Obama purges site of surge criticism

Better late than never, I suppose.  Barack Obama has purged his website of criticism of the surge, and has now credited American troops with the security gains of the last year.  The move comes as John McCain repeatedly points out that Obama opposed the surge in January 2007 and said it would make the situation worse:

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The presumed Democratic nominee replaced his Iraq issue Web page, which had described the surge as a “problem” that had barely reduced violence.

“The surge is not working,” Obama’s old plan stated, citing a lack of Iraqi political cooperation but crediting Sunni sheiks – not U.S. military muscle – for quelling violence in Anbar Province.

The News reported Sunday that insurgent attacks have fallen to the fewest since March 2004.

Obama’s campaign posted a new Iraq plan Sunday night, which cites an “improved security situation” paid for with the blood of U.S. troops since the surge began in February 2007. It praises G.I.s’ “hard work, improved counterinsurgency tactics and enormous sacrifice.”

The scrubbing took place this weekend, and it may signal more changes — or it may just be a way to prep for his upcoming trip to Iraq. If Obama appeared before the troops who defeated the terrorists in western Iraq, he may not get the reception he wants if his website kept discounting their hard work in the face of a despicable enemy. While the Sunni sheikhs have been a critical part of the success in Iraq, it was American tenacity which convinced them to switch sides.

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The campaign says they regularly update the site to “reflect changes in current events”.  However, the Obama campaign has yet to acknowledge that the changes came from a strategy he opposed and that he predicted would fail.  Even more remarkably, he hasn’t changed his policy to incorporate the “changes in current events”.  Instead, he just retooled his demand for timetabled withdrawals with a sop to the troops.

What changes will we see on the Obama site when he returns from Iraq?  And will we have to compare caches in order to discover them, as the Daily News apparently did?

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