That’s what it’s called when you take one fact or a few facts in isolation and attempt to prove something. Fred Thompson was doing it below with global warming; and the entire the Right Wing Echosphere is doing it with the death toll in Iraq, which was at an eight month low in July. Rush Limbaugh was going on about this non-stop yesterday.

Of course, no word on if Iraqi sectarian violence declined as well.

The problem that many people — left and right — seem unable to grasp is that one data point does not create a trend. Trends are trends, i.e., more than one data point. The violence in Iraq has been trending up for years. A one-month pause does not mean anything, especially since past Julys have also been relatively calm.

I hope they are right and things are getting better. But this could just be a blip. Let’s not go around screaming success because Iraq is “only” as bloody as it was in November, when it was so bad President Bush decided to call for the surge in the first place. Oh wait, that was the bloodshed at the ballot box.

If the trend continues in August, then we have progress. But if the violence ratchets back up, as it has every August, I hope the RWE will acknowledge it.

Fat chance.

There are some encouraging signs in Iraq. Let’s hope they continue. But let’s also remember that it didn’t have to be this way. And that the surge was only supported after the GOP lost an election.