Hillary Clinton: Iraq is "functioning quite well"
Junior New York senator also says suicide attacks are sign the insurgency is failing

Austin bay, an Army Reserve Iraq veteran and syndicated columnist, offers much deeper insights than I can. It's not what Hillary said that he focuses on so much as how right she is, and why.

Saddam’s buddies and Zarqawi’s klan were actually weak enemies –"brittle” is the word I used to describe them at a senior planning meeting. Their local power was based on inimidation–killing by car bomb, murdering in the street. Their strategic power was based solely on selling the false impression of nation-wide instability– selling post-Saddam Iraq as a dysfunctional failed-state rather than an emerging democracy .