Did not the Bush Administration and Pentagon both say that the engagement in Iraq would be long, arduous, and costly?

Well, yeah, they did.

So why is "since the Bush Administration declared an end to major combat" the most oft-used phrase in today's media?

Returning from four weeks of holiday, in which I did my best to avoid all news, I find myself again somewhat shocked by the sheer malice of the mainstream media. The journalists themselves are overwhelmingly 'liberal'. In the U.S., for instance, they have been shown to vote as a class for Democrats over Republicans by margins of more than ten-to-one; and further, that they tend to identify with the left wing of that Democrat Party. They want to bring down President Bush, at all costs; and if Iraq is turned back into a Saddamite killing field, or Al Qaeda is given a new lease on life, they don't particularly care. For they smell Republican blood.

David Warren expounds.