Al-Maliki orders Bush to let up on Shiite militias. Bush does so.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki says, "jump." Bush asks, "how high?"

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Tuesday ordered the lifting of joint U.S.-Iraqi military checkpoints around the Shiite militant stronghold of Sadr City and other parts of Baghdad -- another apparent move to assert his authority with the Americans and appeal to his Shiite support base.

U.S. forces disappeared from the checkpoints within hours of the order, setting off celebrations among civilians and armed men on the edge of the sprawling slum controlled by the Mahdi Army militia run by radical anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Now, if a Democratic president ever knuckled under to an order like this from a foreign leader, Republicans would storm the White House, drag him and his family out onto the front lawn, and hang them from the nearest tree

I'll be curious to see how Bush followers react to their Great Leader's capitulation to instructions to leave unmolested someone Bush himself has described as a terrorist.

And, how will the administration spin the fact that this terrorist enjoys such favor with al-Maliki that he is under the Iraqi president's personal protection.

I can smell the cognitive dissonance from here. Smells like burning hair.