I AM NOT CONVINCED by Gregory Djerejian’s criticism of Rumsfeld and current troop-level policy in Iraq. But people in the Administration ought to be reading his blog because — unlike many in the media and elsewhere — he’s an honest critic who wants our effort to succeed. And one of the dangers of an unrelenting media assault is that it can lead you to tune out all criticism, simply because some of it is dishonest. That tends to produce serious errors.

And this is certainly true: “Elections are not a panacea leading to stability.” They’ll help a lot — and it’s certainly clear that Zarqawi, et al., fear them — but this is a lengthy process, not one of quick fixes.