I sat and watched the Sunday shows in astonishment. It was not what Hillary was saying, but when she was saying it. By telling us in the most explicit terms yet that she will not withdraw from Iraq in 2009, she must believe she has the nomination wrapped up. And she is beginning to protect her flank from what I have long believed to be our most lethal argument against her.

The Clintons have promised Democrat primary voters that they will “end the war” once Camelot is restored. Which begs the question that our nominee should begin asking on February 6th, “Okay. When?”

Withdrawal from Iraq seems impossible today, and would be the kind of abrupt foreign policy change you would only expect from a transformational President (e.g. not Hillary). It is an open question whether a cautious trimmer like Hillary would have the guts to actually go through with it.

Our best argument against Hillary is not that she will end the war. It’s that she won’t.

And that she’s being dishonest when she says she will. And that she’s just another spineless Democrat like John Kerry who can’t stand up to any criticism, and won’t tell the country what she really thinks about the war. And that her political gamesmanship sends the wrong message to our troops and our enemies.

If there is little operational difference between Hillary Clinton and say, Mitt Romney on Iraq, then why change? If no one who gets elected in 2008 will end the war, why not stick with the party that you would normally trust in wartime?

So what Hillary told us on Sunday is that she will refuse to be pinned down on a date certain for withdrawal. (She won’t even apologize for her 2002 vote!) Until she does, her pledge to end the war should be laughed at, and this should be used to drive a wedge between Hillary and her anti-war base.

Fleshing this out further, you could easily argue that President Hillary’s middle ground approach would be just as dangerous as complete withdrawal. Under President Hillary, we’d have 75,000 troops in Iraq — not enough to get the job done and but still taking significant casualties. Iraq 2010 would look like Vietnam 1970 and you can call her Hillary Milhous Clinton.

ISN’T THERE AN EERIE CONGRUITY building between Hillary Clinton and George Bush on Iraq? The President, while confidently predicting a Republican will win in 2008, is openly talking of handing off to an anti-war successor a stable enough situation to be able to maintain at least some force presence through the next Administration. And Hillary is practically meeting him half-way, refusing to budge on her 2002 vote and talking openly about the dangers of abject withdrawal. Given that the natural drift of any incoming administration is to be more not less interventionist in foreign policy, it’s a pretty good bet that the netroots will be sold down the river in 2009.

Hillary is morphing into a George W. Bush Democrat. While that will draw heat from an increasingly desperate Obama, she will pay the price in the general election, not because she’s totally wrong, but because Democrat-inclined voters will smell something fishy about their gal acting like the one they’ve so long fantasized of kicking to the curb. And if she wins, the BushClintonBushClinton consensus will be back.