Then: Commander Guy, introducing journalist Kagan's spooge surge:

BUSH: To establish its authority, the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq's provinces by November.

Yesterday: the comedy stylings of Pony Blow:

Q And in terms of the various benchmarks and schedules, this surge began with a plan to turn over security to the Iraqis by November. Are we still on track to do that?

MR. SNOW: You mean on all the provinces? [Yeah, Bush said "Iraq," right?] We'll have to take a look at what they have. I don't think we're probably going to get there, but I'm not sure. I haven't seen the report. Again, November is -- if you're going to look for a November guess, I'd probably wait for the September report, rather than the July.

Never mind.

Winning is good. Losing is bad. But as I keep telling the wingers:

Even worse than losing is losing and looking stupid, craven, inept, criminal, and like the kind of monarch who can't cut his losses, and can only hang onto power through ruthless and very personal tactics inside the eminently blackmailable Beltway--full of quivering aspens as it is.

Because losing that way would be really bad.

NOTE Oddly, or not--it doesn't fit into the Republican Revolt narrative, I suppose--today's WaPo story ignores that particular goalpost move.