Bush Speechwriters United....

... Against Obama.

Michael Gerson attempts to attack Barack Obama's record on the Iraq war, but first a blatantly false assertion about McCain:

John McCain's nomination was ensured by the success of the surge he had consistently advocated, against intense opposition.

Daniel Larison responds:

This is ludicrous. McCain was the frontrunner in the spring of 2007, long before anyone could have reasonably claimed that the “surge” had done anything (not that many pundits didn’t make outlandish claims), and there was in any case never any doubt in the Republican rank-and-file that the “surge” was the right thing to do. On the contrary, if McCain’s nomination was ever assured it was assured by the collapse of his only real national rival, Mitt Romney, under the waves of the Huckaboom, whose beginning had literally nothing to do with the war in Iraq.

Gerson attempts to depict Obama as inconsistent on Iraq, lifting his analysis out of an essay by fellow Bush Speechwriter Peter Wehner. The phases appear to be:

1. The 2002 speech, opposing the Iraq war;
2. A post-war period, from 2003 to 2006, in which he argued that it would be irresponsible to withdraw, and that we had an obligation to try to stabilize Iraq;
3. Starting in late 2006, argument for phased withdrawal, and skepticism about "the surge";
4. An apparent present mindset that his Iraq policy as President will be shaped by the facts on the ground.

Gerson, of course, is all for the idea that Obama should base his opinions on the realities of the situation in Iraq, not campaign promises. But this obviously undercuts his suggestion of inconsistency between pre-war opposition to invasion, and post-war support for an effort to make the invasion and occupation work. Did Gerson somehow miss that the facts on the ground changed considerably between the time Obama opposed a theoretical war, and the time he was hoping to get the best outcome out of an actual war? Of course not. Gerson's attacks on Obama are consistently short on honesty.

Not only is there no inconsistency between points one and two, Obama remains correct to have opposed the war, and once Bush started the war he was correct to press for the best outcome. Had his position during the post-war period been a demand for immediate withdrawal at any cost, it would have been ridiculous. And this, of course, further highlights Gerson's mendacity - Gerson would be savaging that stance, as well. (The difference being, had Obama taken such a ridiculous position, Gerson could have presented an honest impeachment.)

So now the "inconsistency" is reduced to skepticism of "the surge", and the suggestion that the time has come for the Iraqi government to shoulder the burden of running the country. Or, if you believe that the Iraqi government will remain incapable of assuming actual governance and responsibility for security in the next twelve to thirty months, that the time has come for us to cut our losses. With all due respect to Gerson, if he truly believed that "the surge" was working he wouldn't be trying to disown the Bush Administration's benchmarks of its success, or exaggerating its successes.

It is a perfectly legitimate reaction to the present situation to observe that it is not apparent that Iraqi factions will even try to resolve their differences as long as the occupation remains in force, and to ask, "Why shouldn't we cut our losses?" The easy thing to do is what Gerson and his ilk have done from day one - prop up the official Bush Administration line that up is down, left is right, and the best way to overcome past failures is to keep on doing exactly the same thing.

Oh, you say, but "the surge" was something different. Even accepting that argument, that the failures of the prior years of strategy had become so patent that there were some real changes in our approach to the occupation on the ground, the surge has failed by the Bush Administration's benchmarks, and apparently also in the assessment of General Petaeus. And here's where the circle closes - the brilliant strategy of the man Gerson wants to push into the White House? "We'll keep doing exactly the same thing, whether for a hundred years or even a thousand years." That, Gerson would have us believe, is the better Iraq war policy.

I know I tease Gerson here, by suggesting that he is a world-class idiot, but there's another possibility. He's capitalizing on his position with the Washington Post to inject Republican smears into mainstream discourse. If they don't stick, those feeding him the lines he is to pitch can shrug and say, "It's only Gerson." And if the smears stick, more credible right-wingers can run with them.

Lurching Along In The Ditch....

To build his case that "The Democrats were wrong in their assessments of the surge", William Kristol cherry-picks a strange statement from Barack Obama as a basis for attack:

When Obama was asked in the most recent Democratic presidential debate, “Would you have seen this kind of greater security in Iraq if we had followed your recommendations to pull the troops out last year?” he didn’t directly address the question. But he volunteered that “much of that violence has been reduced because there was an agreement with tribes in Anbar Province, Sunni tribes, who started to see, after the Democrats were elected in 2006, you know what? — the Americans may be leaving soon. And we are going to be left very vulnerable to the Shias. We should start negotiating now.”

But Sunni tribes in Anbar announced in September 2006 that they would join to fight Al Qaeda. That was two months before the Democrats won control of Congress.

Yes... And it was at least three months before "the surge" began, and nine months before the troop buildup was complete.

So is Kristol taking the position that Obama should be berated for failing to attribute to the surge something that preceded the surge? Or does he truly believe that everything positive that has ever happened in Iraq must be attributed to the surge, regardless of when it occurred? Nebuchadnezzar's Hanging Gardens of Babylon? Thank the surge!

In fairness to Kristol he does describe those non-surge accomplishments as having been "sustained" by the surge, not caused by it, but his sloppy logic more or less kicks the foundation out from under his entire attack.

McCain On "The Surge"

Today John McCain was arguing that the Democratic Party should be happy with the position of General Petraeus that "the surge" is working and that there will (possibly) be a "reduction" in troop levels to pre-surge levels in about a year. It's not such a bad talking point, but beyond that isn't very coherent.

• A "surge" has to end, or it is an "escalation". It was thus a foregone conclusion that if we were going to keep calling this a "surge" it would have an ending point.

• If "the surge" ends with no political progress, there is no reason to believe that further troop withdrawals are possible or even advisable if you wish to even maintain the status quo.

• The military successes of "the surge" do not automatically translate into political success. If "the surge" brings about none of the political reforms and improvements promised at its inception, the surge can be an unqualified military success yet still be a political failure. (Surely McCain has heard reference to armed conflicts were "we won every battle, yet lost the war".)

If General Petraeus is comfortable predicting an end to "the surge" by next July, why isn't he comfortable describing a timetable for additional troop reductions after that date?

I would venture that it is because he continues to expect that number of troops to remain in the field for at least another five to ten years.

Whatever "points" the Democratic Party can claim for getting tentative dates for the end of the surge, maintaining pre-surge troop levels for the indefinite future does nothing to bring this conflict to an end. McCain knows that, and if he wishes to vindicate himself as a "straight shooter" he should admit as much. (But perhaps "McCain the straight shooter" was always more of a matter of perception than reality.)

Hand Wringing Over "The Surge"

With all due respect to how well "the surge" has been played up in the media, what real difference does it make? If Bush gets another year of his war, and it turns out that "the surge" (like every other Bush White House claim about the war) has been exaggerated, what will the Republicans be claiming a year from now as they again try to save themselves from being held responsible for the lack of progress? "But we thought it was working last year" serves to excuse the Dems for any claimed optimism.

Beyond Bush and his immediate advisors, what's the gain to the Republican party in exaggerating the results of "the surge"? Bush has virtually no credibility and he cannot be reelected, so being again found to be prevaricating has essentially no impact on him - but he gets to carry on his war until he leaves office. But would you want to be a Republican Senator or Member of Congress in a competitive race, with that albatross hanging around your neck?

Is It Truly That Bad?

The London Guardian opines,

An elite team of officers advising the US commander, General David Petraeus, in Baghdad has concluded that they have six months to win the war in Iraq - or face a Vietnam-style collapse in political and public support that could force the military into a hasty retreat.

* * *

Possibly the biggest longer term concern of Gen Petraeus's team is that political will in Washington may collapse just as the military is on the point of making a counter-insurgency breakthrough. According to a senior administration official, speaking this week, this is precisely what happened in the final year of the Vietnam war. Steven Simon, the national security council's senior director for transnational threats during the Clinton administration, said a final meltdown in political and public backing was likely if the new strategy was not seen to be working quickly.

Bush's "Hail Mary"

Eugene Robinson writes,

Not once has Bush given the slightest indication that he intends any significant change of course in Iraq. Quite the contrary: The expectation in Washington is that soon he will announce an escalation of the war -- increasing troop levels but calling the increase a "surge" and giving the impression that it's a short-term measure. Don't be fooled by the focus-group word "surge," because a two- or three-month increase in troop levels makes no military sense. If and when the president sends more troops to Iraq, they will not soon come home.

With all due respect to the idea that this is solely a public relations move, it's more than that:

Interestingly enough, one administration official admitted to us today that this surge option is more of a political decision than a military one because the American people have run out of patience and President Bush is running out of time to achieve some kind of success in Iraq.

It is a given at this point that the public is not going to give any administration unlimited time to demonstrate progress in Iraq, and Bush has only two years remaining in which he can either maintain an unacceptable status quo that has no chance of success, draw down forces and admit failure (like that'll happen), or throw a Hail Mary pass. The fact that it's a long shot does not mean it's just a public relations ploy - if anything, it highlights how bad things are in Iraq and how few options remain available. I don't know if even Bush expects it to work, but he seems to view a surge as his best (and probably only) shot.

Given that the Democratic Party's fortunes keep rising as Bush sinks deeper into the Iraq quagmire, political expediency might tempt the new leadership in Congress to let the president have his way and reap the rewards in 2008. But that would be wrong. Democrats can't give speeches saying that sending more troops to Iraq without a viable mission is nothing more than a futile sacrifice of young American lives -- and then limit their dispute with Bush to whether he gets to send 3,000 more troops or 30,000.

If the Democratic Party attempts to negotiate over the number of troops sent to Iraq, it will find out pretty quickly how its powers on that issue compare to those of the Commander in Chief. As Mr. Robinson notes, there is no present possibility that Congress will cut off funding for the war - an action which would instantly shift responsibility for the bad outcome in Iraq from Bush to the Democratic Party. Mr. Robinson's time would be better spent focusing the spotlight on Bush, as the decision for a troop surge is not one that Congress is going to be able to change.