Bush lies. (I know, I know)

After speaking with Prime Minister Maliki today, Bush said, "We appreciate the fact that he's beginning to meet the benchmarks that he set out for his people."

"Bush said al-Maliki is making strides in almost every area,"

"by providing extra Iraqi troops on time" (Froomkin disputes this pointing out that only two of the three promised brigades have shown up by the second deadline, and the last reporting we saw was that Iraqi units were showing up at 55-65% of their full strength.)

"making sure that no ethnic or religious factions are ignored in the security operations" (The majority of violent operations thus far have been primarily aimed at Sunnis, and the Iraqi generals are pointing the operation towards the Sunnis.)

"and approving $10 billion for reconstruction projects" (True) "and working on a oil revenue-sharing law." ("Working on." I'm "working on" a unified theory of physics.)

It seems every time Bush talks to a leader, Putin, Musharraf, Karzai, Maliki, whoever, he comes out praising them and endorsing everything they say. Is he lying for impact or is the president just that gullible?