E Pluribus Unum

Admit it -- you've heard it time and again: "General Petraeus literally wrote the book on counterinsurgency." Problem is, the Bushies haven't read it.

Arianna:

[Petraeus'] newly-minted counterinsurgency approach calls for a ratio of 25 soldiers per 1,000 residents -- which would require 120,000 soldiers to provide the proper security for Baghdad, and roughly three times that amount for all of Iraq.

But let's just focus on the 120,000 soldiers that, according to the manual written by Petraeus -- "the expert on counterinsurgency," remember? -- are needed to secure Baghdad.

Simply put: we're not even close to that number. And never will be. Even after all of the planned 21,500 additional troops are sent to the embattled capitol, there will still only be 85,000 security forces there -- and that includes significant numbers of Iraqi security forces, whose readiness and loyalty have repeatedly proven to be unreliable at best...

Petraeus' manual also says that a muscular military presence is just 20 percent of what is needed for a counterinsurgency effort to succeed -- the other 80 consists of establishing political and economic reform, two areas in which the United States is also failing miserably.

This is a pretty devastating analysis -- and one that almost anyone should be able to deduce from the available facts. That we're not hearing it from the traditional media nor from the administration, the fact that the same old gasbag pundits are telling us to wait and see until September -- well, no matter. The American people aren't being fooled. They agree with Harry Reid: victory is not an option and our continued occupation of Iraq is simply bleeding us dry.

Gen. Petraeus can't change that -- and he should be ashamed of himself for selling out to an administration that is using him to prop itself up.