Oh what a difference a month makes.

Reality-based educator made a point in the comments yesterday about how the congressional Republicans' grandstand debate on Iraq has completely turned on them in just a month. (Remember 'cut and run'?) Just as an interesting confirmation,

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Declaring that he believes the situation in Iraq has devolved into a civil war, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said Thursday he plans to try to bring the war back up for debate on the Senate floor.

There was the WaPo story on the new, more nuanced, position the congressional Republicans are trying to manage on the war, but the spin is no longer driving Iraq. Iraq is driving Iraq, and all indications are that it's going to get worse. Yesterday,

(U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. William) Caldwell said insurgents were streaming into the capital for "an all-out assault against the Baghdad area."

"Clearly the death squad elements, the terrorist elements, know that Baghdad is a must-win for them," he said. "Whoever wins the Baghdad area, whoever is able to bring peace and security to that area, is going to set the conditions to stabilize this country."

(And, I'm sorry to even mention politics in relation to the horrors that are going on in Iraq right now, but these same Republicans I'm attacking here are, in part, responsible for the policies that have led to today's Iraq. If they had done their jobs through oversight rather than cheering on their failing president, the policy would've been shifted some time ago.)

But, I'm not the only one playing politics with Iraq. Allegedly, John Negroponte has "stonewalled" the creation of a new National Intelligence Estimate(NIE) on Iraq out of fear of the phrase "civil war."

The analysts know that it's a civil war, but there's a feeling at the top that [using that term] will complicate matters.” Negroponte, said another source regarding the potential impact of a pessimistic assessment, “doesn't want the president to have to deal with that.”

At least my mention of politics in Iraq isn't stalling policy assessment and getting people killed.