James Joyner blogs:As our ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, recently told Congress, “We are buying time at a cost of the lives of our soldiers.” Unfortunately, the signs that those lives are buying much progress on that front are non-existent....

I continue to believe that regardless of polls, stump speeches, and Senate votes, we're probably going to have a substantial troop presence in Iraq for the foreseeable future (I have a good story about long-term vs. short-term planning I'll have to tell you some time). However, my prediction is that if we do withdraw our forces by, say, spring of 2008 and if the worst-case scenario does come to pass, that one of two explanations will be put forward:

1) well, it would have happened whether we were there or not (obviously untrue but appealing)

2) we really didn't believe it would get this bad (possibly the truth)