What Is it With These People?

I recently read an article reporting on a positive assessment of the Afghanistan surge by a couple researchers from the Obama-friendly Center for a New American Security. They have some decent people associated with the place, and nobody horribly inept, like Lawrence Korb, for example, as far as I can tell. But I couldn't bring myself to link to it. First, I've noted our success in Afghanistan recently, and didn't need the cover of CNAS to bolster my point right now.

More important, even a non-nutcase outfit that leans left can't get that "Iraq bad but Afghanistan good" mindset out of the way of their analysis of Afghanistan. They took a shot at the Iraq victory by stating to the effect that we are learning that unlike in Iraq we can't kill our way to victory.

Sigh. We did not try to kill our way to victory in Iraq. Strategypage highlights the guilty parties on the body count (which was much lower than the screeching harpies of the hard core Left still insist it was):

The war in Iraq did not play out quite like the mass media portrayed it. The one thing there is most agreement on is that nearly all the violence was the result of terror attacks on Shia and Sunni Arab civilians. This violence peaked in late 2006-early 2007, during which time civilian deaths were at least 3,000 a month. They have greatly declined since then, with December 2010 being the lowest, with 151 civilian deaths.

Got it? Nearly all the violence was from Syrian- and Iranian-supported Sunni Arab terrorists killing Shias and Iranian-backed Sadrists killing Sunni Arabs.

When even an outfit like CNAS can't avoid bowing to the anti-Iraq War Left, I have little reason to pay much attention to them.