NPR's Kelemen reported McCain's response to Maliki's call for withdrawal timetable, but not McCain's 2004 assertion that "it's obvious" the U.S. "would have to leave" if Iraq requested it

SUMMARY: NPR's Michele Kelemen reported that Sen. John McCain "suggested in an interview with MSNBC that the Iraqi calls for a troop withdrawal date may be driven by politics in Baghdad," and quoted McCain as saying, "The Iraqis have made it very clear, including the meetings I had with the president and foreign minister of Iraq, that it's based on conditions on the ground. [...] I've always said we will come home with honor and with victory and not through a set timetable." But Kelemen did not note that in 2004, when asked what the United States would do if the "Iraqi government asks us to leave," McCain responded, "I think it's obvious that we would have to leave."

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