Approaching the Midnight Hour

Elizabeth Williamson, Melanie Trottman and Stephen Power write in the Wall Street Journal: "President-elect Barack Obama is signaling by a combination of words and deeds that his administration will toughen regulations at federal agencies that oversee consumer products, environmental policy and workplace safety.

"Mr. Obama has named a number of people to his transition teams for regulatory agencies who favor a firmer government hand in overseeing industry behavior. In addition, Mr. Obama has indicated in a series of pre-election letters to a big federal employee union that he intends to take a more pro-union approach on labor questions than his predecessor, and give agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency more money."

Victory in Iraq?

I've written before about how the Bush administration's attempt to lock in its Iraq policies with a status-of-forces agreement backfired, and instead led Iraqis to demand a withdrawal timetable.

Now, in trying to spin the agreement as a success, the White House is declaring victory in Iraq.

"We believe that the conditions are such now that we are able to celebrate the victory that we've had so far," White House Press Secretary Dana Perino announced at yesterday's press briefing.

But victory is a dangerous thing to claim in Iraq. Remember "Mission Accomplished"? Even Gen. David H. Petraeus, head of the U.S. Central Command, won't use the word -- and for good reason.

There's no doubt the security situation in Iraq has improved dramatically since the beginning of the year. But what's not at all clear is whether this is a remission -- or just an intermission. If victory is a secular, democratic and pro-Western Iraq, then despite a little movement around the edges, there's not very much to celebrate.

Mary Beth Sheridan writes in The Washington Post: "With violence down sharply this year, the U.S. military is broadening its efforts to reconcile Sunnis and Shiites, reintegrate former insurgents into society and repair the rift between residents and their government.

"But as American forces begin to withdraw, some Iraqis question the long-term impact of the pacification campaign. Iraq has no history of democracy, and the government that has come to power since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion is sharply divided along sectarian lines.

"'The idea or identity of this is American, not Iraqi,' Kassim Daoud, a former Iraqi national security minister, said of the U.S. efforts. Although the Iraqi government has declared its support for reconciliation, he said, 'it hasn't got a real program or a map.'"

One way to look at the situation in Iraq is this: Maybe things will fall apart when the U.S. troops leave; or maybe the Iraqis will make peace with each other. But in either case, our continued presence is simply postponing things, not actually making them better.

Ben Armbruster writes for ThinkProgress: "The firm redeployment deadline is less a declaration of victory and more a reflection of Iraqis' long-held dissatisfaction with the occupation."