Surging The Republican Caucus

Nico at Think Progress: This morning on the Chris Matthews Show, NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell revealed that Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, met “very recently” with the Senate Republican caucus to discuss their strategy on Iraq legislation. “Petraeus went to the Republican caucus and told them, I will have real progress to you by August,” Mitchell said. The Republicans claim they told him that after August, they will end their support for the war. “They have told him at a caucus meeting as very, very recently, that if there isn’t progress by August — and real progress means not a day of violence and a day of sanity — that they will pull the plug.” Nico, as usual, has both video clip and transcript. Two things - Firstly, why is Petraeus in a closed-door session with the Senate minority to plot a legislative strategy for countering the Senate majority's legislation? Does he work for the United States or for George Bush? Maybe someone could explain to the general that there's a distinction between Bush as President and Bush as just another political hack - because for sure Bush himself doesn't see any such distinction. Secondly, this means the Republican caucus, as one of Nico's commenters puts it " did not believe it would work, the Generals told them it wouldn’t work, it failed three times before, and they still voted to send more troops into harm’s way." All so they could march in lockstep together into Dubya's bright future. Their contempt for the people they supposedly serve beggars belief. And the surge so far isn't helping Iraq as a whole. The AP says: "The U.S. military death toll in March, the first full month of the security crackdown, was nearly twice that of the Iraqi army" but the BBC gets to the real tragedy - "Iraqi figures estimate civilian deaths in violence across the country rose by 13% last month". So while the US military and the rightwing cheerleaders are telling us that violence is down 25% in Baghdad, all that means it that the bad guys moved out of town and that things are actually worse overall because of Petraeus' efforts.