Reply #1: This is starting to smell like the lead-up to a rout [View All]

Not that I've been particularly accurate about my predictions, although I never doubted that we were going to war as soon as the administration started seriously rumbling about it last summer.

There are just too many little things: the flagrant strutting and defiance of Chalabi, sudden desperate changes in tactics on our part, morale and ever-divided allegiances among the Iraqis themselves.

Something just smells very skittish here. The CIA's using desperate controlled leaks to make their point, fearing that they can't get through Junior's henchmen. Sudden claims of immediacy are coming from usually reliable sources like David Gergen. Confusion seems to reign.

I don't see an IMMEDIATE rout, but a building panic and series of draconian counterstrikes.

Not good.