You Wanted the Surge? You Got It!

The president just made an anti-Iraq supplemental funding statement from the Rose Garden, which—little known fact!—is located behind the looking glass.

Last November, the American people said they were frustrated and wanted a change in our strategy in Iraq. I listened. Today, General David Petraeus is carrying out a strategy that is dramatically different from our previous course.

This really isn't true at all. The election exit poll had 57 percent of voters straight-up "disapproving" of the war. Polls before and after the election pegged troop withdrawal or timetables for withdrawal as the most popular Iraq policies; support for sending more troops came in below 25 percent. Joe Lieberman, the most pro-war politician who survived the midterm culling, packaged his Iraq position as "bringing our troops home." Check out his TV ads and find one that suggests he'd send more troops to Iraq.

It's not really ideal that the two big parties have moved into opposing pro-war and anti-war camps. But that was useful from the perspective of a 2006 voter. If you voted GOP, you knew you'd buck up the president's war policy with a Congress that would accede to what he wanted. If you voted Democratic, you knew you were voting to get the hell out. The president's approach to the resulting situation—a Democratic Congress that wants to get the hell out—is a total rip-off of Alexander and the Gordian Knot.

UPDATE: Ah, those TPM guys got this. With video.