The media is going to play this report up big and quite frankly it's already annoying the hell out of me. John makes some good points about the traps for our Democratic leaders, but what's really insane is that there isn't one Middle East expert on the panel. NOT one.

Rather, it is a classic Washington blue-ribbon commission, a group of "old hands" steeped in the ways of the capital -- two former secretaries of state (Baker and Lawrence S. Eagleburger), two former senators (Republican Alan K. Simpson and Democrat Charles S. Robb), a former defense secretary (William J. Perry) and a former Supreme Court justice, (Sandra Day O'Connor).

Bi-partisanship is meaningless if nobody knows what the heck they are talking about. It's like bringing a car to a friggin' Burger King to get an oil change. Ok, that's a bad analogy, but you know what I mean. Arthur has much more.

Here's a suggestion. Let's trade up a lot. I'll give you one Juan Cole for Ed Meese. And I'll give you Patrick Cockburn for Charles Robb. Cockburn has actually spent a lot of time in Iraq and the Middle East just recently. Amazing, ain't it?...read on