[Peace-discuss] Iraqi reporter throws shoe at Bush!

[Chris Tuck]

BAGHDAD – On an Iraq trip shrouded in secrecy and marred by dissent, President
George W. Bush on Sunday hailed progress in the war that defines his
presidency and got a size-10 reminder of his unpopularity when a man hurled
two shoes at him<http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/ynews;_ylt=AvbVcgYRoPUYJto5xFoeMC8Gw_IE?ch=4226716&cl=11096193&lang=en>during
a news conference.

"This is a farewell kiss, you dog!" shouted the protester in Arabic, later
identified as Muntadar al-Zeidi, a correspondent for Al-Baghdadia
television, an Iraqi-owned station based in Cairo, Egypt.

Bush ducked both shoes as they whizzed past his head and landed with a thud
against the wall behind him.

"It was a size 10," Bush joked later.

The U.S. president visited the Iraqi capital just 37 days before he hands
the war off to his successor, Barack Obama, who has pledged to end it. The
president wanted to highlight a drop in violence in a nation still riven by
ethnic strife and to celebrate a recent U.S.-Iraq security agreement, which
calls for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq by the end of 2011.

"The war is not over," Bush said, adding that "it is decisively on it's way
to being won."

In many ways, the unannounced trip was a victory lap without a clear
victory. Nearly 150,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq fighting a war that is
intensely disliked across the globe. More than 4,209 members of the U.S.
military have died in the conflict, which has cost U.S. taxpayers $576
billion since it began five years and nine months ago.

Polls show most Americans believe the U.S. erred in invading Iraq in 2003.
Bush ordered the nation into war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq while citing
intelligence claiming the Mideast nation harbored weapons of mass
destruction. The weapons were never found, the intelligence was discredited,
Bush's credibility with U.S. voters plummeted and Saddam was captured and
executed.

"There is still more work to be done," Bush said after his meeting with Iraqi
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

It was at that point the journalist stood up and threw a shoe from about 20
feet away. Bush ducked, and it narrowly missed his head. The second shoe
came quickly, and Bush ducked again while several Iraqis grabbed the man and
dragged him to the floor.

In Iraqi culture, throwing shoes at someone is a sign of contempt. Iraqis
whacked a statue of Saddam with their shoes after U.S. marines toppled it to
the ground following the 2003 invasion.

White House press secretary Dana Perino suffered an eye injury in the news
conference melee. Bush brushed off the incident, comparing it to political
protests at home.

"So what if I guy threw his shoe at me?" he said.

Al-Maliki, who spoke before the incident, praised postwar progress: "Today,
Iraq is moving forward in every field."

After the news conference, the president took a 15-minute helicopter ride
through dark skies over Baghdad to Camp Victory. Telling hundreds of troops
he was "heading into retirement," Bush blamed Saddam for the 2003 invasion
and said, "America is safer and more secure" than it was before the war.

For Bush, the war is the issue around which both he and the country defined
his two terms in office. He saw the invasion and continuing fight as a
necessary action to protect Americans and fight terrorism. Though his
decision won support at first, the public now has largely decided that the
U.S. needs to get out of Iraq.

Air Force One, the president's distinctive powder blue-and-white jetliner,
landed at Baghdad International Airport in the afternoon local time after a
secretive Saturday night departure from Washington. In a sign of security
gains in this war zone, Bush received a formal arrival ceremony — a flourish
absent in his three earlier trips.

Bush soon began a rapid-fire series of meetings with top Iraqi leaders.

He met first with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and the country's two vice
presidents, Tariq al-Hashemi and Adel Abdul-Mahdi, at the ornate,
marble-floored Salam Palace along the shores of the Tigris River.

Later, Bush's motorcade pulled out the heavily fortified Green Zone and
crossed over the Tigris so he could meet al-Maliki at the prime minister's
palace. A huge orange moon hung low over the horizon as Bush's was ferried
quickly through the city.

The two leaders signed ceremonial copy of the security agreement.

The Bush administration and even White House critics credit last year's
military buildup with the security gains in Iraq. Last month, attacks fell
to the lowest monthly level since the war began in 2003.

Still, it's unclear what will happen when the U.S. troops leave. While
violence has slowed in Iraq, attacks continue, especially in the north. At
least 55 people were killed Thursday in a suicide bombing in a restaurant
near Kirkuk.

It was Bush's last trip to the war zone before Obama takes office Jan. 20.
Obama won an election largely viewed as a referendum on Bush, who has
endured low approval ratings because of the war and more recently, the U.S.
recession.

Obama, a Democrat, has promised he will bring all U.S. combat troops back
home from Iraq a little over a year into his term, as long as commanders
agree a withdrawal would not endanger American personnel or Iraq's security.
Obama has said the drawdown in Iraq would allow him to shift troops and
bolster the U.S. presence in Afghanistan.

The new U.S.-Iraqi security pact, calls for all American troops to be
withdrawn by the end of 2011, in two stages. The first stage begins next
year, when U.S. troops pull back from Baghdad and other Iraqi cities by the
end of June. Gen. Raymond Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said
Saturday that even after that summer deadline, some U.S. troops will remain
in Iraqi cities.

Journalists and staff who made the 10 1/2-hour trip to Iraq with the
president agreed to tell almost no one about the plans, and the White House
released false schedules detailing activities planned for Bush in Washington
on Sunday.


-- 
Chris Tuck
"People should not be afraid of their governments,
Governments should be afraid of their people."
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