Bush Opposes Iraq's Premier, Shiites Report.

Source: NY Times

I guess the Iraqi prime minister did a "Bush Administration no-no": he spoke up, and he thought for himself. How dare he? (ha ha)

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 28 -- The American ambassador has told Shiite officials that President Bush does not want the Iraqi prime minister to remain the country's leader in the next government, senior Shiite politicians said Tuesday.

It is the first time the Americans have directly expressed a preference in the furious debate over the country's top job, the politicians said, and it is inflaming tensions between the Americans and some Shiite leaders.

The ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, told the head of the main Shiite political bloc at a meeting on Saturday to pass on a "personal message from President Bush" to the interim prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, said Redha Jowad Taki, a Shiite member of Parliament who was at the meeting.

And to support the fact that the government in Iraq is an U.S.-controlled puppet government with no power or say in how things are run:

Mr. Khalilzad said Mr. Bush "doesn't want, doesn't support, doesn't accept" Mr. Jaafari as the next prime minister, according to Mr. Taki, a senior aide to Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, the head of the Shiite bloc. It was the first "clear and direct message" from the Americans on a specific candidate for prime minister, Mr. Taki said.

The Shiite bloc nominated Mr. Jaafari last month to retain his post for four more years. Uh, the same guy...voted in by the Parliament, voted in by the people. What's wrong with this picture?

I guess it was only a matter of time before what he does back here in the States resonates in Iraq. In a supposedly "free" (yeah, right) Iraq, Bush doesn't listen to the will of the people there either. The Neo-cons in the Bush Administration have different definitions of a "free Iraq" and "democracy" than the rest of us.

Tags: [Iraqi prime minister], [Ibrahim al-Jaafari], [Bush "doesn't want, doesn't support, doesn't accept" Mr. Jaafari as the next prime minister], [Bush], [Bush doesn't like people who think for themselves or speak their mind], [who does Bush think he is...the next dictator of Iraq?]