Thursday, March 27, 2008

"Surge" is passe

There's a new buzzword in town -- "pause":

Concerns in Iraq that recent security gains are fragile and could backslide mean that President Bush is likely to hand over to his successor a war being fought by as many as 140,000 US troops – about the same number as before the "surge" of some 35,000 troops announced in January 2007.

The White House says Mr. Bush will not make any decisions on troop levels in Iraq until after Gen. David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, and Ryan Crocker, the US ambassador to Iraq, testify before Congress April 8 and 9. But with General Petraeus already recommending against further drawdowns beyond those set to take place by July, and with Vice President Dick Cheney suggesting that further reductions are unlikely to be put in place now, it seems doubtful that Bush would go in any other direction."

Talk about Mission Accomplished. As the year ticks down to the next presidential election, it's finally safe for the Bush administration to announce that there'll be no further troop reductions in Iraq. Instead, the sucker who gets into the White House in November will be left with an ongoing disaster of a war, including troops still deployed at pre-"surge" levels. And Georgie's just a-skatin' away.

But Georgie's been getting other people to follow him with bandaids and toilet paper and clean up his messes all his miserable douchebag life. Why change now?

UPDATE: Nothing succeeds like success, eh?