Seems to me that making parental noises and setting deadlines a few months down the road — at the end of the next semster, so to speak — is somewhat better than springing a ultimatum on them by surprise some random Monday morning.

On the down side, now the whole world knows when we intend to start pulling out of Iraq – including the insurgents, whom I expect to ratchet up their campaign to full-throttle intensity once the Iraqi government takes the lead, in hopes of collapsing the government and forcing the U.S. and other coalition members to choose between letting Iraq sink into a bloodbath or re-entering the fray to restore the Iraqi government.

See, I’ve never bought that meme from Bush. He says “We can’t set a timetable” and yet, when we decide to leave, we’re going to have to set a timetable. It’s going to be in the news. People will know.

It just feels like another example of them saying something idealistic because it sounds good to the public, and then doing another because it’s realistic.

On the up side, it’s encouraging to see that an Army general who’s actually on the ground in Iraq (and undoubtedly has a better view of where things stand vis-a-vis the insurgency than we at home do through news stories) is satisfied enough with the progress there to see fit to publicly talk about being able to turn the fight over to Iraqi authorities in a matter of months.

On the down side, now the whole world knows when we intend to start pulling out of Iraq – including the insurgents, whom I expect to ratchet up their campaign to full-throttle intensity once the Iraqi government takes the lead, in hopes of collapsing the government and forcing the U.S. and other coalition members to choose between letting Iraq sink into a bloodbath or re-entering the fray to restore the Iraqi government.