Repub Rats getting ready to jump ship in Iraq?

Rats: Politicians with tails?

Looks like September is going to be the next big skirmish in the Troop funding war.

From the Chicago Tribune.

"This is going to be a step-by-step process, continuing to isolate" the president, said Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), the House Democratic Caucus chairman. (Speaking of rats and who should appear? Why it's Rahm-bo.) "The key to that is to basically get Republicans who say, 'We're not going to do this anymore.'

"Privately and publicly, some House Republicans and their staff say defections could come as early as September, when Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of American troops in Iraq, returns to brief Congress on the progress of Bush's "troop surge" of nearly 30,000 to quell insurgent fighters.Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.) said the briefing will be a different sort of "benchmark" for a Republican caucus that has so far stood nearly united behind the president against troop withdrawals.

"That [unity] will change very abruptly and very quickly in September if the report is not good," he said. "People are going to be looking at their next election. Their next election will be right around the corner, and the war will be the big issue."

And if the RNC does not whack the pee-pee of every Republican representative that threatens to jump ship...I am really going to be steamed.