Divide and conquer

Atrios makes a good point:

It's important to remember also that the administration has taken to referring dumped murdered bodies as victims of sectarian violence, while bombings tend to be attributed to an insurgency or al Qaeda [in Iraq]. This has the advantage of letting them talk about things separately, pointing to "good news" in one category or another if they can claim it exists. Also it makes all of those killed by bombs as victims of "bad guys everyone agrees must be killed" rather than part of a civil war in which taking sides is a rather problematic issue.

They've actually done this in many other ways. For example, if violence temporarily falls off in one area of the country, they'll point to that as a sign of success even if violence is increasing elsewhere. Right now, everyone points to the "good news" from Anbar Province while ignoring the disaster that Basra has become. Last month, US casualties fell off a bit (as they always do in July) and everyone pointed to that as a sign the surge was working, even though it was the worst July since the war began.