Should Republicans go ahead and add Supreme Court Justices to head off Democrats

Wapo burys lead on story about insurgency

Dana Priest and Josh White write deep into their story:

...

Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House panel that the extremists associated with al Qaeda and Zarqawi represent "a fairly small percentage of the total number of insurgents."

Sunni Arabs, dominated by former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party, "comprise the core of the insurgency" and continue to provide "funds and guidance across family, tribal, religious and peer-group lines," Jacoby said.

Foreign fighters "are a small component of the insurgency," and Syrian, Saudi, Egyptian, Jordanian and Iranian nationals make up the majority of foreign fighters, he said.

So what did they lead their story with?

The insurgency in Iraq continues to baffle the U.S. military and intelligence communities, and the U.S. occupation has become a potent recruiting tool for al Qaeda and other terrorist groups, top U.S. national security officials told Congress yesterday.

"Islamic extremists are exploiting the Iraqi conflict to recruit new anti-U.S. jihadists," CIA Director Porter J. Goss told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

Ok, the Islamic extremist have been so successful at using the war to recruit that they make up only a small portion of the enemy in Iraq. Does the Washinton Post actually have editors who read reporters copy to see if they are internally inconsistent? Or, is it just an opinion piece that does not require consistnecy as long as the Post can run a headline that says. "

War Helps Recruit Terrorists, Hill Told

Intelligence Officials Talk Of Growing Insurgency

Of course, the other part of the story that is buried is that the intelligence data is so inconsistent there is know way to tell whether the insurgency is growing.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told the House Armed Services Committee that he has trouble believing any of the estimates of the number of insurgents because it is so difficult to track them.

Rumsfeld said that the CIA and DIA had differing assessments at different times but that U.S. intelligence estimates of the insurgency are "considerably lower" than a recent Iraqi intelligence report of 40,000 hard-core insurgents and 200,000 part-time fighters. Rumsfeld told Rep. Ike Skelton (Mo.), the committee's ranking Democrat, that he had copies of the CIA and DIA estimates but declined to disclose them in a public session because they are classified.

It would appear that the Post's Priest and White want to present a picture of the war being lost, regardless of what the facts are. Never mind that the enemy was screamingly unsuccessful in achieving his primary goal of stopping the election. Never mind that the enemy has never been able to launch a successful attack against a defended position. Never mind that the enemy is entirely incapable of sizing and holding any position anywhere in the country. Priest and White are so determined to lose this war they just ignor the facts, or select the ones that support their ridiculous position.