Obama scheduled to make Iraq speech in Clinton, Iowa
Quad-City Times | September 10, 2007
By Ed Tibbetts
Presidential hopeful Barack Obama plans to make a major policy speech on Iraq when he comes to Clinton, Iowa, Wednesday, a Democratic official who's familiar with the campaign's plans said Sunday.
The speech is planned for after Gen. David Patraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker give their much-anticipated progress report to Congress about the surge in Iraq.
Obama, a Democratic senator from Illinois, is planning a two-day trip to Clinton, Davenport, Maquoketa, Anamosa and Dubuque on Wednesday and Thursday.
The address on Iraq, the official said, will include new policy proposals on troop withdrawals, diplomacy in Iraq and the region and ideas about what to do about the humanitarian crisis in Iraq. He'll also talk about his ideas for U.S. leadership in the region after the war, the official said.
In January, Obama announced a plan to begin a troop withdrawal that was to have begun by last May. The goal was to have combat brigades out of the country by March 31, 2008.
Obama will be accompanied on this trip by Zbigniew Brezezinski, the national security adviser for Jimmy Carter. Brezezinski announced his support for Obama last month.
The speech will be given at Ashford University at the Durgin Educational Center, 400 N. Bluff Boulevard, at 1:30 p.m.
The doors open at 1 p.m.
Later Wednesday, Obama will hold a town hall meeting at the LeClaire Park bandshell in Davenport. The gates open at 5:30 p.m., with the program to start at 6:15 p.m.
On Thursday, he'll hold a town hall meeting at First Ward Park, between East Quarry and East Apple streets in Maquoketa, with the doors to open at 9:30 a.m. and the program to begin at 10 a.m.
He'll wrap up the day with visits to Anamosa and Dubuque.
This week's Iraq report, as well as being an important milepost in the four-year-old war, is also a key juncture in the 2008 presidential campaign. Candidates have been positioning themselves for the report and the ensuing congressional debate on whether to continue funding the war.
Obama voted against a funding bill in May, which did not have a timetable for troop withdrawal. Other Democratic presidential candidates U.S. Sens. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and Chris Dodd, D-Conn., also voted against it. U.S. Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., voted for the measure.
This will be a week for foreign policy talk in the Quad-City area. Madeleine Albright, the secretary of state for former President Clinton, will be in Davenport on Thursday to campaign for Clinton. Her campaign announced the trip last week.
Read the full article at the Quad-City Times.
