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| Iraq |
| Bush Plan to Set Series of Goals for Iraq Leaders |
| 2007-01-08 |
| WASHINGTON, Jan. 7 — President Bush’s new Iraq policy will establish a series of goals that the Iraqi government will be expected to meet to try to ease sectarian tensions and stabilize the country politically and economically, senior administration officials said Sunday. Among these “benchmarks” are steps that would draw more Sunnis into the political process, finalize a long-delayed measure on the distribution of oil revenue and ease the government’s policy toward former Baath Party members, the officials said. Without saying what the specific penalties for failing to achieve the goals would be, American officials insisted that they intended to hold the Iraqis to a realistic timetable for action, but the Americans and Iraqis have agreed on many of the objectives before, only to fall considerably short. Mr. Bush is expected to refer to the benchmarks in a much-anticipated speech this week outlining his new Iraq strategy, including plans to send as many as 20,000 additional troops. Administration officials plan to make the benchmarks public sometime after the address. |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #3 Giving Maliki and his band of clowns benchmarks and goals is like telling your new puppy not to crap on your new carpet. |
| Posted by: SpecOp35 2007-01-08 11:11 |
| #2 Mr. Bush is expected to refer to the benchmarks in a much-anticipated speech this week outlining his new Iraq strategy be kool if Rantburgers were in the decision making loop and could speak to Congress. |
| Posted by: RD 2007-01-08 03:32 |
| #1 Is there a rolled-up newspaper involved? |
| Posted by: mojo 2007-01-08 02:22 |