As far as the war in Iraq is concerned, the trouble with September for the Bush administration is that August has to come first.

This means the good news in the run-up to the anxiously awaited Petraeus-Crocker progress report gets upstaged by the bad news: Negligible decreases in U.S. and Iraqi casualties despite all of the spinning about how much better things are.

Please click here for the monthly war wrap-up at Kiko’s House.