How else is one to take the latest Iraqi government request regarding the US efforts in Iraq:

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, in an interview, asked for a long-term US military presence in Iraq, saying his country will need two permanent US air bases to deter “foreign interference.”

“I think we will be in need of American forces for a long time — even two military bases to prevent foreign interference,” Talabani told The Washington Post.

“I don’t ask to have 100,000 American soldiers — 10,000 soldiers and two air bases would be enough.”

The president indicated the bases would most welcome in Kurdistan, an autonomous region in northern Iraq that has practiced de facto self-government since the 1991 Gulf War.

But he suggested that the Sunni Arab segment of the Iraqi population would also welcome a long-term US military presence in Iraq.

“In some places Sunnis want the Americans to stay,” he argued. “Sunnis think the main danger is coming from Iran now.”

This is clearly a refudiation of every democrat talking point on Iraq over the last year. Iraqis are not asking America to leave or redeploy. They are asking for our help to keep their fledgling democracy afloat. The cut-and-run crowd has just been handed a huge foreign policy blow. We need Arab-Muslim support in our war against Al Qaeda and terrorism, and now we have a formal, public request from a country that used to be a sworn enemy of America to be an ally and help them out. Now when a liberal democrat cries “runaway” (in an echo of Monty Python’s Holy Grail) the country can respond “what about what the Iraqis want from us?”.

My guess is the left will say we need to run from the M and hide behind our shores because, in the end, they could care less about the suffering of others. So America now has a clear choice in November. And it is getting clearer by the day.