Those Stupid Democrats

It appears that the Democrats have made a serious tactical error in winning the recent elections. You see previously this war had been President Bush's fault. But when Democrats take power in the middle of January it becomes all their responsibility. Because people will forget all about President Bush's decision to invade Iraq and his administrations mishandling of the war and start wondering why haven't the Democrats fixed it yet. Or that's the line of thinking in David Keene's latest article.

The lack of any unified Democratic stance on a crucial national security and foreign policy issue — on which the party's candidates ran and won control of Congress — means that my friend is at least partially right.

Iraq is many things, including a tar - baby that congressional Democrats are going to find as difficult to get away from as the Republicans they so gleefully beat up over the last few years.

What's great about this formulation is that the Democrats don't actually have the power to implement any of their solutions. They control neither the State Department nor the Department of Defense. They can't pull our troops back. All they can do is make recommendations or cut funding, and they certainly won't cut funding. So all they can do is make recommendations that the President can helpfully reject.

So the idea that Democrats better fix the war on Iraq or be doomed - well, that's a gift that keeps on giving.