So here we are on the verge of total victory in Iraq, having deposed a genocidal tyrant, and inaugurating a democratic government in the heart of the Middle East, and all you liberals want to do is ‘wank’ about its imperfections.

You call this a ‘crime’? The one that Hillary & Kerry voted for? That one? But I suppose the Democrats latest ‘call to arms’ to invade & liberate Darfur wouldn’t be a crime, would it? That’s completely different.

Democrats have been wedded to failure since the inception of their party, and apparently that’s not going to change any time soon.

The practical meaning of “The Surge” has changed while the pretended meaning has stayed the same.

The PRETENDED meaning is, The US increased troop strength in Iraq for a period of time beginning in 2007. The ACTUAL meaning is, the US increased troop strength WHILE ramping up a program to pay off Sunni resistance leaders WHILE Iraq’s warring ethno-religious factions finished completely remaking Iraq’s demographic patterns, owing to tens-to-hundreds of thousands of dead and millions of exiled and internally displaced, WHILE the US turned the capital into a warren of barricades. The net result of all those changes has been a less obtrusively violent Iraq for the time being, and the whole arrangement is “The Surge” in practice, but the cheerleaders talk as if it was all due to The Surge in pretense. Meanwhile Iraq’s “calm” would count as calamity almost anywhere on earth but Darfur or Zimbabwe.

That’s leaving aside the essential truth that The Surge is not The War and The War remains a massive waste and a monstrous crime.

“Whether or not the war was a mistake…”

That statement alone impeaches the entire column. Less violence is very welcomed news. Hopefully it will get us closer to leaving. And stopping the $11 billion a month drain. But the Iraqi revenue sharing deal has not been done, the re-Baathification law has not been put into place and it has been described by many as further isolating the Baathists. Rarely is mentioned that the sunni awakening councils are being paid by US to play nice, and these same people were called insurgents prior to us paying them. Similarly the 21 miles of 15 foot cement blast walls in Baghdad separating sunni and shia slums gets little press as does the fact that previously mixed neighbors are much more segregated due to our inability to stop the civil war. Once a population/sect realignment occurs like it has in the capital, a drop in voilence would be expected.

Having said that, lets continue to put lipstick on the pig, finish propping up the Iranian-friendly gubmint in Iraq, heed Maliki’s very recently repeated request for a US troop withdrawl date (which reflects the majority of Iraqi opinion) and start packing up.