If the Dems do wrest away control of Congress, the back-pounding and hat-throwing should give way quickly to a sense of sober introspection. Bush has left things in one hell of a mess and he's still president (with a VERY small 'p'). The task of setting things even a little straighter than they are will require a lot of solidarity and hard work.

Who ARE those four out of ten who approve of what's going on in Iraq? It's like finding a significant group of people who approve of liver cancer or child molestation. Where do they come from? Who are they? Yaaaaaaahh!!!

And your article just made it better. Thanks, Andrew.

...that down deep GWB is really a liberal -- if not too bright -- kinda guy who's been dancing with the people who brought him to the party but now will have a chance to ditch the clammy-cold bastards and do some more humanistic things to try and polish up his legacy before it's too late. The first thing could be real, empathetic immigration reform. Then a raise in the min-wage. Could universal health care be far behind? What has GWB got to lose at this point? I can just hear it, in a Doonesbury-style speech over a shot of the White House, "God damn it, Karl, stop tellin' me what to do! I been listenin' to you for six years and where's it got me? Everyone hates my guts! I'm gonna go down in history as the worst president we ever had. I've had enough. Now, maybe if I work with these jokers I can give folks SOME damn thing to remember me for that doesn't make 'em want to spit on the ground! You, too, Dick, just shut the hell up! Now, Nancy...what was that you were saying about health care for everyone?"

GWB bypass the Senate? Why...why, that would be horrible!

...space in these exalted pages to every nut-ball who says something outrageous. Sheldon no doubt has his believers, just as there are those who put rattlesnakes in their jockey shorts and call it religion, but do we care? Do we pay attention? I hope not.

...what exactly is going to be different in "four to six months," as we've heard Dems say is a good time to start "redeploying?" Is there anyone still willing to have their son, daughter or spouse come home in a box or missing important body parts so we can be there four to six more months and THEN start bringing them home?

Waiting four to six months, or a year, or three friggin' days, to withdraw from Iraq is nonsense. What is going to be better in six months? Failure is failure. Military action in Iraq was a mistake and doing it for a longer period of time won't make it a better idea. We are not training Iraqi troops. We are not providing basic services. We are not establishing a stable political base from which to grow a government or endearing ourselves to the locals. Unfortunately, what we've broken someone else is going to have to fix, namely the Iraqis themselves. And stateside...who is willing now to have their child or spouse come home in a box now that it is an established fact that we shouldn't be in Iraq? Continued slaughter will increase political pressure; politicians and generals would do well to get ahead of the curve, start getting out of Iraq right now. Yes, we'll have the blood on our hands of those who die in the resulting chaos, but that will be no less true -- and perhaps even worse -- four to six months to a year from now.

"When I come to Washington, I feel despair," he told Clinton. "When I am in Iraq with my commanders, when I talk to our soldiers, when I talk to the Iraqi leadership, they are not despairing. They believe that they can move the country toward stability with our help. And I believe that. This has been a very hard and difficult process. And over the length of time we have learned some hard lessons."

Yeah, okay. Fine. But where's the part where you tell us HOW things are going to be better in six months? What are those "hard lessons?" What actual strategy has arisen out of them? Or are you and your commanders and soldiers like a boys' club who, up in your treehouse where the "gurlz" can't hear you, telling each other how wonderful and successful you are? Because I'm sorry, we're not seeing it here down on the ground and we are not hearing that you have a plan to make the next six months any better than the last six months.

And I'm ashamed of what college students have become. Standing there, letting that guy be abused by those campus swine, standing there like it was a sporting event, a few people yelling "Thtop! Thtop!", no one intervening, daring to risk their own precious safety for a fellow under duress. Very sad.