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Politics : I Will Continue to Continue, to Pretend....
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To: Sully- who wrote (17936)3/22/2006 4:18:11 AM
From: Sully-  Read Replies (1) of 35834
 
    [T]he shift of meme from the "insurgency" to a "civil 
    war" is a backhanded way of admitting the military defeat 
    of the insurgency without abandoning the characterization 
    of Iraq is an American fiasco.

THE BELMONT CLUB LOOKS AT CLAIMS OF CIVIL WAR IN IRAQ:

Via Instapundit

<<< So what's the truth? The principle in determining truth should be to apply the factual indicator test. A civil war is a visible event whose indicators include the insubordination of armed units, mass refugee flows, the rise of rival governments, etc. The test is whether those events are being observed. What famous individuals say about a situation is a shortcut for encapsulating a factual assessment; it describes reality as public figures see it but is not the reality itself. . . .

Politically what's interesting is how the narrative has changed. Nobody is talking about the Sunni insurgency succeeding any more. Even the press hardly makes the claim of an insurgency on the brink of success. As late as November 2005, the Daily Kos was boasting:
    "The occupation is exacerbating terrorism in the country. 
    America is losing, the insurgency is winning. Maybe we 
    should say, 'has won.'"
But by the December 2005 elections this view could no longer be held by anyone with the slightest regard for the facts. . . .

Instead of insurgency the talking points have changed to how Sunnis might soon become victims of an ethnically hostile Iraqi army in a Civil War. Going from a boast of conquest to a portrayal of victim is usually an indicator of something. In my view, the shift of meme from the "insurgency" to a "civil war" is a backhanded way of admitting the military defeat of the insurgency without abandoning the characterization of Iraq is an American fiasco. It was Zarqawi and his cohorts themselves who changed the terms of reference from fighting US forces to sparking a 'civil war'. With any luck, they'll lose that campaign too.

Indeed.

UPDATE: MurdocOnline says that it is a civil war of sorts, and I agree with that.
murdoconline.net

(See this post from 2004 on the subject).
instapundit.com

But the press coverage is presenting it as something very different -- a sea change in what's going on, as opposed to, well, what was going on in 2004.

instapundit.com

fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com
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