Fail in order to succeed

More good news from Iraq:

Iraq’s national government is refusing to take possession of thousands of American-financed reconstruction projects, forcing the United States either to hand them over to local Iraqis, who often lack the proper training and resources to keep the projects running, or commit new money to an effort that has already consumed billions of taxpayer dollars.

On the one hand, this, along with other aspects of the growing rift between the White House and Baghdad, along with the ever-mushrooming chaos in greater Iraq, along with increasing rivalries between just about every nation in the region and its neighbors, should probably point sensible people to the conclusion that we ought to call it quits sooner rather than later. On the other hand, this is exactly what we've come to expect in this war--the kinds of failures that can are used by insensible people as arguments for never leaving Iraq. Of course, it's insensible people who are in charge of the whole operation, so I imagine you can guess what our official reaction to this news will be.