraq by his own DOD, with his own people.  If he wants out, all the old warhorses will back him up, because he will be the prez.

2. Since Bush is still president, and he has no credibility about the war, if his brass try to say Obama can't ever leave, Obama can just say, well, look at the source.  We'll have a top-down review once I'm prez.

3. Obama can take some popular and anti-war former brass with him when he visits Iraq.  They can state their profound disappointment with what they find, and how at odds it is with what Bush's brass and DOD are telling us.  This essentially neuters any sly attempts to have Bush-motivated brass argue for staying.

4. Once prez, Obama can get members of the Iraqi government to ask that we leave.  (They have already done this, multiple times.)  After that, what excuse do we have for staying, no matter what Petraus or anybody else says?

5. The economic meltdown underway can be pinned directly to the cost of the war.  Every discussion about the war can be brought back to the costs.  When it connects to the pain that we are all suffering, the war won't seem like such a fun spectator sport.

6. Once prez, Obama can just beat the drum for a new war somewhere else, to distract the media long enough for us to get out of both Iraq and Afghanistan.  (Hate me if you want, but it's what --I-- would do.  Reagan blazed the path for that clever trick with Grenada right after the Lebanon fiasco.)  I would suggest something like the recent Columbian hostage rescue, but with more planes and helicopters and emergency UN meetings and oval office prime-time speeches and embedded reporters wandering around lost in the jungle for a couple of weeks.  While everybody is alternately cheering and worrying, we pull the troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, because, fuck it, those are old wars and who cares when we have a bright shiny new fake war?

more info.  i havent heard anything about this story.