The quote of the week. Senior officials are "Shedding the Unreality" about Iraq while Bush is on vacation

"U.S. Lowers Sights On What Can Be Achieved in Iraq"
The Washington Post, 14 Aug 05:

'What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground,' said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. 'We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning.'

Who is this "Senior Official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion"? Is it a name we would know? Could it be a former member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) that sold us this war with falsified information? Shouldn't there be a journalistic rule that all these names need to become public eventually, like, in say 5 years, or 10 years after the official leaves office? Just so there's some accountability for these statements?

Is this Senior Official going off message while his/her boss is on vacation, or is this the new message of lowered expectations? Are we now prepared to leave a cauldron of warring ethnic and religious pseudo-states in place of what was Iraq, with our only accomplishment being "at least we got rid of Saddam" (cf. Yugoslavia after Tito, but 10 times worse)?

Just asking,
True Blue Liberal