[tomder55]

According to Amir Taheri he did when he visited Iraq in July.

WHILE campaigning in public for a speedy withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama has tried in private to persuade Iraqi leaders to delay an agreement on a draw-down of the American military presence.
According to Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, Obama made his demand for delay a key theme of his discussions with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad in July.
"He asked why we were not prepared to delay an agreement until after the US elections and the formation of a new administration in Washington," Zebari said in an interview.
Obama insisted that Congress should be involved in negotiations on the status of US troops - and that it was in the interests of both sides not to have an agreement negotiated by the Bush administration in its "state of weakness and political confusion."

OBAMA TRIED TO STALL GIS' IRAQ WITHDRAWAL - New York Post
He claims Hoshyar Zebari told him on the record that Obama tried to convince the Iraqis to end the negotiations and instead asked them, to request an extension to the UN mandate.

Perhaps Obama has never heard of the Logan Act.

Anyway according to the article ,the move Obama attempted would've had the affect of further delaying troops withdrawals.

[excon]

Hello tom:

Wow. Amir and Hoshyar. Two well known bastions of truth writing in your average fair and balanced RIGHT WING RAG.

Of course you believe them. You believed Achmed Chalabi, didn't you?

Bwa, ha ha ha.

excon

[tomder55]

Assuming what was said is true . Did Obama viotate the Logan Act ?

McCain should make issue of this and force Obama to deny it.

If you want confirmation that this was most likely on Obama's agenda perhaps the NY Slimes is your source :

One day after Senator John McCain met with Iraq's foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, Mr. Obama spoke to Mr. Zebari by telephone. Mr. Obama said he was ''encouraged'' by reductions in violence in Iraq, but added that the United States should withdraw troops at a pace of one to two brigades a month, with a goal of removing most combat troops in 16 months.

''We have no interest in permanent bases in Iraq,'' Mr. Obama said.
Among the issues being discussed between Mr. Zebari and the presidential candidates is a long-term security accord between Iraq and the United States. While the Bush administration would like to see an agreement reached by midsummer, Mr. Obama said he opposed such a swift timetable.
''My concern is that the Bush administration, in a weakened state politically, ends up trying to rush an agreement that in some ways might be binding to the next administration,'' Mr. Obama said, ''whether it's my administration or Senator McCain's administration.''

TRAVEL PLANS; War Zones on the Itinerary - New York Times

So here we have Obama saying in June that his personal preference would be for the Iraqis to delay the negotiations . Evidently he went to Baghdad and conducted his own diplomacy.

[speechlesstx]

Tom, it seems in their response to Taheri's claim, the Obama campaign confirmed it:

Obama's national security spokeswoman Wendy Morigi said Taheri's article bore "as much resemblance to the truth as a McCain campaign commercial."

In fact, Obama had told the Iraqis that they should not rush through a "Strategic Framework Agreement" governing the future of US forces until after President George W. Bush leaves office, she said.

Isn't that what Taheri said?

[excon]

Hello again,

Shame on Obama. I don't know what the Logan Act is, but he probably violated it. That's OK, Bush violates the Constitution all the time.

excon

[tomder55]

Supporters of a quicker U.S. withdrawal must be sickened by BO's duplicitous conduct .

[speechlesstx]

Seems Dems are making a habit out of undermining things in Iraq...

No Oil for Blood
Thanks to three American senators, China will be pumping Iraqi oil.
By Frederick W. Kagan
09/16/2008 3:15:00 PM


This morning, I had the honor of testifying before the House Budget Committee on the situation in Iraq. The discussion was polite and civilized, and was a reminder that even now it is possible for people who disagree about what to do in Iraq to argue without raised voices and disagreeable language (apart from the Code Pink women, yelling for those who think that shouting opponents down is preferable to arguing with them). Congressman Brian Baird once again demonstrated that it is possible even for those who bitterly opposed the war to recognize the importance of doing the right thing now--as well as the possibility of crossing the Republican-Democrat sectarian divide on this issue. One question came up repeatedly in the hearing that deserves more of an answer than it got, however: Why, after all the assistance we've given to Iraq over the past five years, was the first major Iraqi oil deal signed with China and not with an American or even a western company? The answer is, in part, because three Democratic senators intervened in Iraqi domestic politics earlier this year to prevent Iraq from signing short-term agreements with Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total, Chevron, and BP.

The Iraqi government was poised to sign no-bid contracts with those firms this summer to help make immediate and needed improvements in Iraq's oil infrastructure. The result would have been significant foreign investment in Iraq, an expansion of Iraqi government revenues, and an increase in the global supply of oil. One would have thought that leading Democratic senators who claim to be interested in finding other sources of funding to replace American dollars in Iraq, in helping Iraq spend its own money on its own people, and in lowering the price of gasoline for American citizens, would have been all for it. Instead, Senators Chuck Schumer, John Kerry, and Claire McCaskill wrote a letter to Secretary of State Rice asking her "to persuade the GOI [Government of Iraq] to refrain from signing contracts with multinational oil companies until a hydrocarbon law is in effect in Iraq." The Bush administration wisely refused to do so, but the resulting media hooraw in Iraq led to the cancellation of the contracts, and helps to explain why Iraq is doing oil deals instead with China.

Senators Schumer, McCaskill, and Kerry claimed to be acting from the purest of motives: "It is our fear that this action by the Iraqi government could further deepen political tensions in Iraq and put our service members in even great danger." For that reason, presumably, Schumer went so far as to ask the senior vice president of Exxon "if his company would agree to wait until the GOI produced a fair, equitable, and transparent hydrocarbon revenue sharing law before it signed any long-term agreement with the GOI." Exxon naturally refused, but Schumer managed to get the deal killed anyway. But the ostensible premise of the senators' objections was false--Iraq may not have a hydrocarbons law, but the central government has been sharing oil revenues equitably and there is no reason at all to imagine that signing the deals would have generated increased violence (and this was certainly not the view of American civilian and military officials on the ground in Iraq at the time). It is certain that killing the deals has delayed the maturation of Iraq's oil industry without producing the desired hydrocarbons legislation.

Nor is it entirely clear what the senators' motivations were. Their release (available along with their letter to Secretary Rice at the New York Observer quoted Senator McCaskill as follows: "'It's bad enough that we have no-bid contracts being awarded for work in Iraq. It's bad enough that the big oil companies continue to receive government handouts while they post record breaking profits. But now the most profitable companies in the universe--America's biggest oil companies--stand to reap the rewards of this no-bid contract on top of it all,' McCaskill said. 'It doesn't take a rocket scientist to connect these dots--big oil is running Washington and now they're running Baghdad. There is no reason under the sun not to halt these agreements until we get revenue sharing in place,' McCaskill said." So was this about what's best for Iraq and American interests there or about nailing "big oil" in an election year?

Either way, like Barack Obama's asking the Iraqi foreign minister to hold off on a strategic framework agreement until after the American election, it was nothing but harmful to American interests and our prospects in Iraq.

[tomder55]

I can't stand Chuck the schm*ck Schumer. I'll do everything in my power to support whoever opposes him either party . Please NY Democrats... run someone solid against him in the primaries . Start running now... please!! WE got to endure this national embarrassment until 2010... AAAARGGHHHHH!!

Jean Kerry ;no more words need to be said against that idiot. McCaskill ;I don't know much about this back bencher but she must be a winner.

Let them say they want to help the American worker I dare them. Especially Kerry who is running for reelection this year. Jeff Beatty is his opponent . I encourage him to make this a major campaign issue. Kerry has been in the Senate for 24 years and has done nothing to help the American consumer or to make American energy independent . Instead he throws monkey wrenches at anything that would help the nation.

The utter idiocy of their rational for blocking it ;that a revenue sharing plan had not been agreed to amongst the Iraqi regions is absurd. It is none of their damn business how Iraqis divvy up their oil revenues. Obviously it did not concern the Iraqis enough to prevent them from signing agreements with China. A$$h*les! For political reasons they tried to delay success in Iraq just like BO did by trying to stall the security agreement negotiations. In my view they are as guilty as BO of undermining US negotiations . None dare call it treason.

[speechlesstx]

It is none of their damn business how Iraqis divvy up their oil revenues.

So much for non-interference in Iraq’s internal affairs.

[tomder55]

It's bad enough that Schumer opens his blow hole and causes runs on American banks. It is said that the most dangerous place to be in America is between Schumer and a news camera. He demogogues the price of gas in this country using a gas station sign as his back drop every time there is a nickel increase. In fact he demogogues any issue he is involved in!!

April he accused the Iraqis of using US tax money to hire lobbyists to try to influence US lawmakers . He had no proof of this charge. But that did not stop him from spreading the lie ;and for the NY Slimes from reporting it.

Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, is considering pushing the debate into yet another arena next week, an aide said, perhaps by asking the State Department to determine if Iraq is using American tax dollars to hire lawyers and lobbyists to influence Congress and the administration.
Mr. Schumer does not know if that was the case, the aide said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the senator had not yet finalized his plans. But he said Mr. Schumer believed that it was inappropriate for Iraq to try to influence policy while American soldiers were in Iraq.
Since 2003, $22 million has been spent by political and government entities in Iraq on lawyers, lobbyists and other consultants who represent them in the United States, according to Justice Department records.
The Iraqi government has been the biggest spender: $15.6 million through late last year, with the Kurdistan Regional Government spending $6 million.
Mr. Schumer's concerns mostly relate to two firms hired by the Iraqi government that helped defeat a proposal in Congress that would have allowed Americans to seize Iraqi assets to settle certain outstanding legal claims.
Samir Sumaidaie, Iraq's ambassador in Washington, rejected Mr. Schumer's criticism, saying that United States aid has never been used to pay its lobbying and law firms here.
“I can say categorically, that no such thing has happened,” he said Friday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/19/wo...ong.html?fta=y

Meanwhile he puts whatever pressure he can bear to get the Saudis to pump more oil!!
He went so far as to threaten to block arms sales to Saudi Arabia if it didn't produce more oil. He is a despicable creature. In a legislative body the wallows in the muck for a living ,he is a bottom feeder in the pond scum of the swamp.

This idiot complained that Iraq was about oil . Then complained that the war was not paying for itself as some in the administration claimed it would . Every time they wanted to discredit the war they would say that Iraq was not up to pre-war oil production. Then every time General P. testified Chucky would flap his gums complaining that the Iraqis are not paying enough. And now that they are finally in a position to increase their output ,he screws up any chance of the US getting any benefit from it . Will he now continue to insist the Iraqis pay for the war ? Perhaps then they will pay for it in Yen .

Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total, and BP have all been working in Iraq during the most dangerous times of the last 4 years advising the Iraqis on how to proceed in the development . They have been doing it for free. If any company deserved to get a contractual advantage they did.

But you listen to the Democrat meme about "BIG OIL" and you would swear that these companies are evil encarnate. It doesn't surprise me at all that Schumer would rather have the most dangerous jackboots of the world like Hugo Chavez and the Mahdi hatter benefit from oil revenus at the same time he hauls American oil company exec to capitol hill to abuse them . It's just what Democrats do.

[speechlesstx]

You mean pay for it in yuan since China is the beneficiary? What's all this we've been hearing about the Chinese holding our debt and shipping our jobs going to China? You mean that was all talk, the Dems would rather China benefit from investment in Iraq than the US? They'd rather reward the Chicoms than reward American companies that provide American jobs that have risked so much or horror of horrors, do something that might ease the energy crisis on the home front? Yeah, that's them.

[tomder55]

New chant for the DEMS : NO OIL FOR BLOOD !

[ETWolverine]

Tom,

Regarding the Logan act... yeah, it was probably a violation for Obama to try to influence Iraqi policy or try to negotiate on behalf of the USA when he has no authority to do so. But my understanding is that the Logan act is so broad that it would be impossible to prove a case of violation of the Logan act in a court of law.

The Logan Act reads as follows:

Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply himself, or his agent, to any foreign government, or the agents thereof, for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects.

So... in order to prove that Obama is guilty of said offense, we would have to prove that 1) the conversation actually took place, 2) what was actually said in the conversation, 3) that Obama was speaking on behalf of the USA, 4) that he wasn't just speaking 'hypothetically', and 5) that he was trying to influence Iraqi of US policy outside of his official standing in the government. While I happen to believe that he did violate the Logan Act, it would be damn near impossible to prove it in court.

I agree, it's sleazy and underhanded and dishonest and everything I have come to expect from the Obama campaign. But it can't be prosecuted because it can't be proven.

[tomder55]

Yeah that's why he and Damascus Nan gets away with it.

McCain's spokesman said :
At this point, it is not yet clear what official American negotiations Senator Obama tried to undermine with Iraqi leaders, but the possibility of such actions is unprecedented. It should be concerning to all that he reportedly urged that the democratically-elected Iraqi government listen to him rather than the US administration in power. If news reports are accurate, this is an egregious act of political interference by a presidential candidate seeking political advantage overseas. Senator Obama needs to reveal what he said to Iraq's Foreign Minister during their closed door meeting. The charge that he sought to delay the withdrawal of Americans from Iraq raises serious questions about Senator Obama's judgment and it demands an explanation.