Broder and Cole in the Washington Post

Two good OP-EDs in the WAPO today.

David Broder has joined the Bush will lose team.

The factors that make President Bush a vulnerable incumbent have almost nothing to do with his opponent, John F. Kerry. They stem directly from two closely linked, high-stakes policy gambles that Bush chose on his own. Neither has worked out as he hoped.

and
Juan Cole explains Shiite clerical leadership in Iraq and what it means to the United States.

.. the Allawi government is discrediting itself with the religious Shiites by calling on the Marines to do a job that should have been undertaken by Iraqis. Even the cautious and long-suffering Sistani will eventually lose his patience if the holy sites are too brutally trampled and if the Americans overstay their welcome. Several potential successors to the ailing Sistani will likely be less patient with the Americans than he has been.

As for Sadr, he desperately wants the Iraqi people to toss the United States out of their country, as the Iranians did in 1978-79. He seems to think that if his life cannot convince them to do so, his death might. Long-time expatriate secularist politicians in Iraq -- and U.S. Defense Department officials who know almost nothing about Iraqi culture and society -- are gambling that he is wrong.