The difference a day makes….

House Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo) says about Democrats “their best day will be the day before they release their agenda.” We’re waiting….

There is an old axiom in Republican Party politics heard often at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Memphis: Republicans win when they run on the issues. Fred Barnes of The Weekly Standard reports “some Republicans insist it doesn’t matter whether Democrats finally offer a party agenda. ‘The question is not what they promise,’ (RNC Chairman Ken) Mehlman told Barnes ‘It’s what they are going to do’ that is important.”

With the helicopter Marine One at rest in the background on the South Lawn of the White House, the President outlined conversation today marking the third anniversary of coalition intervention in Iraq. On this beautiful day in Washington, Bush spoke of efforts to enable an Iraqi government that will successfully implement a democracy, build the peace and offer America the thanks, and relief, that will come from a victory in Iraq. We hope…

Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld today opined that the war in Iraq is in a Post-victory stage, terminology which is a naïve depiction of politics (and terrorism) better understood as a reiterative process. In politics, democratic - terrorist - or other, one deed begets another, end without end. In the Washington Post, Rumsfeld restated the rationale for a free and democratic Iraq: the search for deterrence to attacks on its neighbors, quelling conspiracies with terrorists, elimination of the funding for suicide bombers and death squads seeking American victims. We wish…

Experiences in Iraq serve to remind us that democracy is a rare, and fragile, form of self-governance. Ralph Peters writes about the media’s extrapolating daily crises from minor incidents. He argues we are being misled by a systemic reliance on local Iraqi stringers who enhance their own viability by bringing bad news to journalists whose distant editors know little of the reality on the streets. An author of 20 books, Peters believes “the Arab genius for failure could still spoil everything.” But being on the ground in Iraq, riding around with today’s U.S. Army, the former intelligence officer looked for evidence of the New York Times’ declared civil war and could not find it.

My favorite military friend may mock my six syllable academic terminology but I love a good ‘systems analysis’ when I read one. Find more Ralph Peters on www.realclearpolitics.com.

Perhaps another day, even tomorrow (the first day of Spring) brings a turning point? Lessening sectarian tensions, fewer ethnic provocations, greater momentum toward democratic institution building. As Ken Mehlman says, it’s not what they promise; it’s what they are going to do that is important.