With Friends Like These ...

who needs enemies?

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, orchestrated into power by the Bush Administration, responded this way about his erstwhile patron and Bush's mild rebuke:

Al-Maliki, on a trip to Syria, reacted harshly when asked about the earlier comments from U.S. officials.

"No one has the right to place timetables on the Iraq government. It was elected by its people," he said at a news conference in Damascus at the end of the three-day visit to Syria.

"Those who make such statements are bothered by our visit to Syria. We will pay no attention. We care for our people and our constitution and can find friends elsewhere," al-Maliki said.

Now, Bush is planning to backtrack on his comments because he is afraid to hurt al-Maliki's feelings. The sad thing is that Bush has painted himself into this corner and has given al-Maliki the upper hand in the relationship. Bush needs the Iraqi government to succeed, even if it is an ineffective and counterproductive one, because he has so much invested in having Iraq seem less like the basket case that it is.

In the past, such testy and whiny comments by proxy surrogates would be met with an even sterner rebuke and a harsher dose of truth-talk, rather than a meely-mouth cave-in.

Bush is reaping what he has sown.