MICHAEL RUBIN ON IRAQ: He wants to bring back the CERP program, something that I spent a fair number of pixels on here a while back. Earlier entries on that topic here, here, and here.

UPDATE: Rubin emails:

I whole-heartedly agree with you re: CERP, and have long been a fan of the program and concept.

What was edited out because of space is the proposal that USAID, should they balk at losing control of funds, embed everyone necessary to make a decision with various military units out-and-about on patrol. This might have the auxiliary benefit of encouraging some streamlining.

As noted here at the time, dropping the CERP funding was one of the major failures of the early occupation. And check out this StrategyPage piece from 2004.