As I have been trying to explain for months here at DKos withdrawal from Iraq with a date certain is liable to lose us enough midterm elections to cost us control of Congress.
I am not going to go over all the reasons again (I've done that at length and been fried doing so) but just look over the poll results listed in the WSJ.
When offered a choice between a Republican who wants to maintain troop levels and a Democrat who wants to reduce them, voters choose the Democrat by a 53%-40% margin. If offered a choice between a Republican who wants to maintain troop levels and a Democrat seeking "immediate and orderly withdrawal," voters prefer the Republican by 48%-41%
I think it's clear that with the GOP and Bush rising in the polls and the election advantage of Democrats shrinking day by day every Democrat better think long and hard about how the message they send resonates with the public.
Especially Independents.
We need Independent voters badly to counter the GOP voter turnout push (and all the money and ground-game they have to get out the base) and things like leaving Iraq isn't a subject we should give specifics on or even really need to focus on to win... and we do so at our own peril.
Better to focus on how badly the war has been run, how corrupt the GOP has been, and how clueless this administration has performed in the last 5 years.
If we win control of the House then we'll be in a great position to hold these jerks accountable and quickly get our troops home but if we screw this up...it's going to take so much wind out of the sails of Progressives we may never fully recover.
Beware what you say about Iraq, it's dangerous and we can win this election without saying much more than how badly Bush and the GOP do-nothing/see-nothing Congress have prosecuted it. Being for reducing our troops is fine but a date certain is playing with fire.
Leave the time-tables and specifics about withdrawal off the table until after November and Democrats will easily cruise to victory.