dKos alum Steve Soto
says it all:
But while the media slavishly covers [Bush's brief Baghdad trip] for maximum White House benefit, they conveniently forget that Clinton visited another war zone on Thanksgiving only four years ago, and he was able to travel into a war zone only five months after the US-arranged coalition secured the liberation of Kosovo. My how quickly they forget. The big difference was that Clinton was warmly received by a large contingent of troops in Kosovo, but more importantly was also warmly received by the natives prior to the event, who thanked him for their liberation.
Bush was unable to visit with the locals today, for obvious security reasons, and instead had to settle for a staged event in front of 600 troops that gave (from the look of the NBC video) a relatively subdued response.
I would be a lot more impressed if Bush spent the night in Iraq. Perhaps visited one of those famous schools that have allegedly opened since the war. But fact is that Iraq is nowhere near as calm and safe as the administration would have us believe. The country really is a mess, thanks to the US invasion and inept occupation.
And letting the president spend more than a few hyper-secret hours in Iraq would've been the height of folly.
Too bad some of those 600 soldiers couldn't come home with Bush. Given the chance, I bet most of them would've leapt at the chance. Instead, they get to stay behind and take incoming on behalf of the president's reelection bid.