Sun Tzu wrote that the best battle is the one you don't have to fight. Perhaps Saddam will leave on his own He knows that the goal of this operation is to get rid of him personally. That's a major difference from the Gulf War, which had the goal of liberating Kuwait.

According to this article, Saddam agrees to send top aide to discuss possible exile. Several of the neighboring nations have mentioned the possibility of him leaving and going into exile.

As for your other questions:

Does the added time for Sadam to muster his forces make them easier to find and destroy?

Delaying the war does give Saddam more time to build up his forces. Saddam believes that time is on his side, so anything he can do to postpone the attack works to his benefit. Of course, that also gives us more time to locate those forces for eventual destruction.

Does the Pentagon need months and months and months to work out every last micro-managed detail of the operation?

Yes and no. The Pentagon does tend to micromanage and some things do take a long time to plan. However, the biggest problems are transportation and logistics. It takes a long time to move a few hundred thousand personnel to the region along with their equipment (almost all of it has to be moved by ship). It also takes time to do whatever training is necessary, make sure everyone has the necessary equipment, and get everything ready to go.

Are we out of ordinance and we needed the time to produce more "smart" weapons?

Not exactly out of ordance, but we have used a lot of it in the past few years. For example, I heard a news report last week that we used 300 cruise missiles in Yugoslavia a few years ago and didn't order replacements. We've stepped up production of smart weapons like JDAMS but there are limits to how many you can make without adding more factories.

Is Iraq really the target?

One of several, IMO.

Is the State Department undermining the operation along with the UN?

Probably.