Don't expect this to make as many headlines as the old "Bush Has Alienated U.S. From Rest Of World" stories.

AP via Fox News

WASHINGTON — The United States has decided to remove Libya from its list of state sponors of terrorism and to renew normal diplomatic ties, a State Department offical said Monday.

A formal announcement was expected later.

The move is a culmination of a process that began three years ago when Libya surprised the world by agreeing to dismantle its nuclear weapons program.

There have been no normal relations with Libya since 1980. The State Department said the Libya for years was a major sponsor of international terrorism.

Libya was held responsible for the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 in 1988, which claimed 270 lives, most of them American.

But Libya has made a decisive move away from terrorism in recent years, officials said.

UPDATE

More from AP via USA Today (including the creepy photo at right, which can only be captioned with a school girl "tee-hee"):

The State Department was to announce that it will open an embassy in Libya, upgrading the current U.S. liaison office in Tripoli, said a department official.

Removing Libya from the list of countries the United States considers to be state sponsors of terrorism means a 45-day public comment period will begin on Monday, after which Libya would be removed from the list. The official described the plans on condition of anonymity because the official announcement was still pending.

The establishment of normal relations may have come sooner were it not for allegations that Gadhafi's regime was behind an attempt on the life of Saudi's Arabia's King Adbullah when he was crown prince several years ago.

read on...

I wanted to add that I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on Libya, so I don't know whether or not this is a good move. The reason I posted it was to point out that Bush isn't always a "cowboy", but when he's being diplomatic, the media is less than enthusiastic about reporting it. It reminds me of what Laura Bush said the other day. She pointed out that while it seems like every day there's a "Bush Approval Hits New Low" headline, we didn't have these headlines when it was extremely high. I assume there must have been one or two at the time, but they weren't reporting his approval, seemingly around the clock the way they are now.

Anyway, we'll see what happens with this Libya move. I suspect this may have something to do with Iran, but who knows.

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Michelle Malkin, RussBlog, Solomonia, Hot Air, Right Voices, NinthState