It is best to listen with one's "third ear" on this matter. The Democrats have one problem and the Republicans another although they have some mutual interests.
Pelosi took steps to corral and keep in the nutroots antiwar faction of her party by endorsing Murtha for Majority Leader and then not using her influence and power to make this happen. Not a symptom of defeat but of success in blunting the nutrootsers influence.
When the President looked at the election results what was hinted became actual--a divided country in a time of war. Listen again to what Baker et al said. A bipartisan effort at unity is the major theme but with enough criticisms and implied failure to keep the peaceniks and nutroots in the corral again.
When faced with a challenge the President must decide what the overall goal is. He has chosen to win the war. True enough Rummy and Bolton have been thrown under the bus, but they are no longer the nidus of RAT attack. All attacks now must be on the President and this will be harder since it is hard to justify a full fledged defeat in Iraq by a full fledged frontal political assault on POTUS.
A good leader leads. He or she will sometimes make errors, suffer devastating losses but the fact that they are the ones leading should never be forgotten. It is easy to see the mistakes and errors when one does not have to make the life and death decisions the President does.
The President is doing his best to win overseas at the same time he has lost at home. Remember, he has lost not just the antiwar RATS but also a considerable segment of the Pubbie voters including almost all the Objectivists, Libertarians and Paleoconservatives. Not an easy task and I pray he will prevail.
it seems to me that the iraq study group was set up to present a "realist" analysis and set of recommendations. that is why Baker was chosen as head of it.
who set it up? who chose the members?
i am assuming bush wanted political cover to pull out of iraq.
this is very similar to what nixon did with "vietnamization" of the vietnam war: reduce the US army role to that of advisors, and let the locals fight the bad guys. then pull out troops, and declare "peace with honor".
i recently read an article by brent scowcroft claiming that vietnamization would have worked (if the dem congress hadn't sabotaged it), and that we should use the same strategy in iraq.
i think this is what is going on: "iraqization".
there may not be any real alternative--it is hard for a democratic country to fight a war without public support.