http://thinkprogress.org/2008/07/15/ohanlon-livid-over-obama-wanting-withdrawal-from-iraq/O’Hanlon ‘livid’ over Obama’s plan for withdrawal from Iraq.»
Yesterday, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) published an op-ed in the New York Times outlining his strategy to get out of Iraq. The Washington Post reports that Iraq war supporter Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institution was “livid” after reading Obama’s op-ed:
“To say you’re going to get out on a certain schedule — regardless of what the Iraqis do, regardless of what our enemies do, regardless of what is happening on the ground —
is the height of absurdity,” said O’Hanlon, who described himself as “livid.” “I’m not going to go to the next level of invective and say he shouldn’t be president. I’ll leave that to someone else.”
In 2004, however, O’Hanlon’s sentiments were strikingly similar to Obama’s. In an op-ed titled “Set a date to pull out,” O’Hanlon wrote that “our own enduring commitment to success in Iraq is beginning to work against us.” “Some will see this as cut-and-run,” he said. “It is not.”