"There's a real sense that the clock is ticking, that Bush is desperate for a change, but no one in the White House can bring themselves to say so with this election coming," - an anonymous member of the Iraq study group, headed by James Baker.
So once again, the president is not being candid with the American people about the challenges of this war and the changes he may be about to make. Why? Because we have an election, and heaven knows we mustn't address Bush's failure as a war-leader before people vote, must we?
Just think about that for a second. We are entering an election which will have a huge impact on the war in Iraq. And yet the president doesn't want possible changes in policy debated or floated beforehand - because it might suggest his current policy has failed and that the admission might cost him support among the faithful for whom he must appear to be as inerrant as the Bible. So he places his own political exigencies over the interests of the country as a whole at a time of war. Again.