Back on topic??
Here's the money graf, I think, in the WaPo article:
The administration has pushed ahead with high-level diplomatic negotiations with Iran and North Korea, agreed to a "time horizon" for a reduction of U.S. forces in Iraq and announced plans last week to shift troops and other resources from Iraq to Afghanistan. U.S. officials also confirmed last week that Bush has formally authorized cross-border raids into Pakistan without that government's approval -- an idea that Obama first endorsed, and was heavily criticized for, last year.
a) WRT Iran and North Korea: The Bush administration had been engaged in multilateral diplomacy with the Norks before Obama even became a Senator. Obama's stance with Iran was meeting without preconditions, not high level contacts. But the fact is, the Bush administration has, as had the Clinton administration and Bush41 and Reagan, been engaged with the Iranians before Obama even became Senator. And the Bush administration sought multilateral diplomacy via Britain, France, and Germany...the same multilateral strategy that the Democrats claim Bush abhors and had abandoned as a matter of principle.
Obama gets no points here as Bush was well on his way to such diplomatic actions before Obama became a Senator.
b) The Bush adminstration always had a horizon for withdrawing troops and it was based on conditions on the ground. Obama proposed and argued for an arbitrary timeline for withdrawal regardles of conditions on the ground (and he has abandoned that, too, with his comments about revising the withdrawal schedule he made this summer). Those conditions on the ground have been changing for most of the year and as of mid-summer represented an appropriate time to begin drawing down forces.
Obama gets no points here as Bush had always maintained a policy of troop withdrawal based on changing conditions on the ground. The changes are obviously changing.
c) Shifting resources to Afghanistan. Obama deserves some credit here for arguing for mroe troops in Afghanistan. However, that shift in resources was coming from an arbitrary withdrawal of troops from Iraq as no additional troop resources were available except if they came from Iraq.
d) Obama's criticism of Bush has included painting Bush as a unilateralist cowboy. Yet, Obama's comments about sending US troops into Afghanistan represent precisely that attitude. But, despite the hypocrisy, he deserves some credit. It was a bold suggestion that warranted serious consideration. Bush recently authorized cross-border strikes and pursuit and that fits with Obama's argument regarding Pakistan.
Result: Push. No credit on 2, partial credit on 2.
No, Bush's foreign policy ain't resembling Obama's foreign policy.
