CUT AND RUN WITH IT

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED again. As poll numbers fall as Iraqis stand up, we will run as fast as we can we will stand down.  Victory kind of is ours.  Do not look at that request for yet more money the man behind the curtain.

"I want my poll numbers to go up our troops to come home, but I don't want them to come home without having achieved partisan advantage at home without victory," he [Bush] said in brief comments to reporters in El Paso during a visit to the Mexican border. "And we've got a strategy I have never been able to clearly state before for victory." The president was describing another delusional fantasy he will engage in a speech he plans to give Wednesday at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.

GEORGE BUSH BROKE Iraq.  How much longer will we have to buy it? Those who have been disturbed by reports of the Shia kicking the shia out of the Sunnis may find small solace in a key Reagan retro approach to the insurgents Donald Rumsfeld can’t even call insurgents.

A senior administration official said Mr. Bush's ultimate goal, to which he assigned no schedule, is to move to a "smaller, more lethal" American force that "can be just as successful."
It is unclear how much of that vision Mr. Bush will explicitly describe Wednesday, in the first of four speeches about the Iraqi transition that he plans to give before the election of a long-term Iraqi government on Dec. 15.

IT IS UNCLEAR because as Bush struggles to clean up his political mess at home, we will engage in dirty war abroad. The predicted  death squads are already there. Because Bush seeks political relief at home in no way means he is giving up on his goals in Iraq and the Middle East.  The apparent war will become smaller in forces and its downsides smaller in the American consciousness.  Mission Accomplished not yet.

FROM THE REVISED RUMSFELD BOOK OF REVELATIONS [NY Times]

"Our problem is that any time something needs to be done, we have a feeling we should rush in and fill the vacuum and do it ourselves. You know what happens when you do that?
"First of all, you can't do it, because it's not our country. It's their country. And the second thing that happens is they don't develop the skills and the ability and the equipment and the orientation and the habit patterns of doing it for themselves. They have to do it for themselves."

STEVE  SOTO HAS SOME pointed analysis. Rumsfeld is the enemy of straight talk.

ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDED READING
RESISTANCE IS FUTILE or language languishes when Marines and Iraqi’s agree on “withdrawal.”  Yeah, we all want that, but the war of words over what “the resistance” means shoots back and forth  [WaPo]

"We all want the withdrawal," Nasir Abdul Karim, leader of Anbar province's Albu Rahad tribe, told scores of the armed Marines and Sunni sheiks, clerical leaders and other elders at the gathering Monday in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad. "We all believe it is an illegitimate occupation, and it is a legitimate resistance."
"We're committed to withdrawing," responded Brig. Gen. James L. Williams of the 2nd Marine Division, "as soon as we have strong units" in the Iraqi army to replace U.S.-led forces. "I understand the resistance," Williams added, commenting later that he was referring to the peaceful opposition to the U.S. presence in Iraq. "But you must understand we're military people. People who are shot at will shoot back."

WHO IS THE ENEMY and who is not will not be so cleanly defined as the war enters its dirty phase.  Some will not be phased by that.  But some most assuredly will be. 

THE REWRITING IS NOW in progress.  Bush speaks at the Naval Academy. (applause) Another tough audience. [text of President's speech]  Maha liveblogs: Lordy, he said we’ve turned a corner. He said that. Shakespeare's Sister: Bush is full of . . .

THE PLAN, THE PLAN! From the White House comes the plan on paper: National Strategy for Victory in Iraq.  Olvier Willis: There’s really no concrete definition of victory here, still. California Yankee: Why a document like the National Strategy for Victory in Iraq, assembling our strategy into a single unclassified document, has never been done before now escapes me. It was obviously something that should have been done long before now.  [WaPo] The new report says the U.S. strategy is working in Iraq, but victory will take time and many challenges remain. Think Progress: The problem is, it’s not a new strategy for success in Iraq; it’s a public relations document. The strategy describes what has transpired in Iraq to date as a resounding success and stubbornly refuses to establish any standards for accountability.

BUSH'S SPEECH CITED LIEBERMAN in support of his policies.  The Democrats must love this. Lieberman: Does America have a good plan for doing this, a strategy for victory in Iraq? Yes we do.  Greg Piper/ The Moderate Voice: Lieberman '08!  The Heretik: God, no, oy!

VERY EARLY REAL DEMOCRATIC RESPONSE [AP] Even before Bush finished speaking, Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid issued a statement claiming that Bush "recycled his tired rhetoric of 'stay the course' and once again missed an opportunity to lay out a real strategy for success in Iraq that will bring our troops safely home."

IF WE ARE OUT, WHO IS IN? Seeing the Forest has a good synopsis of James Fallow’s Why Iraq Has No Army?   VIETNAM IRAQ! The Next Hurrah:Deja vu all over again.  Jeanne at Body and Soul: I'm still trusting Seymour Hersh's prediction: Troops, most of them, will go. The war will continue. 

SNARK FROM Dependable Renegade before the speech started.

MORE TO FOLLOW

Comments

[Neil Shakespeare]

I am so happy to know we have successfully routed the EOTLIGs. The Enemies Of The Legitimate Iraqi Government have been defeated! So saith the cover of the book! Now we just have to figure out what the LIG is...

[Mary]

Brilliant post, absolutely brilliant!

[catherine]

Love it! Bring on the Snark!

[Pepper]

The Dems oughtta tar and feather Lieberman. Why doesn't he just GET IT OVER WITH and switch teams?

I gotta admit a deep, dark secret. There was a time when I thought Lieberman was principled. He was consistent, but I think he is trying to catch a ride on the McCain Train these days!

[Kyle]

Watch out, The EOTLIGS won't stop, until we win the WOT... War on Terror... Or the GWOT, Global War on Terror.