We know the GOP strategy for November 7 is to try to scare the crap out if the Republican base by talking about all the horrible things that will happen if Democrats control all or part of Congress -- but why, at the same time, are the Bushies permitting an unprecedented level of truth-telling on Iraq?

The United States military command in Iraq acknowledged on Thursday that its 12-week-old campaign to win back control of Baghdad from sectarian death squads and insurgents had failed to reduce violence across the city....

In one of the most somber assessments of the war by American commanders, a statement read by the spokesman, Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, said the campaign had been marked by increasing attacks on American troops and a spike in combat deaths. Attacks soared by 22 percent, he said, during the first three weeks of Ramadan....

The general’s remarks [were] unusual for their candor and unvarnished portrayal of bad news...

... he has struck a generally upbeat tone in his briefings since arriving here this spring....

I don't believe this is some genie the Bushies couldn't keep in the bottle -- the Bushies have always managed to enforce message discipline. They want this message out. They've suddenly decided that it's good for them to say things are going badly in Iraq.

I think they're hoping the base links the upswing in violence to the Democratic surge (Message: There'll be even more of this if Satan's party wins). But beyond that, I think this is a strategy for what happens after November 7.

The Bushies, I think, plan to use their own failure in Iraq to indict the Democrats. No, really -- they're going to say things started to go bad when it seemed as if the Democrats were going to score big victories, and, if that actually does happen, that any insurgent success is also a consequence of Democratic ascendancy. (The base, of course, doesn't believe things have been going badly all along. The base believes "the liberal media" has simply overmphasized the bad news and ignored all the wonderful schools being built and so on.)

Everyone who's read Kevin Baker's Harper's article "Stabbed in the Back!" knows where I'm going with this. The rest of you should read it.

If Democrats win even one house of Congress next month, even by a slim margin -- hell, if they even gain seats and close the gaps somewhat -- the Bushies are going to spend the next two years declaring that every collapse of a Bush foreign-policy house of cards is the fault of Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton and Ted Kennedy. This is their strategy for 2008. I think they're not even waiting for this election cycle to be over to put it into effect.