All Hail the Never Ending War

Amazing how in our democracy, we manage to just keep on fighting the war that the majority of people in both countries want to be over.

And the Bush Administration has come up with a way to keep it going...

The Bush administration will not try to assess whether the troop increase in Iraq is producing signs of political progress or greater security until September, and many of Mr. Bush’s top advisers now anticipate that any gains by then will be limited, according to senior administration officials.

In interviews over the past week, the officials made clear that the White House is gradually scaling back its expectations for the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. The timelines they are now discussing suggest that the White House may maintain the increased numbers of American troops in Iraq well into next year.

No benchmarks, no expectations, just keep on keeping on with the bloodletting. When will the military just plain rebel and say enough.

There is one person that Patraeus has on his staff that should know, H.R. McMasters, author of 'Dereliction of Duty' and how Generals in Vietnam went along with civilian leaders and/or failed to fully inform them of difficulties. Will McMasters and his boss Patreaus practice what the former has preached?

Letting the Iraqi government off the hook AGAIN makes me somewhat skeptical.

Also, I rather doubt that the Administration is just going to stay mum. They will leak...and leak...and leak...stories spinning about their great "successes" (which as usual will turn out to be overblown or non-existent after the 'spin cycle' ends). Plus they can always count on their endless supply of enablers to lie for them. Their problem is, we all know the game now, and we know that they and their enablers are full of shit.