For that matter, is the Saudi government doing as much as it can to stop its young men from trooping to Iraq to kill Americans?

The president knows we have to win this war. If some of his subordinates are trying to find ways to escape from it, he needs to assert control over them, overrule them or replace them. What the president needs to do now is tell the Pentagon to stop talking about (and planning for) withdrawal, and make sure they are planning for victory.

With this action, in one fell swoop, the president deprived himself and his supporters of the easiest argument for his next nominee: that surely a reelected conservative president is entitled to replace a conservative justice — Rehnquist — with another conservative.

Surely the United States should do what it can to prevent dictators elsewhere from inferring that repression works.

The Defense Department apparently refused a CIA request to launch an attack on a Syrian terror-sponsoring target within the last two weeks.

I don't think this is serious. Most conservatives are very pleased. . . . He has a long record, and has been very consistent.

For one thing, Democrats can explain that resolutions of censure have typically been reserved for ethics violations, not for meretricious statements - thereby perhaps succeeding in confusing the debate and wriggling off the hook.

[Even some of President George W Bush's staunch supporters are worried.] He is a strong President but he has never really focused on the importance of good execution, ... I think that is true in many parts of his presidency.

Would any of [the president's] aides have the nerve to explain to the president that a Gonzales nomination would utterly demoralize many of his supporters?