Steps towards peace?

Was the recent Cairo meeting of Iraqi political groups the first solid steps towards peace? Gareth Porter says maybe. At least, it's a positive first step.

In a related development, Jim Lobe reports on the recent overtures made by the Americans for Iranian help to quell the situation in Iraq. As Lobe puts it,

Washington's growing reliance on and support for regional diplomacy marks a serious setback to neoconservatives who, long before the Iraq war, had championed the unilateral imposition of a Pax Americana in the Middle East that would put an end to what in their view constituted the chief threats to Israel's security – Arab nationalism and Iranian theocracy.

Now, two and a half years after invading Iraq to put that peace into place, the administration finds itself seeking the support of both forces, just as the realists had warned.

Ironic? Perhaps. But sounds more like desperate pragmatism to me.