Why not get out of Iraq now? Immediately. No phased withdrawal. No graceful exit. No fig-leaf of victory.

Here’s the first argument: Iraq will fall into chaos.

Well, it’s already in chaos.

Argument No. 2: America will be humiliated in the world.

Could we be more humiliated?

Actually, I’m not sure getting out is right.

But I suspect that all the foreplay with the Iraq Study Group is about finding a politically palatable way to get out – with both Democrats and Republicans escaping blame in 2008.

I respect Senator John McCain for saying we ought to put in more troops and win.

But I don’t think that’s quite the political risk it is made out to be. We’re not going to do what he suggests, so McCain can always say I told you so.

If we don’t follow McCain’s advice – and if Bush and the Democrats come up with a fig-leaf strategy – aren’t we going down the same road as Nixon in Vietnam from 1968 to 1972?

And will that road be paved on the bodies of more dead American men and women?

As John Kerry once famously asked: Who wants to be the last person to die for a mistake?

I hope the politicians spend as much time thinking about those lives as they do about their own political hides.

The risk for Republicans is obvious: Pay the same price in 2008 that you paid this year.

The risk for Democrats is also obvious: Be painted again as weaklings who won’t protect America, like 2002 and 2004.

But the risk to our troops is far greater.

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