It is a little difficult for the average citizen to understand exactly what is going on in this ugly tug-of-war between the United States Congress and President George W. Bush regarding funding for the military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Will Congress' refusal to pass this emergency spending bill actually cause hardship to our troops who are situated in harm's way?

If this is so, then it is a terrible bill, regardless of any higher motive and regardless even of the horrible way this administration has managed this conflict. Politics should not be played with lives.

But is that assertion true? The Democrats say that it is not and, furthermore, that they are willing to give the president every penny he wants to conduct the war if he will set a deadline of August 2008 to remove troops from Iraq.

The president says he will veto any such notion of a deadline.

We tend to agree that a stated deadline for removing troops is a bad idea. It would seem that this would be a recipe for disaster in Iraq of even greater magnitude than that which already exists there — and that is saying something.

We believe we gave the word of this nation to do better than that and, difficult as it might be, we should keep that promise. The problem with the last statement is that makes our involvement in Iraq completely open-ended and that is not a good thing.

So it is our contention that if the bill actually cuts funding it is a terrible idea. If it does not cut funding but merely sets a deadline, it is still a bad idea. The Democrats should stand down at this time.

Note that we said at this time.

Because the ineptitude of the Bush administration is such that we cannot say inequivocally that this tactic might not, at some point have to be used, as chilling as that thought is. We believe this is not a war being lost by our military — so far as we know they have won essentially every battle — but by the civilian leaders. If the military had been given free reign, we would have been long gone from Iraq.

And, please, no silly assertions that political pressures caused the problems four years ago. This was caused by ineptitude of the highest order.

But with the surge of Baghdad just beginning and a new plan apparently in place, the administration and military deserves the time and space to get the job done. After all, even staunch opponents to the war would have to admit the lives of millions of people in Iraq will be better if we succeed than if we merely walk away.

The Democrats are wrong-headed in this effort and the Bush team has put itself in this sorry situation. The American people — most importantly, the United States fighting forces — deserve so much better than this.

The answer for bad governance is not more bad governance and that seems to be what the Democrats are offering up. We can only hope that, at some point, statesmanship will again emerge in Washington.