David Brooks to the blue courtesy phone

I really, really wanted to avoid jumping on the Brooks-hating bandwagon this week -- not because it's not deserved, but just on a don't-feed-the-trolls theory. Plus, others have done a great job of eviscerating what was a truly stupid column about how Hillary's lead in the polls demonstrates that Dems are becoming more hawkish. See the links for a full shredding of this idea (especially, as always, Glenn's over at Salon).

But there is something that for some reason hasn't gotten mentioned, as least not that I've seen: Many, many Democrats who support Hillary erroneously think she's planning to remove all troops from Iraq within nine months.

Hillary's in the lead not *due to* her position on Iraq, but rather, one could persuasively argue based on this polling, because people are *projecting upon her a position she does not hold* (note to Mr. Brooks: polls are where opinions are determined empirically, which I admit is less efficient than just deciding everybody agrees with you, but almost certainly more accurate in the end).

Now, admittedly I'm somewhat less concerned with the evasion about final numbers than are others, and I think reasonable people can disagree about the appropriate pace of withdrawal (at least between "soon" and "really really soon"). But a much more interesting -- and intellectually honest -- column could have been about whether her support would be where it is if people fully understood her position. Instead, we get David Brooks on how everybody agrees with David Brooks.