Photo from Barack Obama - Yahoo! News Photos¹

I do not think that the troops hate Obama. And I am certainly not displaying this image to claim that they all support him.

Rather, this post is in the manner of a prediction. Here goes …

Over the next week Obama will be photographed about 10,000 times, many times with U.S. troops. Should even one of those photos show any service members with anything less than adulation on their faces, I predict the usual suspects will be howling, “See, see, see … The troops hate Obama. Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk.” If we are very unlucky, we will be treated to another tiresome excerpt of Col. Nathan R. Jessup’s tirade along with it.

I give them three days.

And, if no such actual photograph emerges, and they have to resort to Photoshopping, then it might take them a week.

Update: So, as soon as I wrote this post, I fired up Google Blog Search to see what i could find. To my dismay, it was worse than i thought. Read what the “not racists” at Power Line Forum have to offer:

Power Line Forum | Video: Obama Visits BLACK Troops in Kuwait²

Power Line Forum | Don’t white troops support Obama?

1. I don’t know if that’s a permanent link.
2. Their caps, not mine.

So while there’s been some suggestion that Maliki was playing domestic politics, this seems like the opposite. (Who plays domestic politics in the pages of Spiegel?) Maliki is playing international politics, American politics even. While some may object to that, it may be a sign that he intends to be a player in the American election from now until November, and realizes how much more leverage he has now on the next president’s stance toward his country than he will after our election.

Too many ins and outs. Everyone is gonna get way, way in the weeds, and pick out what they want.

Me? I must point out that the correction or clarification released through CENTCOM by Ahmed Chalabi’s buddy, Dabbagh, struck me as the most humorous aspect of this whole business. “Humorous,” not necessarily “of zero credibility.” But couldn’t they have done better? I wonder what time it was in Iraq when they trundled Dabbagh down to the CENTCOM press office. I envision the middle of the night, but I don’t really know.

At any rate, in all fairness, in a kerfuffle that is cloudy at best, Ben’s take seems the best that anyone can draw: Maliki’s comments were meant for U.S. domestic (i.e. political and electoral) consumption.

While the obvious take would be that he favors Obama, I really don’t know. Further, if Ben’s analysis is correct, even if Maliki was trying to help out McCain, by some less obvious path, would it matter much.

Update: As I read more, and a couple more stories appeared today, I want to revise my thoughts. First, it’s becoming quite clear that Maliki is trying to 1) play in U.S. elections, and/or 2) gain concessions from the Bush administration. (See this AP story.) Second, the “denials” are pretty weak. (See Yglesias.) The main point of my revision is that I think this story, i.e. Maliki’s statement, does have meaning. Also, I recommend my readers take the “Aha, see, he didn’t mean it” with a grain of salt. I’m not in the mood to link & argue all the details, but anyone who wants can follow them from easily.

At any rate, Xenophon’s Greek mercenaries (or somewhat more than half of them) made it back to Greece. What remained of the army was absorbed into a Spartan expedition against Persia. Xenophon himself was exiled from Athens, but apparently lived out an otherwise prosperous, comfortable life, and wrote several other books, besides the Anabasis. As I remarked earlier, the ability of a small, disciplined, trained Greek army to slice through the Persian Empire was noted by Alexander the Great, who did that quite successfully 70 years later.

I’ve been reading Plato, who, despite the egg-headed reputation of being a philosopher, wrote in a Greek style no more difficult than Xenophon’s. I read Euthyphro, and am almost finished with the Apology.

For my friend Tom Roper, here is a snippet of Greek text, typed into Wordpress: ἄλλοι δε ἄρα αὐτὰς οἴσουσι ῥαδὶως

I didn’t try to get every accent right, but it demonstrates the concept.

Fundamentally, Maliki’s comment is evidence of what the Iraqi government sees as the primary impediment to their government attaining real legitimacy: Us. The American occupation is hugely unpopular, and if Iraq is to truly stabilize, its government needs to be seen as independent from the occupiers and opposed to their continued presence.

McCain needs to either come out with a new Iraq plan featuring a withdrawal component tomorrow, or explain why he believes America should fight for continued military dominance in Iraq over the objections of the American people, the Iraqi people, and the Iraqi government.

Why do I suspect the rightwingers will declare that this has been their position all along? …

On second thought, they won’t. They’ll come up some other mind-bending, through-the-looking-glass dodge that I can’t envision yet.

Ben Smith’s Blog: McCain breaks embargo on Obama’s schedule

Obama, you may have noticed, doesn’t have a public schedule today. The press generally respects campaigns’ and officials’ security concerns, when voiced.

So Josh Marshall is probably right to raise an eyebrow that John McCain — of all people — just said, at a fundraiser, that Obama would be in Iraq with other senators this weekend.

Ironically, McCain and the GOP have been demanding for months that Obama go to Iraq; his comment may have made the trip slightly more complicated.

His comment was reported by Reuters.

The right wing blogs and commenters would be in a frigging UPROAR. OMG, I can hear the howling and gnashing of teeth right now. In this case, though, I am 100% certain that Hot Air and LGF and Malkin and Hewitt and the gang won’t mention it, unless of course, they find some third-rate leftie blogger who claims it was deliberate. Then they will go into an orgy of victimization. Yeah, that sounds about right.

In any case, if McCain did not do it intentionally, might we infer that he was a little “confused,” perhaps slightly not on top of his game to do such a thing? Maybe it was just a tiny error in judgement, for, you know, a guy who has such meaningful foreign policy, defense, and security experience. That’s ‘knowing how to win wars,’ isn’t it, just shooting your mouth off about stuff that even the media knows to keep quiet about.

You can’t make this up… NBC’s John Yang reports President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki have agreed that a new agreement setting the parameters for US-Iraqi relations after the current UN mandate expires at the end of the year should include non-binding language–”a general time horizon” and not “an arbitrary date”–about the withdrawal of US troops.

“You can’t set an arbitrary date of 16 months. It’s unrealistic, terrorist-appeasing, threatens our national security, typical of Surrendercrats, … ” blah … blah .. blah.

“No, no, no. OUR plan is a general time horizon of 17 months. Totally different.”

$8.34 to be exact. I did.

h/t John Cole

Army Secretary Pete Geren said at a trade conference on July 10: “Just one man in a cave that’s hooked up to the Internet has been able to out-communicate the greatest communications society in the history of the world — the United States.”

“It’s a challenge not only at home, it’s a challenge in recruiting, it’s a challenge internationally, because effective communication brings people over to our side and ineffective communication allows the enemy to pull people to their side,” Geren continued. He said the Army brass needs to catch up — fast. But how exactly?

One solution: “Find a blog to be a part of,” Geren said.

Young people embrace social media “as a fluent second language,” he added. Army leaders have to do the same.

So, American military leaders should be tech-savvy. It’s important for them, says our Secretary of the Army. “Embracing social media” — That’s would be interesting concept to explain to a non-internet person wouldn’t it?

Military leaders … military leaders … hmmm … I’m just wondering how high up he means. Any higher than BG? I’m just wondering if this advice might also apply to some of our senior civilian leaders? Just a thought.

Especially the ones who are, all ’strong on national defense,” and “know how to win wars,” and stuff.

Does Team Obama have bad news they want to bury far into a weekend cycle?

In a word, No.

Hotline On Call: Obama’s Camp: $52M In June

In an email to supporters this morning, Obama mgr David Plouffe announced that the campaign raised a total of $52M in the month of June with an average donation of just $68. Combined, the Obama camp and the DNC have a total of nearly $72M CoH. Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported Obama’s campaign brought in around $30M in June, calling the number “underwhelming.”

Heh. Indeed. Is $52 million “underwhelming?”

Jim Geraghty at NRO speculated:

Let me offer a bit of speculation. If Obama had raised $100 million in June, we would have heard about it by now. If he had raised anywhere near that king’s ransom, we would have heard about it by now. In fact, you have to think that if his number was say, $44 million, doubling McCain’s collection for the month, we would have heard that, too.

Good insight, Jim.

Over to doubleplusundead:

So really Obama, where are those June fundraising numbers?

John McCain released his on July 10th, raising $22 million. The Obama campaign has yet to release theirs.

John Kerry made $30 million in June 2004. Is it possible that Obama’s figures are well below both of these figures?

The refusal to release the records, combined with this desperate plea for money make me think that is the case.

They goes on and on. A word of advice for the wingnuts: Don’t autopsy the golden goose … when it’s still alive.

$52 million for June. Not too shabby.

But today Sam Nunn filled in for him.

Maybe he wants to get on McCain’s veep list.