This is from yesterday’s press briefing [added emphasis is mine]:

Q What’s the President’s expectations for this weekend’s elections in Iraq? And how much will they be a litmus test, in terms of security, as he makes his decisions on the draw-down of troops?

MR. GIBBS: Well, obviously the President will watch the results, and believes that the provincial elections this weekend mark another significant milestone in Iraq’s democratic development. There are a series of elections that will happen throughout the country throughout the rest of the year — an important year, again, for that democratic development to continue.

Separately, the President has met with military advisors, the Joint Chiefs, the Secretary, commanders on the ground in the region over the past almost two weeks, to hear from them and quite honestly, for them to hear from him about a way forward in Iraq, Afghanistan. And also, I think as I mentioned yesterday, a fairly lengthy and engaged discussion at the Pentagon with the Joint Chiefs this week on the health of the military force that we have right now. I think the Pentagon said this, and it’s true that we expect that we’ll have recommendations and decisions on moving forward on Iraq quite soon.

And later:

Q Robert, with the Iraqi elections coming up this weekend, how concerned are you that external forces, neighbors of Iraq, specifically Iran and Syria, might play a role that is not in the best interest of the democracy —

MR. GIBBS: Well, let me not — I don’t want to go into hypotheticals about what may or may not happen other than to say that, you know, we’re going to obviously watch these elections, watch their outcome, and believe that Saturday marks just another — that Saturday marks a very important continued milestone for democratic development in Iraq, and that as the President laid out, that one of the — one of the goals of his review process as it relates to our forces in Iraq is to give more responsibility for security and governing to the Iraqi government. And I think these elections, again, mark an important milestone towards achieving that and, we hope very soon, to giving them more of that opportunity and more of that responsibility.

Q Thank you, Robert.

The “just another” phrase was an interesting slip.