Bush gets kudos on Iraq? Not from me...

I'm feeling a bit apoplectic after reading a Jonathan Kay article about Bush's Iraq legacy. This paragraph in particular didn't sit well with me:

In the long run, history will be kinder. Bush's legacy will be based not on his intellect, nor on what becomes of New Orleans. It will turn on his signature project, the war in Iraq. Though the war itself was a mistake - at least in the clumsy, thoughtless way it was fought - an extraordinary new book has convinced me that Bush deserves enormous credit for turning the tide in what might have otherwise become the single greatest military disaster in American history.

Is Kay really arguing that history will be kinder to Bush simply because the consequences of his boneheaded decision to invade Iraq could've been worse? Bush drove the Porsche into the ditch and he deserves applause because he eventually stopped being pigheaded and we're now in a position where it's plausible that the car may one day be extricated from the ditch?

Isn't giving credit to Bush now while our soldiers are still in harm's way in Iraq potentially another "Mission Accomplished" banner? In order to accept what I respectfully find to be a faulty premise by Kay, the reader has to believe the following: 1) Bush deserves credit because the Iraq War has been less disastrous than it could have been, and 2) that we're now in the clear in Iraq and our soldiers will experience a minimum of casualties from this point forward, and 3) it was "the surge" that made it all happen. Call me stubborn but I'm not ready to concede any of the three points just yet.

Lastly, who is to say that Iraq still won't end up being "the greatest military disaster in American history"? Until we're out of Iraq completely and able to assess the long term impact of Bush's mistake on both Iraq and the middle east as a whole, I'm not willing to say that the Iraq War hasn't been a bigger disaster than Viet Nam. Personally, I won't be surprised if history ends up being less kind than the present when it comes to Mr. Bush's legacy.