How's Iraq?

Calpundit decided to try figuring out how things are going in Iraq. After looking primarily at all the policy shuffling at the White House, he says this:

"But the Sunni triangle still seems to be a war zone, ambushes are taking place at an alarming rate, oil production is not ramping up very quickly, NGOs (and the UN) have pulled out because conditions are so unsafe, unemployment is over 50%, and Saddam is still loose. Compared to this, it's hard to take seriously the evidence of a few miscellaneous visitors who proclaim that everything looks safe to them while refusing to go anywhere without a heavy armed guard."

At the same time, Matthew Yglesias takes on those who use pessimism about post-war Germany to argue that things are going well in Iraq:

"Clearly, if pessimists were wrong about one thing, all pessimists everywhere are always wrong. Shall I go hunt around and dig for historical examples of people saying something would work out well that did not, in fact work out well? How many minds will that change? None."

Yglesias then goes on to talk about the Marshall Plan and similarities between the policies that rebuilt Germany and those Democrats support today. Really, both posts are worth reading in full. From my standpoint, Iraq has so many moving parts it's hard to sit down and write a full analysis. I do expect Iraq in five years will be better than it was under Saddam. After all, Muqtada Sadr doesn't seem the type to fill mass graves. However, I hope we can set our standards a bit higher than "better than Saddam Hussein." With all the variables from Ba'athist remnants to fighting on the streets of Karbala, I'm not sure we have enough of a handle on things to create the stable and prosperous future we've been guaranteeing.