A new benchmark for Iraq

In a tea cozy chat with CBS's Katie Couric, George Bush, unwittingly or perhaps not, off-handedly announced a new metric by which to measure the success of the "surge" in Iraq.

If you look at my comments over the past eight months, it's gone from a security situation in the sense that we're either going to get out and there will be chaos, or more troops. Now the situation has changed where I'm able to speculate on the hypothetical. . . . Isn't that remarkable?

Why, yes, that is remarkable! and no less than for who actually uttered such a multisyllabic phrase. Bush speculating about "the hypothetical" hardly seems like something he's done before, ergo, this is a sign of certain progress. Bush's ability to "speculate on the hypothetical" is the new, new benchmark of success. Which means ... we've already won! Hooray!