Nancy Pelosi Retires From Congress

Deliberately or otherwise.

Pelosi has decided to support John Murtha's cut-and-run plan, calling for U.S. troops to be pulled out of Iraq "at the earliest practicable date."

Pelosi has boldly declared, "I believe that a majority of our caucus clearly supports Mr. Murtha."

Really?  So the GOP can look forward to picking up more than 100 House seats in 2006?  Yowsers.

This represents a much more clearly demarcated intraparty policy rift among leading Democrats, as Hillary Clinton reasserted her Iraq vote as recently as yesterday:

"I take responsibility for my vote, and I, along with a majority of Americans, expect the president and his administration to take responsibility for the false assurances, faulty evidence and mismanagement of the war," the New York senator said in a lengthy letter to thousands of people who have written her about the war.