Chabot: Iraqis need to step up to the plate

Rep. Steve Chabot, who was due to arrive back in the U.S. later today after a four-day congressional trip to Iraq and NATO headquarters in Brussels, said the Iraqi government and military is moving too slow to take responsibility for their own country.

Chabot, a supporter of the U.S. military effort in Iraq, said in a written statement that after meeting with U.S. and Iraqi officials in Baghdad that the Iraqis "continue to rely too heavily on the U.S. and other allies to shoulder the military and financial costs of reconstruction."

"The time for the Iraqis to step up and provide for their own security and rebuilding efforts is long overdue,''' Chabot said in the statement.

Chabot's Democratic opponent in this year's election, State Rep. Steve Driehaus, said tht Chabot is "just now coming to the same conclusion that many of us came to several years ago - that the Iraq government has failed to live up to its part of the bargain."