The Politico’s John Bresnahan finally got a response from Rep. John “Small Price” Boehner (R-OH) in his comments about the bargain we’re getting occupying Iraq. His comeback is pretty feeble. In so many words, Boehner’s spokesman says he didn’t mean all the Americans who had died. He meant the cost in dollar amount. But a look at his actual words and their context shows pretty clearly that doesn’t add up. Bresnahan’s got the details. Check it out.

With the president’s speech tonight it appears we are back to the supposed ‘Korea analogy’ for the occupation of Iraq. We’ve been in Korea for more than a half century, as we have been in Japan and Germany. And for all the commitment of troops and money, we now have three highly prosperous allied democracies where in two of the cases we had ardent foes.

Forgive me for saying the obvious. Because it is obvious. But sometimes, apparently, the obvious needs saying.

We garrisoned troops in these three countries for half a century, as we did in Saudi Arabia for about a decade. The periods of military government in Japan and Germany were relatively brief. And most importantly we never mounted counter-insurgency operations in any of these countries.

This simple fact tells you that all these Korean, Japan, Germany analogies are bogus.

And fundamentally why was this sustainable? Because the US troop presence was a defense against a perceived greater threat — either the Soviet Union or the Soviet Union and China. We might add that this is also the premise of our military presence in the Balkans.

On neither count is anything remotely like this in Iraq. The premise is an indefinite period of counter-insurgency and military occupation. And if things calmed down, who would we be defending Iraq against? The question answers itself. No one. If Iraq could get its act together it could certainly defend itself as it did for many decades. We are defending Iraq against itself.

Anyone with a bit of sense can see these comparisons are ridiculous.

ThinkProgress caught Chris Matthews’ reaction to President Bush’s claim that there are 36 nations with troops on the ground today in Iraq. And we’re curious too. What the hell is the president talking about? Which countries are these? There are two countries with a real troop presence in Iraq: the US and the UK. And the Brits make up only a tiny fraction of the overall ‘coalition’ force. Early on there were Spanish, Italians, Poles and a lot of other countries — not with a lot of troops but with enough to give some token international participation. But pretty much all of those countries have left now.

I know in the past the White House used to inflate these numbers by including token commitments from former US Pacific Islands protectorates. Ten guys from Micronesia. Three mechanics from the Solomon Islands.

In a lot of cases the administration has just opened up the diplomatic cookie jar to bargain for a few soldiers from countries with acute need for American help in order to puff up these numbers.

But again, this is 2007. I doubt the White House just came up with this number out of the blue. I’m sure there’s some very strained and feeble argument and data behind. But I’d really like to hear it. Anyone know who these 36 counties are?

Late Update: This is the best the AP could come up with …

There may well be 36 nations contributing to the cause, but the overwhelming majority of troops come from the United States. For example, Albania has 120 soldiers there and Bulgaria has 150 non-combat troops in Iraq. Bush visited both nations this summer as a thank you.

Okay, that’s four. 32 to go.

Laura Rozen has more on the curious case of Alexis Debat, which we mentioned briefly the other day. In particular, she looks at the sometime conflicting roles Debat played at ABC News. Meanwhile, the network continues to investigate Debat and reported yesterday:

Former President Bill Clinton, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan have added their names to the list of people who say they were the subjects of fake interviews published in a French foreign affairs journal under the name of Alexis Debat, a former ABC News consultant.

Will Bunch also takes a closer look.

All very strange.

The latest benchmark report on Iraq is out from the White House this morning. And it glows.

Criminal charges against former Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) appear unlikely.

Interesting Senate battle shaping up in New Hampshire.

From The Politico:

In his testimony, Petraeus used the military science term “battlefield geometry” in describing how he figured out the number of troops he could afford to release. A top GOP Senate adviser complained after the speech: “The president needs better ‘communication geometry’ to prevent overreaching with happy talk.”

You can almost hear the collective sigh of relief coming out of Main Justice as the reign of Alberto Gonzales officially ends.