re: A slow pullout
No, Tony. You don't get to rewrite it now.
In the fourth Democratic debate in July of 2007, Obama said the U.S. should have our troops out of Iraq by March of 2008. "No military solution," he said. Biden's solution, in the same debate, was to divide Iraq into separate nations. I've already gone over the hostility to Petraeus and the surge.
Other Democrats just said "out of Iraq NOW." When Bush told us there should be no deadlines, that it should be based on conditions, he was howled down.
That was during the height of violence over there.
If you want to pretend that Democrats have always been about "winning as an exit strategy," good luck.