Bush, Schroeder mend fences

[Nottingham]

http://feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/redir.php?jid=efc3cd2f75018a38

Bush, Schroeder mend fences

(CNN) -- President Bush and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said Wednesday that they had agreed to work together in Iraq with Germany offering to contribute economic and technical aid to the reconstruction effort.

The two leaders met for the first time in 16 months, after relations between the two countries were strained by Schroeder's outspoken criticism of U.S. policy towards Iraq in the months leading up to the invasion.

"Only the United Nations can guarantee the necessary degree of legitimacy and enabling the people of Iraq to speedily rebuild their country under an independent representative government," Schroeder told the U.N. General Assembly. "My country, Germany, stands ready to support such a process."

Bush and Schroeder met Wednesday morning at U.N. headquarters.
"We've had differences and they're over, and we're going to work together." Bush told reporters after the meeting. "I appreciate his efforts to help Iraq grow to be a peaceful and stable and democratic country." (Full story)

Schroeder said Germany and the rest of Europe had a vested interest in a secure and stable Iraq, and said Germany was willing to help train Iraqi military and police forces.

more...http://feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/redir.php?jid=efc3cd2f75018a38

I think Bush is desperate to mend his Bad PR with the UN and looks to Schroeder!

[Dr Fate]

1. Is Schroeder helping us with the $87 billlion and troops?

Okay- no troops- how much cash?

[Nottingham]

2. Hey Bush is Desperate! He just wants a Handshake for TV

Bush knows Americans are tired of this America does it alone junk!
:bounce:

His Foreign Diplomacy stinks!

[lebkuchen]

5. Germany is protecting US bases in Germany

W/o the Germans doing that, the US would be screwed.

Schroeder isn't particularly popular in Germany except for his strong stand against Bush's quagmire. He's raised taxes when he said he wouldn't, but Germany needed the funds for flood repair (a country w/a budgetary conscious). So, I doubt that much, if any, money will be going to Iraq without a UN resolution.

Bush has been planning to close US bases in Germany and move the troops to Bulgaria, Romania and Poland (coalition countries) unaccompanied. Halliburton/Carlyle et al would reap big bucks that the US doesn't have to spend, building bases on land that the US govt. is currently buying up. God only knows what environmental cleanup awaits us, post Soviet era occupation, another mess that the US cannot afford.

Maybe Bush got out his calculator and decided we needed those German bases, which are largely subsidized by Germany, the land owned by the US, after all. Not to mention, unit rotation/unaccompanied tours is extremely expensive and will be a disaster for morale that is already at its lowest depths.

[Cha]

3. I hope he knows what he's doing ...going in with the highway

marauders.

[Laughing Mirror]

4. well now that Saddam has been ousted

it's George Bush the members of the board are going to oust

so they're giving him the polite smiles members of the board give members who are on their way out

they want somebody in there they can work with
and they just can't work with that joker
they're just trying to be nice until they see him voted out
they are taking the diplomatic approach