POLLACK: We see in a few places in Iraq some very dramatic changes. The one that everyone knows about is Anbar province where the Sunni sheiks have flipped on Al-Qaeda in Iraq, and you have the Iraq Salafi groups that are now working with US forces. Mosul, Iraq’s third-largest city, which at one point in time it required tens of thousands of troops just to keep the place from flying apart, was now mostly being handled by Iraqi security forces with only a very small American presence up there. Elsewhere in Baghdad in the southern belts, northern belts, we also saw progress, important progress, on the security front, and even some progress with local economic and political developments.
RUSH: Now, we have one more bite on this, too. This is from O’Hanlon. He was also on the show. He’s the coauthor Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow, Brookings Institution. Chris Wallace asked, ‘What can you add to that? Particularly this question that I asked Secretary Rice about which is sectarian violence, this argument that this is trying to provide some kind of circuit breaker in terms of sectarian civil war?’
O’HANLON: We have suppressed the sectarian violence. We are seeing much more progress against the Al-Qaeda in Iraq, the other Salafist groups, some of the other extreme Shi’a militia, and that part is going much better because Iraqis — along with the surge, Iraqis — are getting sick of the violence from other Iraqis against them, and they’re getting tired of these extremist movements. That does not solve the sectarian problem. That’s going to have to be faced, too, in this. But the first phase is looking fairly good on the military battleground, at least.
RUSH: Right, it is. That’s the strategy. So the strategy of the alteration has been good. So the Democrats are out there saying, ‘It’s a political situation, the political situation! It’s a political situation! It’s just a political situation!’ That’s all I hear. Here’s a montage. Let’s go sound bite eight. This is Carl Levin on CNN’s Late Edition, a montage of his remarks — and, by the way, we have repeated nothing in this montage.
LEVIN: The whole purpose of the surge was to give the Iraqi political leaders the breathing space to reach a political settlement.
LEVIN: The surge has not succeeded. That is not political progress.
LEVIN: …cautious about any political progress.
LEVIN: …the political progress…
LEVIN: …benchmarks, political progress between the Iraqis…
LEVIN: … a failure of political progress.
LEVIN: …the chances of political progress.
LEVIN: How do you produce political progress?
LEVIN: …political progress….
LEVIN: There’s not going to be political progress.
LEVIN: It’s political progress…
LEVIN …political settlement…
LEVIN: The political surge…
LEVIN: …work out a political reconciliation.
RUSH: Let’s go back to sound bite seven, which takes us back to July 24th on this program, and listen to what I predicted.
RUSH ARCHIVE: It cannot be reported that the surge is succeeding, so what will be focused on instead, ladies and gentlemen, is how the political situation is falling apart, they’re not making progress and so forth. So wherever the good news is, it’s like the Drive-Bys and the Democrat Party find a way to avoid it. But their worst nightmare is for this news to start trickling out for the Democrat Party.
RUSH: 10-4 good buddy! So I suggested that focus on the process, the progress, lack of progress, political progress and so forth just to keep the negative drumbeat going, and the purpose of that during the recess here is to separate recalcitrant Republicans in the Senate from President Bush. That’s what the Democrats are going to be trying to do throughout the recess. Getting ready for the Petraeus report, they’re going to try to get more Republicans. People like Hagel they’ve already got, and Olympia Snowe. They’re going to try to get more Republicans to distance themselves from the president and vote next time they offer resolutions in September, to get the troops out by a certain date. The president has a veto-proof House right now, so whatever the Senate does may be inconsequential. But that’s what the focus is, the political progress. ‘There’s no political progress! (grumbling) The whole purpose of the surge was to shorten the political progress. It can’t be said it’s succeeding (muttering)’