Signs are emerging that Bush et al are trying to back off September as a deadline concerning judging Iraq's progress.

When it came to the spending bill, the Dems didn't have enough votes to override GW's veto; in America, there's not much you can do about that.

However, with this blossoming chicanery about September, the Dems need to go to the mat. Unlike the recent back-down, this attempt at weaseling out of an agreed-upon deadline is not a matter of governmental procedures. If the Dems let September slip away as the time of truth-telling, they deserve to be slammed, hard.

In part, I assumed the Dems avoided the veto fight now to instead use September as the definitive month of judgment -- knowing many Republicans by then would be eager to jump sides on this issue. I wouldn't call that a gamble, but rather a safe, calculated assumption.

Then again, when dealing with rascals like Bush & Co., someone else would say this is what happens when you don't stand up to them every time you have the chance.