After all this, Bush offers a Timetable?

Just out: President Bush prepares to embolden the terrorists.

The Bush administration is drafting a timetable for the Iraqi government to address sectarian divisions and assume a larger role in securing the country, senior American officials said.

Details of the blueprint, which is to be presented to Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki before the end of the year and would be carried out over the next year and beyond, are still being devised. But the officials said that for the first time Iraq was likely to be asked to agree to a schedule of specific milestones, like disarming sectarian militias, and to a broad set of other political, economic and military benchmarks intended to stabilize the country.

Although the plan would not threaten Mr. Maliki with a withdrawal of American troops, several officials said the Bush administration would consider changes in military strategy and other penalties if Iraq balked at adopting it or failed to meet critical benchmarks within it.

This is about as good a move as we can expect out of this administration, but why do I have the feeling they'll still fuck it up.

(Also: Awfully similar to the Dems calls for "a year of transition.")

Later: McClatchy version of timetable.

UPDATE: Sunday morning, WAPO, the White House has gone on the record denying the NYTimes report. However, same article,

"Implicit in that is that if they are not achieving the benchmarks, we are going to have to make changes accordingly," Bartlett said, adding that troop withdrawals or other dramatic changes in U.S. policy are not being contemplated.

So, the White House line, two weeks before the elections, is that we're changing, but not changing. (The President is never wrong. He has never been wrong and will never be wrong. All hail.)