Hot Air has a great article regarding how out of step the Democratic leaders, including the two presidential candidates, are on the war. While 2006 may have been a referendum on the war, I think it is clear that although the American people were not happy with the course of events at that time, I don’t think that they were bent on cutting & running like a large number of the Democrat politicians. In 2006, the war was not going very well, and the main message we were getting from the White House was that we would “stay the course.” Unfortunately, staying the course is not a strategy to win. It is resolve to see a strategy through, but it is not a strategy unto itself, and it was clear that we needed a new strategy. The surge was that strategy. And the surge has worked. We have seen a large amount of progress in Iraq, and it is time to admit that. It is time to stop pushing for defeat. It is time to say that we will not abandon the Iraqis like we did the South Vietnamese. And given the latest tape from Bin Laden saying how great a base of operations Iraq would be, it is clear that there is a strategic interest in staying until we see a stable, self governing Iraq.