how we think we are best going to advantage ourselves to keep control that s why i favored keeping musharraf in power. i thought he was more likely to purge the isi of the radical islamists than anyone else. greta: we ve been over to pakistan twice. you see all this handshaking, all this agreement, everyone is all friends and wonderful. we re going to work together. then you come home and read these horrible things that are going on, whether the rich siphonning off the money from the poor or we are giving 500 million dollars to a country last week that is supplying our enemy. we are not there because we like these people particularly. because we think they are paragons of democracy or anything else. we are there because there s an american strategic interest. is it enough to make you tear your hair out and worry about how much money we are wasting? absolutely is it enough to say we are sick of these people not going to get involved?
the specific outcome or to the. jamie: it seems that it is important that this election take place without the u.s. involvement of maybe the first election. that not necessarily a total hands-off approach, because we still have troops there. but, as we look forward to pulling out more of our troops, bringing our boys and girls home, how important is it to keep some military presence there? of the u.s.? particularly, because of iran? well, i think it is very important. i think the level and the disposition of american forces in iraq, obviously, have to be with the consent of the government. but, from our point of view, they ought to be based on american strategic interest. if we think that our interests are satisfied with lower force levels, by all means, let s go down to those levels but if we think, for example, that iran has increased its support for terrorism, or that al qaeda in iraq is making a come back, i think we need to adjust our plans accordingly. i don t think we should