Bayh's comments were descriptions of a closed-door session between top U.s. intelligence officials and the Senate Armed Services Committee and match what the would-be Czar himself had to say.

President Bush's nominee to be war czar said yesterday that conditions in Iraq have not improved significantly despite the influx of U.S. troops in recent months and predicted that, absent major political reform, violence will continue to rage over the next year.

Lute's dour assessment mirrored the views of U.S. intelligence officials, who told the Senate Armed Services Committee in a closed session last month that trends in Iraq remain negative and that the prospect for political movement by the nation's feuding Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds appears marginal.

All the above are largely echoes of the Iraq National Intelligence Estimate which was released this past February, prior to The Surge &trade.

-The term "civil war" "accurately describes key elements of the Iraqi conflict," though it "does not adequately capture the complexity of the conflict":

-Iran is "not likely to be a major driver of violence or the prospects for stability":

-"Rapid withdrawal" of U.S. forces would likely lead to a "significant increase in the scale and scope of sectarian conflict in Iraq":

Yet again we have proof that there is No Military Solution to Iraq. We really don't need to keep letting them kill us over there, so they don't come and kill us over here. This isn't to say the fight is lost, only that we're fighting on the wrong battlefield and need to move from force of arms, to force of ideas.

Unfortunately, our biggest problem remains who the person decidering those ideas happens to be.

Vyan