After speaking to experts and evaluating the integrity of the Bush White House’s assertions that the so-called surge has been successful in Iraq, the Washington Post writes, “The U.S. military’s claim that violence has decreased sharply in Iraq in recent months has come under scrutiny from many experts within and outside the government, who contend that some of the underlying statistics are questionable and selectively ignore negative trends.”

It seems that, in order to justify continuing the military occupation of Iraq, the White House is taking thin data and extrapolating upon it far beyond the limits of its validity. In other words, the same problems with twisting intelligence for political purposes that got the United States into Iraq in the first place is even now keeping the United States stuck there.

George W. Bush and the pro-war Republicans still have not learned one of the most important lessons of the failure of the Iraq War: Do not found American foreign policy upon dishonestly manipulated information about what’s really going on in the world outside our borders.

(Source: Washington Post, September 6, 2007)