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Are you sure that production used to be as high as you claim, or is that more propaganda from the leftist press?

Here is a reference for the oil production. I've seen that figure several other places.

prewar oil production from VOA

I didn't cite the prewar electricity but here is a passing reference to it running at half capacity from Douglas Feith.

prewar electricity reference from American Forces Press

Here is another reference to prewar electricity from American Forces Press that cites prewar electricity at 4,300 megawatts vs. March 2006 levels of 4100 megawatts. Of course these raw megawatt figures aren't directly comparable with the hours per day figures in the original document because of the increased demand you noted. The increased demand should have made the available hours go down since they are still 200 megawatts behind the prewar level.

prewar electricity reference from American Forces Press

I've seen the same thing you have with regards to Baghdad getting electricity at the expense of the rest of the country. I guess politics go on even in blood thirsty dictatorships.

I would expect that if these sources were going to slant the news they would slant it in favor of our government. I really haven't seen much discussion of either figure recently in any kind of press.

I think there's a slant in all kinds of press. Note that the original document didn't have a reference to the prewar levels of electricity or oil. Were they far ahead of prewar levels you can bet they would have been included.

One of the main causes of the election disaster was the Administration's loss of credibility from its rosy Iraq assessments IMHO. Admitting we aren't winning the war is not the same as supporting a phased withdraw. We need to take our rose colored glasses off with regards to both the war and the Administration.

I'm not sure what the right approach is. On the one hand a phased withdraw might put pressure on the Iraqis to get serious about defending their country. They remind me of a dachshund we once had. It was brutally vicious as long as it was on a leash and couldn't get at its prey. Let it off the leash and it hid with its tail between its legs :).

Of course a phased withdraw might be interpreted by Al-Queda as a defeat for us.

On the other hand staying might allow a chance to make progress towards a stable democracy and all its virtues but keep our troops pinned down in Iraq fighting an Insurgency made up primarily of Iraqis.

If they're determined to fight a civil war it might be best to just get out of the way and let them fight it. Maybe they're all dachshunds and will come to their senses once we aren't restraining them. In any event we could keep forces close by to keep an eye on our interests.

General Abizaid's statement that he couldn't deploy 20,000 additional soldiers in Iraq for more than a short time should be a wakeup call for all of us. This needs to be fixed no matter what happens. Empires fall when they become overextended.