McCain's "Sensible" Op-Ed

John McCain and "sensible" do not seem likely to occur together in anybody's phraseology after the past couple weeks. That's not to say that he won't think so, of course. In today's WaPo, we get just that from him, in an Op-Ed entitled "The War You're not Reading About". He more or less concludes:

We have a long, tough road ahead in Iraq. But for the first time since 2003, we have the right strategy. . . . And we will have the right mix and number of forces.
There is no guarantee that we will succeed, but we must try. As every sensible observer has concluded, the consequences of failure in Iraq are so grave and so threatening for the region, and to the security of the United States, that to refuse to give Petraeus's plan a chance to succeed would constitute a tragic failure of American resolve. . . . This is not a moment for partisan gamesmanship or for one-sided reporting.

Well, well. One especially likes the "every sensible observer" line: even granting that there may be some "sensible" experts who think some sort of "success" (whatever that might be) is yet achievable, it is profoundly untrue to deny that there are any who do not think that American forces can achieve much useful. That is to say, McCain himself is here engaging in "partisan gamesmanship [and] one-sided reporting." I agree with the sentiment that "this is not a moment" for that, and that makes what he writes simply despicable. It's hard to credit anything else he has to say.

I first read this item in TPMCafe this morning on McCain's op-ed. It, and also the attached discussion which includes real debates on the political and military strategy of withdrawal, is well worth a read.