The last time an American president showed up in Iraq he was greeted with boos and shoes. That, as they say, was then.
On Tuesday, Iraqis expressed warmth for a visiting Barack Obama. And in another sign the country is eager to cast aside the legacy of the former administration, a court reduced the jail term for the journalist who hurled his shoes at George W. Bush. ...
Obama isn't Bush, and for many Iraqis that's good enough for now.
"The Iraqi people welcome the new American president in good faith, not like the former President Bush, who is rejected by all Iraqi people from the north to the south," Baghdad resident Rasheed al-Jumaili said.
Few Iraqis caught a glimpse of the president, and government television aired his appearance with Iraq's prime minister only after Air Force One took off for Washington.
Still, many Iraqis find Obama's style, including his openness to the Muslim world, a refreshing change from the previous administration, even though the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue.
"We expect positive relations with the Americans," said Alia Kamil, a senior at the University of Baghdad. "We will see positive developments in Iraqi-American relations because it sounds like Obama's ideas for Iraq will be good." "
Well, good ideas other than the one he had about abandoning the Iraqis to al Qaeda and Iranian-sponsored Sadrist death squads during the height of the war.
Who knew that when we liberated the Iraqi people from Saddam's reign of terror that we'd find out that the Iraqis are really French?
Still, there is hope for them yet:
Privately, a number of Iraqi leaders feel gratitude toward Bush for ousting Saddam Hussein, even if they don't express those feelings in public because of widespread outrage over the turmoil and bloodshed that followed the March 2003 invasion.
I'm not sure you could get many French leaders to privately admit to anything like that. Luckily, President Bush did what was both just and in our national interests, and won't be bothered by the unfairness of the situation. If he'd wanted fairness he could have gone into community organizing, or something.
Why focus your anger on al Qaeda, the Baathists, and Iranians who actually did the killing, when you can just blame the American President who fought for you and accepted such blame as the price of being our president during a time of war?
