WHO'S DOING THE WRITING?

Atrios points out this part of an LA Times article:

Top general may propose pullbacks

Petraeus is expected to tell Congress
that Iraqis can assume duties in some areas,
freeing U.S. troops for other uses.
By Julian E. Barnes and Peter Spiegel,
Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
August 15, 2007

Despite Bush's repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government.

Just before this paragraph, we have this one:

Administration and military officials acknowledge that the September report will not show any significant progress on the political benchmarks laid out by Congress. How to deal in the report with the lack of national reconciliation between Iraq's warring sects has created some tension within the White House.


Obviously, the WH spin doctors will be working overtime on this report. A little more troubling is a very misleading statement from Petraeus reported in USA Today:

The well-spoken, quick-thinking West Point graduate said the shift in loyalty among many Sunni insurgents in Iraq's western Anbar province, Baghdad's Amariyah district and a similar hotspot in the city called Ghazaliyah was "a pretty big deal."

"You have to pinch yourself a little to make sure that is real because that is a very significant development in this kind of operation in counterinsurgency.

"It's all about the local people. When all the sudden the local people are on the side of the new Iraq instead of on the side of the insurgents or even al-Qaeda, that's a very significant change."


As others have pointed out, the Sunnis who have turned against Al Qaeda HAVE NOT decided to support the central government.