Scott McClellan is being celebrated by some of the wrong people but this administration has been so inbred and dishonest and craven that I am all for any honest assault on it. I am not for a precipitous withdrawl from Iraq, either. You have written that Bush has done some truly disgusting things in Iraq. It would be nice if you dedicated a post to enumerating these things. Would this be possible?

So why do you want to Obama to win if McCain saved the country while Obama was so wrong?

Screw Obama and McCain.  I want America to win big.  And I don't want scumbag islamics to be able to come blow us up again by setting up a base in a failed state.

Up until this point, all Obama has been spouting is the same rhetoric back and forth about change, withdrawal, hope, etc.  The facts on the ground have been that Petraus and Crocker have made massive progress; there has not been a single word of acknowledgement about that from the left camp.  All he's been spouting is how they're going to be yanking our troops on inauguration day.  If Obama wants to win, he damned well better convince Americans that he's going to give half a second of consideration before reflexively pulling the troops out.  Not all Americans want us to lose this war.  McCain sucks but at least he gives me the comfort of knowing that he won't be snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

"what will Iraq look like when the Crocker-Petraeus command has done its work? A lot better than anyone thought.... There is some sense that Barack Obama now grasps this, too"

? What 'sense', where? Care to provide us with some links evincing this grasp and said 'sense'?

teplukhin2you ,

Wait a few days. Obama has thrown his church under the bus. Next he'll  throw his ant-war supporters  under the bus.

Colonization is an unprofitable and barbarous business fit for the old world but not for today. Sure we could dig our heals in and create a permanent American Raj but what good would it do us?

I have seen no such "sense."  All I know of Obama's proposed f-p is quick withdrawal from Iraq.  Regardless of the facts on the ground, or the opinions of his generals.  As CinC, that is his right.

So think long and hard, Marty, before you pull the lever for the most inexperienced candidate in my lifetime.

cthu, an American Raj?  Surely you jest.  But along those lines, should we also withdraw from Korea, Japan, and Germany?  and where would President Obama withdraw from, if anywhere?

I'm willing to believe that Obama recognizes reality, ie the constraints that any POTUS will face in Iraq, which are that we aren't going to either achieve "victory or achieve any kind of significant or rapid withdrawal.

Maybe he'll start pivoting to this intelligent, reality-based position now that he no longer relies on the MoveOnner crowd to win the nomination. One can hope.

Butchie, Obama has more experience in government than did George W. Bush in 2000.

But as to the question of withdrawal, the next president is in fact going to oversee a rapid withdrawal of the bulk of U.S. forces from Iraq. It's not about what the candidates promise. It's about rotation schedules, equipment, and manpower. There is little a President Obama could do to speed this reduction in U.S. forces, since it will require so significant a portion of our troop- and equipment-moving capacity to accomplish. But there is nothing that a President McCain could do to slow this reduction in U.S. forces that would not entail the effective complete destruction of American ground-fighting capabilities for up to a decade.

When we confront international challenges today, the Irans of the world can look us in the eye and ask, "You and what army?" and it's a little funny because it's kind of true, but not entirely. But if we do not draw down our forces from Iraq significantly in 2009, it won't be a joke. "You and what army?" will be a literally true statement. Our Army is already broken (and the Marine Corps is close). But it still exists as an institution capable of contesting and occupying territory. Another year or more of equipment attrition and personnel exhaustion in Iraq will leave us with ground forces that are not merely "broken" but actually incapable of fighting any new ground war. Remember the mid- to late-1970s, when analysts seriously debated whether the United States could assist European conventional defense against a Soviet invasion? We'd be back to that in the 2010s if we have more than 60,000 or so troops in Iraq at Christmas 2009.

So either McCain will actually withdraw almost as fast as Obama would, or the choice facing America this November is Obama and an army, or McCain and unilateral disarmament.

Rhubs, perhaps, but exactly zero of it has been in any executive branch. That's why we have tended to elect governors of late.

As to the military part of your quote, any future ground war that I can see on the horizon would require not many troops at all.  I cannot see this or any future administration invading Iran.  Makes no sense, probably couldn't be done with our Cold War Army of 785,000.  We could bomb them, but I don't favor that, either.

Your assertions about a broken military are just that.  Has any military leader said anything resembling your remarks?  Do you work at the OSD level at the Pentagon.? The Army is not broken, and the USMC is so broken we're sending 3,500 of them to Afghanistan to increase our presence there.  Because the situation in Iraq is so drastically improved, our equipment attrition has slowed, as has the level of patrolling and casualties.

In the mid to late 70s, I served in the Army in Europe, and over 200,000 troops were stationed there.  No, can't say as I recall our Euro allies being too concerned about the numbers.  Quality maybe, but the 80s took care of that.

In any case, let's say you're right - Obama and McCain will withdraw at about the same pace.  Then let's hear more about the rest of the world not named Iraq.