Rumsfeld goes.

The day after the American people sent President Bush a very strong message against "staying the course," the president announced that he has accepted the resignation of his embattled defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, and is nominating Robert Gates for the post. Gates, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), served as CIA director under President Bush's father.

A week before announcing this change, President Bush had said that he would stick with Rumsfeld through the rest of his term. But Rumsfeld, a former member of the CFR, has become the poster child for Bush's failed policy in Iraq.

On the Saturday before the election, the Army Times and three other military newspapers owned by the Gannett Company posted an editorial on their websites entitled "Time for Rumsfeld to Go." The editorial, which appeared in the physical weekly newspapers the day before the elections, pointed out that even active-duty military leaders who traditionally toe the line regarding presidential policy "are starting to voice misgivings about the war's planning, executive and dimming prospects for success"

The Army Times editorial also noted that "although the blame for our failures in Iraq rests with the secretary, it will be the troops who bear its brunt." There is no arguing that the troops on the ground bear the brunt of Bush's Iraq policy, but regarding accountability for that policy, doesn't the buck stop with the president?