Reflections of a stormy petrel

The campaign began when, as I said, the conventional wisdom was that Iraq was a "quagmire" and unwinnable. Things since then have changed, which catches the Democratic candidates in a bind: do they accept that things have improved in Iraq, which means conceding that their opponents have a point, or do they insist and pretend nothing has happened? What both have done has been to heavily qualify the promise to abandon the country in interviews - Obama: "Of course I would not take any such action without first consulting with the American commanders and the Iraqi leadership", etc -without actually removing it from their platforms (because if they did they would be assaulted by the Netroots, who are already going insane at the thought that Obama would not actually be happy to see Israel destroyed). And that shows once again the ancient, ancient truth that anyone who follows elections ougth to know in their bones - that of all things in an election, the written platform is by far the least important.