It took awhile but the Dems are realizing that they have to grow up and face hard facts on Iraq. They appear to have passed puberty and they're now more like in the gawky teenage boy stage but the Democrats have had their little fling with the nutroots floozy and have decided they may like the more strait laced, mature type:

In the first place, the netroots candidates are losing. In the various polls on the Daily Kos Web site, John Edwards, Barack Obama and even Al Gore crush Hillary Clinton, who limps in with 2 percent to 10 percent of the vote.

...Clinton has established this lead by repudiating the netroots theory of politics. As the journalist Matt Bai makes clear in his superb book, "The Argument," the netroots emerged in part in rebellion against Clintonian politics. They wanted bold colors and slashing attacks. They didn't want their politicians catering to what Markos Moulitsas Zúniga of the Daily Kos calls "the mythical middle."

But Clinton has relied on Mark Penn, the epitome of the sort of consultant the netroots reject, and Penn's approach has been entirely vindicated by the results so far.

This is on the heels of President Bush conveying info to Hillary about how the war will continue and what will happen if she were to suddenly retreat. Listen, I may not like Hillary but the woman is pragmatic, she knows the consequences of presidential action and inaction and one suspects she learned alot while dealing with the routine "bimbo eruptions," bombings of aspirin plants and other difficulties of Bubba's two-terms. By Bush reaching out, he's showing that the good of the country outweighs the good of the party and that's refreshing.

Don't look now, but if Congress doesn't reach some sort of an agreement for the next fiscal year's budget, the federal government will run out of money on Oct 1. Although political rhetoric is high, there is little chance of the Democrats going down the Newt Gingrich 1995 path and shutting down the government - primarily because they recognize that Newt's battle with President Bill Clinton was largely seen as a victory for Clinton, making Newt even more demonizable (is that a word?) until his exit from Congress in 1998. So, Democrat leaders are going to propose an interim budget to give them more time to "negotiate" with the White House on spending issues.

The draft resolution, which is still being finalized, is intended to buy as many as six additional weeks for negotiations, though Democrats are pessimistic about their chances of making much progress with Mr. Bush. With the exception of veterans' health care and border-security funds, the White House has signaled little flexibility, and neither House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) nor Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) appears to have much appetite for a protracted fight. "I don't want a headache. I want to try to work this out," Mr. Reid said last week after meeting with White House Budget Director Jim Nussle. At the same time as the standoff over domestic spending, Congress is being asked by Mr. Bush to provide more money to implement his Iraq policy, which the top leaders adamantly oppose.

With President Bush emboldened after his victories in Congress last week, his threats of vetoes are being taken more seriously by the Democrats. The Dems simply don't have enough votes to override any Presidential veto right now, be it on the war or general spending. That's not likely to change over the next six weeks, so look for the Democrats to capitulate on many of the White House's demands in the final budget, especially in matters regarding defense spending and funding the War in Iraq. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi believe, rightly so, that giving in on war spending at this precise moment, having lost all anti-war votes so far this fall session, would be the final straw for much of their far-left base. Hence the postponement of the final budget.

In January, we were told that the new Democrat-led Congress was going to save the country, change the world and make every bald guy grow hair. Instead, we have a Congress that continually gets beat by a lame-duck president and hasn't passed even one requisite spending bill:

With none of the 12 fiscal 2008 appropriations bills enacted, both the House and Senate will take up continuing resolutions to extend federal government funding at current levels.

But wait, they're still working on really important legislation. Way more important than passing bills that will keep our country moving:

Two other measures are expected to see House floor action next week. One bill (HR 2693) would protect workers against an artificial-butter flavoring chemical called diacetyl, a chemical that is used in the production of microwave popcorn.

Yeah, that Nancy Pelosi has taken that mandate handed to her and really run with it, hasn't she. I sense that the country is so much better because of Democratic leadership. Or not.

Speaker Pelosi and her compadre Steny Hoyer have spent so much time on stupid investigations and meaningless resolutions condemning everything and everyone connected to the war in Iraq that they've failed to do what they were actually put in office to do. It may just be the shortest leadership run in congressional history if this keeps up.

The title of this post, Dems Divided on Iraq, was not what Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and the mainstream media were planning for September '07. They had all assumed that it would be the Republicans who would be divided after the various congressionally-mandated reports came in -- that's what those reports were designed for. And after the Democrats made quick work of General Petraeus on the Hill? Well, the Dem leadership didn't just expect Republicans to join them in surrender, I'm certain they expected many in the GOP in Congress to beg Reid and Pelosi to allow them into the Democratic Party.

But that's not what is happening. Over at ABC's The Note (a very reliable friend of the Dems), Rick Klein and Company tell us that the real division is among the Democrats:

Start from this point: This is not what Democrats thought September would bring. Though the reviews from last night's speech were lukewarm, the Republican Party appears more united behind the president, not less -- galvanized more by Gen. David Petraeus' congressional testimony than anything Bush himself said. The liberal base is beyond restless -- and showing that the Democrats' most ardent supporters can be a recurring drag on party unity. And the Democratic presidential candidates are pushing competing proposals that largely agree on one point: The Democratic Congress isn't doing enough to hasten an end to the war.

Consider this stubborn fact: "There will actually be 7,000 more troops in Iraq next summer than there were before Bush deployed additional forces to Iraq in January as part of a troop surge plan to quell sectarian violence," ABC's Martha Raddatz and Jennifer Parker report. That's hardly the scorecard Democrats wanted to be able to point to when they took control of Congress eight months ago.

The excuse Klein helpfully promotes in the article is that the Democrats mean well, but just don't have enough votes. That will be seen as a clarion call for organizations like MoveOn.org and its ilk to get more and more shrill, and move the Dems as a whole further and further to the Left. As the Left consumes fellow Democrats, calling for the replacement of any Dem that deviates from their world view, the general voting public will pay attention to their words and tactics - and will not be impressed. The centrism of the Bill Clinton years is about to vanish - and with it the moderate Democrats and Independents that were the key to electoral success from 1992-2000. If only the Republicans could take advantage...

It would seem that the Democrats will be launching a series of "pre-emptive" strikes prior to General David Petraeus' report on the progress of the Iraq war. The International Herald Tribune has pointed out that a number of top Democratic leaders such as Sen. Edward Kennedy and Sen. Joe Biden have reached out to the media to dispute the report.

Such a strategy looks like it will backfire on the Democrats considering that a recent CBSNYT's poll shows that the public holds its faith in the military command and neither congress nor the president in terms of who knows how to run the war. Attacking Petraeus could prove disastrous for the Democrats and should be avoided at all costs. If the Democrats start to push a hard anti-military attitude, they will be in DEEP trouble with the public which can accept anti-war, but NOT anti-military posturing.

Will Petraeus become the modern day version of Gen. MacArthur or Gen. Eisenhower? Perhaps. He will be appearing in an exclusive interview with Brit Hume on Fox News right after his report to congress in what is about as hard of a slap in the face to the mainstream media and the left wing establishment as he could muster. If Petraeus' comes off a media darling after his interview, the war will take a unique dynamic as the public will have a new hero to rally behind.

"This call shows the tables may have turned."

This quote is by an unnamed Republican source in a recent article by the Politico that claims that the anti-war factions that have been pushing the Democrats to end the war in Iraq are losing ground. The "call" in the quote refers to a conference call between Democratic representatives and several left leaning anti-war groups such as Code Pink and Progressive Democrats of America.

The article goes on to mention Rabbi Michael Lerner, the editor of Tikkun magazine, has posted the transcript Friday on the website of the Network of Spiritual Progressives and it also mentions that Lerner had some harsh commentary about the conference call.

What was Lerner's commentary after the conference call? That the Democrats are representing "pure cowardice" (his words) in terms of their attempts to end the war; in other words, they are not going to end the war any time soon.

The Kennedy clan has always been a fascinating study to conservatives; we just can't figure how they continue to get elected. Senator Larry Craig is battling for his political life for copping to a misdemeanor charge that is specious at best. Ted Kennedy allowed a woman who was not his wife drown in his mothers vehicle while he slept it off and didn't contact the police. In fact, the first person he contacted was his lawyer and yet he remains in office nearly four decades later.

It's amazing that through the Mary-Jo Kopechne issue, expulsion from Harvard for cheating, sex scandals and various other unsavory issues, the one issue that has turned liberals against Kennedy is an environmental one:

The source of unhappiness is Kennedy's efforts to kill an offshore wind farm on Nantucket Sound. Cape Wind was to be the first such project in the United States and a source of pride to environmentally minded New Englanders. Polls show 84 percent of Massachusetts residents in favor. But now it appears that America's first offshore wind farm will be near Galveston, Texas.

Proposed the month before Sept. 11, 2001, Cape Wind remains in limbo. It's been frustrated at every turn by a handful of yachtsmen, Kennedy included, who don't want to see windmills from their verandas. Many millions have been spent spreading disinformation and smearing the wind farm's supporters.

It says something about liberals that you can be responsible for a death and not be forced to resign but go against the environmentalists and you're despised immediately. Heaven help him if he ever votes against an abortion clinic being built in Hyannisport.

Despite the best efforts of our esteemed Democratic leadership, the American public believes that yes, we can win the war in Iraq:

A majority of Americans - 54% - believe the United States has not lost the war in Iraq, but there is dramatic disagreement on the question between Democrats and Republicans, a new UPI/Zogby Interactive poll shows. While two in three Democrats (66%) said the war effort has already failed, just 9% of Republicans say the same.

The poll comes ahead of a September report to Congress by David Petraeus, commander of the multi-national force in Iraq, on the progress of the so-called surge in quelling attacks by insurgents and creating an atmosphere where the new Iraqi government can develop.

The good news for Senator Reid and Speaker Pelosi is that 86% of the people in their own party believe the surge is not working so their constant refrain of retreat and loss is working on the party which is heavily invested in our losing. At least someone in the country is actually paying attention to them.

The media has been beating the drum of losing so incessantly that it seems people just stopped paying attention to them. Perhaps they're reading alternate coverage that paints a more realistic picture of the actual situation, one in which we are in fact making progress but still have a ways to go.

It appears that stress has finally gotten to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki as the usually reserved statesman has decided to give a tongue lashing to Democrats who have been harshly critical of his leadership. Al-Maliki's words were fairly sharp. From the AP:

"There are American officials who consider as if it were one of their villages, for example Hillary Clinton and Carl Levin. They should come to their senses," al-Maliki said at a news conference.

Al-Maliki denounced recent military actions in the Baghdad Shiite neighborhoods of Shula and Sadr City that according to the Iraqis resulted in civilian deaths.

"Concerning American raids on Shula and Sadr City , there were big mistakes committed in these operations. The terrorist himself should be targeted not his family," al-Maliki said "We will not allow the detaining of innocent people."

Two nights ago the military clashed with Shiite gunmen in Shula after they attacked an American patrol. The said eight "terrorists" were killed, but some Iraqis reported civilians were among the dead and injured."

While it is somewhat annoying that Dems have no problem lashing out at US allies while taking a soft glove approach to the U.S. enemies, it would be dishonest to say that al-Maliki was anything other than a failure as his government actually furthered the sectarian divide in Iraq as opposed to eliminating. However, Iraq is a democracy and it is up to the Iraqi people and their parliament to remove him and no one else.

I'm a firm believer that Bill Clinton got off way too easily when discussing the failures of pre-9/11 intelligence gathering and our lack of response when repeatedly provoked. Yes, we were attacked prior to Clinton entering office.

The kidnapping of our hostages in Iran and the Hezbollah attack in Beirut are but two glaring examples of pre-al-Qaida terror. The hostage taking was a nadir for our country and Jimmy Carter did not have the nerve or the military to respond. Ronald Reagan also did not respond to the attack that killed 240 Marines and others in Beirut, but at the time we were in the middle of a civil war and we had no idea which side was which and who our friends were and who were our enemies.

The attacks against our interests and military in the 1990's were a different story altogether. From Mogadishu to the first World Trade Center Bombing to he African embassy bombings to the Khobar Towers to finally a direct attack on a U.S. warship -- the USS Cole -- and still we did almost nothing. We said to Osama bin-Laden "attack, we won't respond" and he was emboldened enough to first allow planning for the Millenium bombings and the Bojinka plane bombings (both luckily stopped by heads-up policewomen) while funding the attacks on the WTC and Pentagon.

Once the August recess is over, Congress has a slew of issues on the agenda. The most-important is undoubtedly General Petraeus' report on the success of the "surge".

This is an extremely touchy issue for the Democrat-led House and Senate as the liberal base is getting antsy for them to retreat and come home, the after effects be damned. Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid know full-well that we can't cut and run and their promises last November of doing so are coming back to haunt them. The Dems now have the added burden of trying to withdrawal while every news source is saying we are indeed making serious progress and they have had to shift their talking point from military failure to Iraqi government failure. That's not as easy a sell to the American public who, regardless of what polls say, want us to win.

Update (8/22/07 1425): The inter-party war begins as the nutroots take aim at those who they think betrayed the party. The fact that the only reason they won the majority was because of the Blue Dogs must escape them. Idiocy reins on the left so I say fight on amongst yourselves, donks!

Enter FreedomsWatch.org, an organization that has just spent $15-million on advertising to press the Democrats into continuing to support the war and our efforts in the War on Terror. Their efforts are coming at a crucial juncture of the WOT and could swing things come November 2008. They've released four new ads that are quite effective, this being one of them:

You can see the rest of them back-to-back here.

Here's the Washington Post's take on Freedoms Watch:

And now the Democrats, along with wavering Republicans, will face an advertising blitz from Bush supporters determined to remain on offense. A new pressure group, Freedom's Watch, will unveil a month-long, $15 million television, radio and grass-roots campaign today designed to shore up support for Bush's policies before the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, lays out a White House assessment of the war's progress. The first installment of Petraeus's testimony is scheduled to be delivered before the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees on the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a fact both the administration and congressional Democrats say is simply a scheduling coincidence.

The successes in Iraq have been amazing and the press has nearly ceased to report from the region any bad news with the exception of the Democrat talking points about the ineffectiveness of al-Maliki's government. A crucial issue, but if the surge wasn't working, it wouldn't even be a point of contention. On a separate point, how did the Democrats allow the testimony of General Petraeus to occur on 9/11? It's a day that reminds everyone of terrorist attacks that killed 3,000 people on our soil and can only psychologically work against the anti-war faction.

Get ready for a rough beginning to the next session of Congress. If Pelosi and Reid cave anymore on this issue, the nutroots left will be merciless in their attacks and will take it out on the Presidential candidates as well as Congressional leadership. Bush is pushing hard for a continuation of the War on Terror and the Democrats may be stuck in a position that has no easy extraction.

The Republicans could do worse than make Rep. Jack Murtha the poster boy of what they're trying to defeat in 2008. Over the past few days, Bob Novak has used his sources on Capitol Hill to give us a look at who House Speaker Nancy Pelosi calls on when things get a bit touchy with the ethics and earmarks subject on the House floor -- good old Jack Murtha. He's apparently now referred to openly by his nickname: "King Corruption":

Republicans returning to the House floor on Friday morning Aug. 3 after their walkout the night before were surprised to find as presiding officer the Democrat they call "King Corruption": Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania, master of earmarks and backroom deals.

...Murtha's performance as non-partisan presiding officer ran true to form. On a voice vote, Murtha ruled for Democrats when obviously more Republicans were on the House floor. He subsequently ordered a roll call vote, though members rising in support clearly fell short of the 44 required. After that ruling was challenged, Murtha declared: "The chair's decision is not subject to question."

Nice guy. And one ripe for defeat. Now we fast forward to this morning's Novak column in the Washington Post, House of Corruption?, for an update on the fight against secret earmarks attached to unrelated appropriations bills in the House. Incidentally, this is an embarrassment for both parties, not just Democrats.

I wrote yesterday that the rank and file of the Democrat party seem to actively be hoping the "surge" end badly and how upset they seemed that two liberals actually said we could possibly win it.

Well folks, it's not just the rank and file, it's elected Democrat leadership who have a major stake in us losing as well. House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC) said as much:

Clyburn noted that Petraeus carries significant weight among the 47 members of the Blue Dog caucus in the House, a group of moderate to conservative Democrats. Without their support, he said, Democratic leaders would find it virtually impossible to pass legislation setting a timetable for withdrawal.

"I think there would be enough support in that group to want to stay the course and if the Republicans were to stay united as they have been, then it would be a problem for us," Clyburn said. "We, by and large, would be wise to wait on the report."

Emphasis mine. Who the hell is "us", Congressman? I always assumed that a sitting member of Congress, not to mention the number three man in leadership, thought of "us" as the entire U.S, not just Democrats. I was sorely mistaken I guess.

The veil is coming off and what's underneath is very, very ugly. As I have written on numerous occassions, the Democrats as a whole and liberals in particular have a vested interest in seeing us lose. They don't care about the damage a loss will have on our prestige and our national security, they want to see Bush and Cheney embarrassed, the want to make gains in their majority and if it means more soldiers and Marines are killed to accomplish that, so be it. The damage these people are doing through spreading enemy propagnda is astounding and it's a of no consequence as long as they get their way.

What a sad commentary on the state of the Democrat party that hey are so hung up on power that they want us to lose a war that could have adverse consequences ranging for decades. A loss in Iraq--a major part of the War on Terror--would lead to bad things; and not just for Republicans.

Imagine if Petraeus speaks to Congress and says things are improving to the point that we should continue. Further imagine that Blue Dog Dems like Heath Shuler fall into the Petraeus camp as Clyburn fears, what would then happen to Nancy Pelosi's far-left base? Pelosi would be unable to pass any legislation and the base would blame her for not accomplishing something sooner.

Get ready for September dear readers, it's going to be excellent political theater.

Don Surber has more and a link to video.

Update: Michael Yon has filed his latest dispatch from Iraq.

Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) is the House Majority Whip and part of the Democratic congressional leadership. He said some amazingly truthful things yesterday that we don't usually hear. Speaking with Chris Cillizza from the Washington Post:

Clyburn noted that Petraeus carries significant weight among the 47 members of the Blue Dog caucus in the House, a group of moderate to conservative Democrats. Without their support, he said, Democratic leaders would find it virtually impossible to pass legislation setting a timetable for withdrawal.

"I think there would be enough support in that group to want to stay the course and if the Republicans were to stay united as they have been, then it would be a problem for us," Clyburn said. "We, by and large, would be wise to wait on the report."

Many Democrats have anticipated that, at best, Petraeus and U.S. ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker would present a mixed analysis of the success of the current troop surge strategy, given continued violence in Baghdad. But of late there have been signs that the commander of U.S. forces might be preparing something more generally positive. Clyburn said that would be "a real big problem for us."

Whoa. Did he just say what I thought he did? That good news in Iraq is bad news for the Democratic party? Well, of course it is, everyone understands that the position that the Democrats have put themselves in requires bad news for American for them to win. The Democrats could have taken a position that they supported the war but opposed Bush on other matters, or that they supported the war but would pursue much different tactics to win. But they themselves have declared from top to bottom that we've already lost in Iraq and all we're doing is waiting for the inevitable.

What if the inevitable isn't? That question apparently has Jim Clyburn spooked.

In a pretty remarkable moment of candor, Democrat Senator Chuck Schumer told an audience that he was going to unilaterally revise the "advice and consent" clause (Article II, Section 2, Clause 2) of the U.S. Constitution:

"We should reverse the presumption of confirmation," Schumer told the American Constitution Society convention in Washington. "The Supreme Court is dangerously out of balance. We cannot afford to see Justice Stevens replaced by another Roberts, or Justice Ginsburg by another Alito."

In a way this has just verbally "codified" the Democrats' position since the Reagan administration. They think that when a Republican is president, the Democrats should be able to submit judicial candidates that meet their requirements to the president, then they get to appoint them after confirmation hearings.

That's not the way it is supposed to work. The president nominates, the Senate advises and consents, and the president appoints. It has also been held that the Senate's consent isn't final. After the Senate votes to confirm, the president can deliberate further, or can drop the nomination without appointing that particular nominee. Could the opposite also be true -- if the Senate bases its opposition on pure ideology, could the president then ignore the consent clause? Not under present case law, but what if this latest "constitutional crisis" goes further?