John McCain
Town Hall
Cleveland, OH 05/01/08
TRANSCRIPT:
REPORTER: "April was deadliest month in Iraq in seven months . . . at the same time there seems to have been very little political progress which was one of the aims of the surge . . . are you concerned that the surge is showing signs of weakness . . . ?"
JOHN MCCAIN: "Well, I of course, strongly disagree with your premise and assumption that political progress is not being made. The Sunnis just announced that they're coming back into the government. Everybody in the government just supported Prime Minister Mailiki . . . when they stated together that factions that take up arms against the government and fight against them will not be eligible to participate in the election. That, uh, the city of Basra is now under control of the Iraqi government. The port of Basra also is. There's a fierce fight going on in Mosul and we are succeeding and there is success there. There has been an enormous expenditure of American blood and treasure. I always said that there was going to be ups and downs. But to make a statement that there has not been political process does not concord with the facts on the ground as I know them. And frankly, those facts are very clear that political progress is being very significant, maybe you or others don't think so. I respectfully disagree with that assumption. And I think that most objective observers believe that there's been significant political progress; in fact Mailiki is much stronger than he was before. Now, the events of the last month have been tragic . . . I knew sooner or later that Sadr would have to be taken care of, one way or the other . . . all of us are deeply saddened but the spike up in sacrifice. . . I believed that there always would be those difficulties but I am pleased with the overall progress of the political, military and other aspects that have happened since the surge was deployed. And the facts on the ground continue to affirm that . . . "
LABEL: JM OH 5-1 (EW#5) DAGH -- Clip R
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