Unfortunately, the unwonted taste of victory went to the heads of some in the sphere. The most obvious manifestation was the effluvium of impeachment now mega-threads over at DKos. But, also, there was an assumption that, with the Dems with the power of the purse, the Iraq abortion might be brought a little nearer its end.

The longer the session has gone on, the less this utterly desirable end has seemed likely to be reached. But a cool-headed review at the outset of the personnel (viz, the Dem leadership, chairman and other senior MCs) who supposedly would lead the necessary radical action, and the circumstances in which such action would take place, would have suggested that it was rather unlikely to be brought to a satisfactory conclusion.

Yesterday, there were the AP pieces - that I mentioned in my piece yesterday and were also dealt with in pieces by Sirota and our own Matt - which suggested a further stalling of the process of getting to the floor measures disapproving or restricting the conduct of the war.

Today's papers brought a bit more of the same.

(Do I believe them? No. Do they raise questions that need to be satisfactorily addressed by the Dem leaderships? You bet.)

From the WSJ news pages, we have this today, which suggests that the Murtha Proviso may be in even more trouble than we thought.

For instance,

fearing the entire bill could collapse, House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey (D., Wis.) has sanctioned the drafting of waivers to the Murtha-backed provisions that would restore more flexibility to the administration.

The drafting of waivers is certainly checkable - and, why would waivers be necessary if a bill including the Proviso would pass without them?

I've not seen reference before to Brer Obey in connection with the Proviso: but the Iraq supplemental is his first apps bill as chairman; he's bound to be particularly nervous that it doesn't get derailed.

And Murtha, it seems, insists on opening his yap:

"They want to end the war, but they want to fund the war," said Mr. Murtha, frustrated by his party's reluctance to exert its power over spending.

Rahmbo has an angle of his own:

Rep. Rahm Emanuel, the Democratic caucus chairman, is cautious about crossing this line and argues any conditions on funding should focus on the Iraq government, not U.S. forces. "Congress has the job of oversight and holding the administration accountable, but the war is owned and managed from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue," the Illinois Democrat said.

Or, as the Apocrypha has it,

He that toucheth pitch shall be defiled therewith;

Meanwhile, Murtha is going to address a Caucus meeting tonight. Is this for Nancy to make clear to Dem reps that the Proviso was all, and always, Murtha's own work?

And military details are intruding into the pure politics of the thing (emphasis mine):

the timing of the supplemental spending bill now is a problem, both for the military and lawmakers.

Hoping to quell sectarian violence, the administration will focus the new troops on a set of mixed Shiite and Sunni neighborhoods accounting for about a third of Baghdad's population. But the Army is so short of combat-ready units, it will take until May to complete the "surge" of five brigades.

This makes it dicey for lawmakers to intercede in the midst of deployments; on the other hand, the continued shortage of personnel will make it harder for the administration to maintain the higher levels after May. The White House has been vague about how it will do this. The president asked for money only through Sept. 30, after which none is requested in his 2008 budget, even though military planners assume more time is required for the added troops to be effective.

Mr. Murtha recommends providing ample money for the military, but attaching restrictions that effectively create a cap allowing deployment of three or four brigades, not five. The bill would go beyond the president's request by adding money to build up strategic reserve units at home and require Marine and Army chiefs to certify in advance that any unit deployed be "fully mission capable" with personnel and equipment.

Most controversial, he would add provisions to make it harder for the administration to stretch personnel either by extending combat tours for units already in Iraq or sending them back faster to the war zone. The ban on extending tours would immediately affect the Army's plan to have 20 brigades in Iraq by May, and the problem would recur in June and July.

I'd been assuming that the surge would have been well and truly over by the time any binding measure came up. (Indeed, that the Warner-Levin res was, as much as anything, the Dems vamping till ready - ie, until the time when any anti-surge measure, binding or not, became moot.)

The fact that the Iraq supplemental bill will be on the House floor at a time when a (large?) part of the surge was still not completed makes things a little awkward.

A Philly Inquirer journo's blog makes the point that red state Dem House freshmen may be particularly skittish on defunding - including, presumably, the Murtha Proviso.

The House GOP's wet dream would be for a floor amendment to strike the Proviso to pass with a little help from Dem mods.

Was all this avoidable?

Although leaderships can't compel votes, a minimum of partisan loyalty would surely require MCs to communicate their intentions to the leadership, so that leaders can avoid unnecessary embarrassment and tailor their plans to the votes that they are going to be able to command.

The Dems' problem, be it noted, is not primarily with freshmen unfamiliar with the ways of the Capitol; or with dodderers only too familiar with 20 year old bourbon.

It's communications between senior Dems that gives every appearance of being fubar.

Now, obviously these are busy people who are hard to get in a room together. Fine. That's why they have staffers.

That way, the offices keep in regular contact, and principals can be kept up to date, up to the minute.

Simple, surely. And - if they could arrange that much, perhaps they'd not come over as such a Fred Karno's Army on Iraq.