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W declines to gracefully exit
"Uncle Jimbo" Hanson

I think there ought to be a requirement that all communications from W be read by some one else. I often tell progressives who have no clue what our government is trying to do, to go read his second inaugural speech. They usually hadn't seen it when he delivered it, and when read, in my head I hear Reagan, the words are beautiful and inspiring. The left has forgotten that the other team truly does have good intentions. Disputes over policy and technique have been amplified to the point that all actions and objectives of this administration and it's supporters are not just questioned they are presumed to be nefarious.

Anyhow back to the language flowing from W's cakehole. He had this to say about cutting and running in any euphemized fashion.

"I know there's a lot of speculation that these reports in Washington mean there's going to be some kind of graceful exit out of Iraq," he said. "This business about a graceful exit just simply has no realism to it at all."

I am going to hope that short bit was crafted by one of the master communicators who have written his major speeches. It is two sentences that eviscerates the Baker commission right before they offer a plan for a graceful exit.  ...

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Bush May Order Iraq Study from Amazon.com
Scott Ott

(2006-11-30) — As copies of the still-secret Iraq Study Group report recommending a “gradual but meaningful” reduction in U.S. troops leaked from security-cleared officials to the news media, President George Bush said he’s hoping to get his own copy of the report for Christmas. ...

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A Strange Consensus On Iraq
Ed Morrissey

The James Baker-led Iraq Study Group has found consensus around a set of policy goals, and in the best traditions of Washington DC, they have decided to leak it to the press a week prior to releasing it officially. A review of this consensus in the New York Times proves that when a group of politicians gather on any sticky policy issue, we can expect them to act like ... politicians:

[...]

The "two distinct paths" show themselves rather obviously in the final result. The ISG clearly weighed the competing visions for Iraq, withdrawal and commitment, and came up with something that satisfies no one. They suggest the gradual withdrawal of American troops, but won't say whether they should stay elsewhere in Iraq, in a neighboring country (if any would host them), or sent home altogether. The ISG wants to put pressure on Nouri al-Maliki, but apparently not by applying any specific timetables.

Will this satisfy anyone? Hardly. ...

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The coming debate
Paul Mirengoff

Cliff May has been a member of the “expert” advisory group of the Baker/Hamilton panel. Here is his summary of that experience.

Cliff and a few like-minded colleagues wisely argued not for “victory” as Bush once envisioned it (Iraq as a shining city on the Middle Eastern hill), but "against accepting defeat at the hands of such groups al Qaeda in Iraq and Saddam loyalists" and "against lamely attempting to disguise defeat as 'redeployment' or 'an exit strategy.'” Cliff and his like-minded colleagues were unsuccessful;  ...

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Baker/Hamilton
Cliff May

In other words, the few hawks (or conservatives or neo-cons or whatever you want to call them) were arguing not for “victory” as Bush once envisioned it (Iraq as a shining city on the Middle Eastern hill) but against accepting defeat at the hands of such groups al Qaeda in Iraq and Saddam loyalists, against lamely attempting to disguise defeat as “redeployment” or “an exit strategy.” At the very least, we implored, let’s imagine and plan for the likely consequences of American defeat. That was derided as subscribing to the “domino theory.”

The Foreign Policy Establishment types who dominate the Iraq Study Group had opposed the war from the start and, in my view, mostly wanted to send Bush this message: “Idiot! We told you so!”

They were unconvinced by the case that I and a few others were making: That if the U.S. mission in Iraq sinks, it won’t just be Captain Bush and his neo-con crew that will drown. America will have a lost a key battle in a serious global conflict.

I think the following quote from one unnamed commission member who was a source for the NYT story today, confirms what I’ve said above:  “We had to move the national debate from whether to stay the course to how do we start down the path out.”

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Sitting down with evil
Michelle Malkin

Read Andy McCarthy:

So now comes James Baker’s Iraq Study Group, riding in on its bipartisan white horse to save the day. The democracy project having failed, this blue-ribbon panel’s solution is: Let’s talk.

Let’s talk with our enemies, Iran and Syria. Let’s talk with terror abettors as if they were good guys — just like us. As if they were just concerned neighbors trying to stop the bloodshed in Iraq … instead of the dons who’ve been commanding it all along.

Someone, please explain something to me: How does it follow that, because Islamic cultures reject democracy, we somehow need to talk to Iran and Syria?

What earthly logic that supports talking with these Islamic terrorists would not also support negotiating with al Qaeda — a demarche not even a Kennedy School grad would dare propose?

There’s none.

When I grew up in The Bronx, there were street gangs. You mostly stayed away from them, and, if you really had to, you fought with them. But I never remember anyone saying, “Gee, maybe if we just talk with them ....”

Nor do I remember, in two decades as a prosecutor, anyone saying, “Y’know, maybe if we just talk with these Mafia guys, we could achieve some kind of understanding ...” ...