Iraq: Spinning Quagmire into Gold

The Washington Post reports on an "unusual public-relations effort by the Pentagon and the U.S. Agency for International Development ... to improve Americans' opinions about the Iraq conflict." USAID's reports on the number of insurgent attacks are now "restricted to those who need it for security planning." The Pentagon "is sponsoring a group of Iraqi Americans and former officials from the Coalition Provisional Authority to speak at [U.S.] military bases." And "the U.S. government and a representative of President Bush's reelection campaign" were "heavily involved in drafting the speech given to Congress last week by interim Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi."