This is becoming the often repeated distortion of reality. The reason the republicans got booted is because republican voters were sick of them, not the war.
The American Conservative=The David Irving Gazette
As soon as Saddam was hanged, the pundits instantly chimed in with opinions of various sorts, which mainly were irrelevant, and almost always critical of anyone whose name they could vaguely remember or almost spell. A pundit has to submit copy every day. So does a cub reporter. The difference is that the cub reporter better have his facts right or he will be reprimanded once or twice and then fired. The pundits don't have have the facts right. Every newspaper endeavors to pair each leftie with a rightie, and as long as they have one of each, they don't care about the truth or falsity of the columns, because the public doesn't read the editorial page anyway, they only read newspapers nowadays for the obituaries, and the ads, and maybe in the really small markets, the local news.