[theknife]

the Prez in radio la-la land yesterday, desperately trying to keep the dream alive:

“So we will honor the fallen by completing the mission for which they gave their lives, and by doing so we will ensure that freedom and peace prevail.
..And when that mission of defeating the terrorists in Iraq is complete, our troops will come home to a proud and grateful nation.”

it's almost like his weekly bedtme story for the nation - the only thing missing is "...and then they lived happily ever after."

but, almost amazingly simultaneously, members of his administration can no longer sustain the fantasy. from today's Washington Post:

The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.

the administration is just now figuring out what some of us have been saying for three years. doh. so how come this information can't come from the Prez? maybe a little too much of a downer for his weekly bedtime stories?

"What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. "We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning."

translation: what the fuck were we thinking? take note that all of this stuff has to come from anonymous administration officials - because no top Bush official will go on record and admit the truth: " by the way, we fucked up and nothing is going to work out like we thought it would."

"We've said we won't leave a day before it's necessary. But necessary is the key word -- necessary for them or for us? When we finally depart, it will probably be for us," a U.S. official said.

yup, the Prez always leaves out that part. "necessary" at this point means pulling out at whatever time is necessary to make sure that GOP congressmen running for Congress in 2006 don't have spend election season scrubbing the stain of Iraq from thier campaigns. in other words, the timetable is driven by US elections, not Iraq elections.

"We set out to establish a democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of Islamic republic," said another U.S. official familiar with policymaking from the beginning, who like some others interviewed would speak candidly only on the condition of anonymity. "That process is being repeated all over."

so now that we're conceding Jeffersonian democracy is a pipe dream, Bush is apparently now asking Mr. & Mrs. America to sacrifice thier kids to prop up an Islamic republic in Iraq. hmm - - could be a tough sell for the military recruiters, no?