So I'm sitting around reading the 1/31 issue of Time magazine and I see that this story says, with regard to the Iraqi insurgency, that its "estimated strength could be higher than 20,000." Then I see that this story says, "According to a senior U.S. commander in Iraq, U.S. forces are rounding up 1,000 suspected insurgents a week."

Wow! Amazing! Four and a half months and we'll have all of them! Every last insurgent!

Anyone actually believe that? Good. You can write me a check for the swampland.

Good Lord -- it's the Vietnam body count all over again. We're kicking ass! Really! Look how many more dead VC there are than Americans! Yeah, right.

We're not rounding up 1,000 "suspected insurgents" a week. Maybe we're rounding up 1,000 warm bodies a week, a small percentage of whom may prove, perhaps after months of abuse, to be insurgents. The rest? Whoops! Their tough luck.

Also in that second story, I see that Lieutenant General John R. Vines, who's about to become the ground commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, has recently had discussions with Paul Wolfowitz.

The two men agreed that the new Iraqi government may have to increase the ranks of its army soldiers, police and border-patrol agents beyond the 271,000 personnel the U.S. has projected the Iraqis need.

Excuse me: If the U.S. thinks the Iraqis will need 271,000 personnel -- or, in fact, more -- why doesn't the U.S. think the coalition needs at least 271,000 personnel now? Why does the administration keep insisting that we're doing just fine with 150,000 of our own troops plus about 30,000 non-U.S. troops?