But it is news when:

- people like Powell warned that if u break it, you own it

- you have Cheney saying almost a year ago that "I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency."

- generals like Shinseki are ignored when they tell the admin that we'll need a couple hundred thousand troops

- articles come out like this one http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/13984788.htm that state:

WASHINGTON - U.S. intelligence agencies repeatedly warned the White House beginning more than two years ago that the insurgency in Iraq had deep local roots, was likely to worsen and could lead to civil war, according to former senior intelligence officials who helped craft the reports.

Among the warnings, Knight Ridder has learned, was a major study, called a National Intelligence Estimate, completed in October 2003 that concluded that the insurgency was fueled by local conditions - not foreign terrorists- and drew strength from deep grievances, including the presence of U.S. troops.

Robert Hutchings, the chairman of the National Intelligence Council from 2003 to 2005, said the October 2003 study was part of a "steady stream" of dozens of intelligence reports warning Bush and his top lieutenants that the insurgency was intensifying and expanding.

"Frankly, senior officials simply weren't ready to pay attention to analysis that didn't conform to their own optimistic scenarios," Hutchings said in a telephone interview.

And that happens to dovetail with a new, bleak pentagon assessment of Iraqi troop strength (http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/02/24/iraq.security/index.html?section=cnn_topstories):

Pentagon: Iraqi troops downgraded
No Iraqi battalion capable of fighting without U.S. support

The only Iraqi battalion capable of fighting without U.S. support has been downgraded to a level requiring them to fight with American troops backing them up, the Pentagon said Friday. The battalion, made up of 700 to 800 Iraqi Army soldiers, has repeatedly been offered by the U.S. as an example of the growing independence of the Iraqi military. The competence of the Iraqi military has been cited as a key factor in when U.S. troops will be able to return home.

Which, according to GDub, correllates to when we can get the hell out of there.

Repeated examples our this administration living in a bubble is news. Even when these examples crop up again and again.


>>http://articles.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20060227192009990005
>>
>>Look at the pics. Do you still think the Iraqi's view us as liberators?
>
>To me this is not news at all. Outright civil war between Shiite and Sunni Muslims, with Kurds in there somewhere as a wild card, has been my expectation for Iraq from the day we invaded and the existing regime collapsed. I'm not necessarily saying they were better off under Saddam than they will be when we leave, but I wasn't expecting some happy outcome where they all get along like a Girl Scout troop, either.