It took a long while, but the New York Times editorial board has seen enough of the war in Iraq to know that it is now “time for the United States to leave Iraq, without any more delay than the Pentagon needs to organize an orderly exit.” The paper of record makes the case in a lengthy, 1,700-word mega-editorial in today’s edition.

The Times’ editors acknowledge that they have, like many Americans, “put off that conclusion, waiting for a sign that President Bush was seriously trying to dig the United States out of the disaster he created by invading Iraq without sufficient cause, in the face of global opposition, and without a plan to stabilize the country afterward.” But the editorial board isn’t waiting anymore.

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have used demagoguery and fear to quell Americans’ demands for an end to this war. They say withdrawing will create bloodshed and chaos and encourage terrorists. Actually, all of that has already happened — the result of this unnecessary invasion and the incompetent management of this war.

This country faces a choice. We can go on allowing Mr. Bush to drag out this war without end or purpose. Or we can insist that American troops are withdrawn as quickly and safely as we can manage — with as much effort as possible to stop the chaos from spreading.

Editor & Publisher’s Greg Mitchell argues that the Times’ piece “may one day be viewed as a historic editorial.” Noting that a handful of major dailies reached the same conclusion sooner, Mitchell adds that the Times’ detailed argument comes at “a critical moment,” which the paper may influence with “its considerable weight.”

We’ll see. I’m skeptical that any editorial can have a sweeping an impact on a debate of this magnitude, but the Times’ piece is both comprehensive and compelling. Take a look.

When the president commuted Scooter Libby’s prison sentence, the conventional wisdom told us that the White House was anxious to score a few points with the far-right GOP base, which has slowly distanced itself from Bush over the last several months.

Byron York suggests today the commutation, if it was a political ploy, didn’t work.

Bush came up with a cramped, limited statement, commuting Libby’s jail term while keeping (at least for now) his conviction, a $250,000 fine that he has already paid and two years of probation. One didn’t have to read too far between the lines to guess that the president believes Libby to be guilty of perjury; just for good measure, Bush threw in some good words for Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald. The problem, the president said, wasn’t that Fitzgerald had gone on a three-year fishing expedition that netted only Libby, or that the Iraq war’s foes were using the CIA leak case to rehash their grievances against the original decision to invade; rather, the problem was simply that U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton’s sentence was “excessive.”

For many conservatives, it was exactly the wrong way to approach the problem. […]

In other words, if Bush had pardoned Libby because the CIA leak probe never should have happened, fine. But don’t play judge, Mr. President — that’s not your branch.

This is consistent with what we’ve been hearing most of the week. Bob Novak reported a couple of days ago that other than Libby, “hardly anybody else is all that happy” with Bush’s decision.

Similarly, the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page was in rare form this week, calling the commutation “a profile in non-courage.”

Frankly, I think the talk about Bush’s concern for the base is probably overwrought. The president wasn’t trying to impress deserting Republican activists; he was abusing his power to “shortcircuit the investigation of a crime to which he himself was quite likely a party, and to which, his vice president, who controls him, certainly was.”

Nevertheless, York’s piece does speak to a broader truth: even the president’s far-right flank is suffering from acute “Bush fatigue.”

Here we go. White House to say “no no no no” to all coming Congressional subpoena deadlines from the U.S. attorney firings investigation.

John Edwards may be falling behind in the race for campaign cash, but he’s encouraging supporters to remember Howard Dean’s fate in the 2004 race, despite his fundraising prowess. That and other political news of the day in today’s Election Central Sunday Roundup.

In light of the letter from Sara Taylor’s lawyer to the Senate Judiciary Committee, Atrios asks a question I’ve been mulling over myself.

What possible authority does the White House have to try to prevent a former employee from testifying about something? How can they White House “not let her” testify?

Obviously if she doesn’t want to testify they can play legal games to try to prevent her from being compelled to testify, but she’s said she’s willing. How can they stop her?

I suppose the natural White House response is that Bush is concerned about the ability of presidents to get unvarnished advice from his aides, and if a president’s team has to worry about discussing internal Oval Office deliberations, aides might hold back. Or something. It’s never been entirely clear to me.

But with Taylor, the argument is not only flawed for the reasons Atrios explained, but also because it defies the White House’s own defense: the president, the Bush gang says, was not integrally involved with the U.S. Attorney purge. There were no internal Oval Office deliberations, because Bush was out of the loop, according to the White House line.

This makes the tack on Taylor even more confusing. The White House is effectively claiming that a former aide, who no longer works for the administration and is willing to testify, can’t talk about conversations with the president she didn’t have.

I’d only add that there also seems to be some confusion about what, exactly, the White House is telling Taylor and her lawyer. The AP reported today that the administration is “urging” Taylor to ignore a subpoena. The letter from Taylor’s lawyer to the Senate Judiciary Committee, however, explains that the White House Counsel’s office is “directing her not to comply.” The letter goes on to say that Taylor would “testify without hesitation,” were it not for the White House’s “direction.”

The difference is not just semantics. The AP piece suggests the White House simply prefers that Taylor ignore a congressional subpoena. The letter from Taylor’s lawyer explains that the White House has effectively given her an order not to cooperate.

Can the Senate hear testimony from Patrick Fitzgerald? Chuck Schumer broached the subject this morning on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Schumer: One thing, and I’ve spoken to [Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat] Leahy about this, that we’re thinking about doing is calling Patrick Fitzgerald, the prosecutor, before us.

You know, he’s not allowed to talk about what happened before the grand jury, but he did interview the president and the vice president, not before a grand jury, and [Fitzgerald] might have some very interesting things to say.

He issued a rare statement after the commutation that was very harsh in condemning it — and with good reason. […]

CBS: When would you like to see Mr. Fitzgerald come to Capitol Hill?

Schumer: Well, you know, this would be Sen. Leahy’s call, but I talked to him about it yesterday and he seemed inclined to do it. It would be very interesting and we’d like to hear what he has to say. Obviously he can’t talk about anything that occurred in the grand jury, but there’s a lot else that he might be able to tell us. Because obviously, with the commutation of Libby, and with no one else meeting a criminal standard, but still something terrible being done in the name of an agent being leaked…we sure want to get more answers.

Stay tuned.

One of the curious ambiguities of the Libby commutation controversy is what role Dick Cheney played in the process. As the recent Washington Post series made clear, not much happens in this White House without the VP’s direct involvement (i.e., dictation), but what did Cheney do to keep his former chief of staff out of jail?

The Bush gang has been more than a little cagey about the details, which generally hints at the answer. The Post reported this week, “An unanswered question last night was Vice President Cheney’s role in advocating leniency for his former chief of staff and alter ego.”

Reporters tried to get a few more details out of Tony Snow on Tuesday, but came up short. At one point, Snow told the press corps, “I’m sure that the vice president may have expressed an opinion,” but added shortly thereafter, “[Cheney] may have recused himself.”

Michael Isikoff sheds some light on the subject, noting the internal deliberations.

The president was conflicted. He hated the idea that a loyal aide would serve time. Hanging over his deliberations was Cheney, who had said he was “very disappointed” with the jury’s verdict. Cheney did not directly weigh in with Fielding, but nobody involved had any doubt where he stood. “I’m not sure Bush had a choice,” says one of the advisers. “If he didn’t act, it would have caused a fracture with the vice president.”

Well, we certainly can’t have that, now can we? (Bush may not have had a “choice”? It’s good to know who’s in charge in the West Wing.)

Isikoff also added an interesting detail I hadn’t heard before: Bush asked White House Counsel Fred Fielding to help determine whether Libby’s jury made the right call. Far from respecting the verdict, as the White House has been emphasizing all week, the president hoped to find that the jurors came to an unreasonable conclusion, which in turn would make it easier for Bush to intervene.

Fielding came up empty. As Isikoff explained it, he “reluctantly concluded that the jury had reached a reasonable verdict: the evidence was strong that Libby testified falsely about his role in the leak.”

In other words, the president learned just how guilty Libby really was, but commuted the sentence anyway because he “hated the idea that a loyal aide would serve time.”

Well, that and the fact that Libby still had plenty of damaging information about Bush and Cheney that they needed to keep under wraps.

During an interview this morning on “Meet the Press,” David Gregory interviewed Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) about the war, and noted the political dynamic surrounding the Maliki government.

“Seventy-four members of parliament have boycotted, as you say, the 275-member body. There’s 12 ministers from the 38-member Cabinet no longer attending Cabinet meetings. There was an oil revenue law where they would share between Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites that was passed but without Sunni participation, which renders it virtually meaningless, and the agreement on the oil revenue part has still not been struck. So this is that fundamental question for the government of Nouri al-Maliki: Can he actually govern a unity government?”

The answer is increasingly clear.

For four years, Iraqis have been waiting in lines at gas stations in Baghdad, waiting for their lives to get better. But, as CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan reports, the situation has gotten worse and their government is now in crisis.

That has led senior Iraqi leaders to demand drastic change. CBS News has learned that on July 15, they plan to ask for a no-confidence vote in the Iraqi parliament as the first step to bringing down the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Even those closest to the Iraqi prime minister, from his own party, admit the political situation is desperate.

“I feel there is no strategy, so the people become hopeless,” said Faliy al Fayadh, an MP from the Dawa Party. “You can live without petrol, without electricity, but you can’t live without hope.”

The Bush administration’s security goals aren’t being met, its political goals aren’t being met, and now the president’s team is left scrambling for “alternative evidence of progress” — in lieu of, say, actual evidence of progress — while the Maliki government falls apart at the seams.

No wonder Colin Powell is now, five years later, arguing that he tried to stop this calamity before it started.

Oddly enough, the president used to be fairly responsible when describing al Qaeda’s role in Iraqi violence. Not too terribly long ago, Bush described “the terrorists affiliated with or inspired by al Qaeda” — not even the network itself — as the “smallest” component of violence in Iraq.

As the political winds shifted, so too did the administration’s rhetoric. In May, Bush declared that al Qaeda is “public enemy No. 1 in Iraq.” A few days ago, he reiterated the point at the Naval War College, describing al Qaeda as “the main enemy” in Iraq.

The point is as subtle as a sledgehammer. If the administration can transform al Qaeda from a minor player in Iraq to the sole purpose for our ongoing presence, simply through rhetorical games, Bush might reframe the debate: us vs. them. Americans against those responsible for 9/11. Forces of freedom vs. forces of terrorism.

I understand the appeal of such a dynamic — it would make the war in Iraq so much easier — but it’s simply, unquestionably wrong. Worse, it’s a shamelessly cynical ploy to rally public support under false pretenses. Americans don’t support U.S. staying in the middle of a civil war, but maybe, the White House thinks, Americans will support a war against al Qaeda. It’s a transparent con job.

Glenn Greenwald recently had an excellent item explaining that several major media outlets, most notably the New York Times, have been buying into the administration’s rhetorical shift. Today, to his enormous credit, the Times’ public editor, Clark Hoyt, tackled the subject head on a terrific column.

[I]n using the language of the administration, the newspaper has also failed at times to distinguish between Al Qaeda, the group that attacked the United States on Sept. 11, and Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, an Iraqi group that didn’t even exist until after the American invasion. […]

I went back and read war coverage for much of the month of June and found many stories that conveyed the complexity and chaos of today’s Iraq…. But those references to Al Qaeda began creeping in with greater frequency. Susan Chira, the foreign editor, said she takes “great pride in the whole of our coverage” but acknowledged that the paper had used “excessive shorthand” when referring to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. “We’ve been sloppy,” she said. […]

On Thursday, she and her deputy, Ethan Bronner, circulated a memo with guidelines on how to distinguish Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia from bin Laden’s Al Qaeda.

It’s a good move. I’d have been happier still if The Times had helped its readers by doing a deeper job of reporting on the administration’s drive to make Al Qaeda the singular enemy in Iraq.

Military experts will tell you that failing to understand your enemy is a prescription for broader failure.

There’s certainly no guarantee that the White House will stop playing cynical rhetorical games just because they got caught — they are a shameless bunch — but items like Hoyt’s help set the record straight. With a little luck, they might even help improve reporting on the war and discourage the Bush gang from playing the electorate for fools.

File under a bit late in the day, but still interesting to know. And I’d like to know what Bush told him in response …

THE former American secretary of state Colin Powell has revealed that he spent 2½ hours vainly trying to persuade President George W Bush not to invade Iraq and believes today’s conflict cannot be resolved by US forces.

“I tried to avoid this war,” Powell said at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado. “I took him through the consequences of going into an Arab country and becoming the occupiers.”