Defending against incompetence

Or rather, the charge of incompetence. Tom Bevan of RealClearPolitics takes on critics of the Administration who (seemingly every day) love to call Bush and interchangeable members of the brain-trust "incompetent."

The money-quote and best point in the entire piece, and it doesn't even directly address the idea of competence. Rather, it makes a keen point about those bringing the charge:

If Democrats want to say the war in Iraq was a mistake because it simply wasn't winnable in the first place, that's one thing. History may eventually bear out the merit of such an argument. The problem, however, is that Democrats who voted to authorize the invasion forfeited the right to make that argument, because no one in their right mind would vote in favor of doing something they believed was impossible.

Unable to articulate a policy difference and trapped between the pull of a fervent antiwar base and a mainstream public that remains solidly against cutting and running, Democrats abandoned debating the merits of Iraq long ago. Instead they've been focused on building the myth of Bush administration's incompetence in Iraq by touting whatever chaos and carnage is reported in the press and downplaying consequential events like tomorrow's vote.