I think I called it sometime around the changing of power in Congress, but here it is officially: Bush is already getting noticed for his new “willingness” to change his opinion on things. I put the willingness in quotes for a reason.

For President Bush, last week’s decision was the latest of several reversals on issues on which he once refused to budge. Since Democrats captured Congress, Bush has fired Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, authorized direct talks with North Korea, sent more troops to Iraq, agreed to discuss the contours of a Palestinian state in Middle East peace negotiations, and even proposed a tax increase for millions of Americans — all ideas he rejected earlier.

Yep. Well, ignoring the sending more troops to Iraq part (which has been done about five times so far), that is indeed a list of things that Bush previously rejected and that he has now supported. There’s a reason, though, right? Of course.

“It’s not really surprising to me that they’re beginning to change,” said former congressman Lee H. Hamilton (D-Ind.), co-chairman of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, whose report in December recommended opening talks with Iran and Syria. “The realities of the situation are becoming more apparent to them. . . . Presidents begin to focus very much on their legacy, and he recognizes that insufficient progress has been made on some of these international issues.”

This is where good ol’ Hamilton and I will have to part ways. Bush may indeed care about his legacy, but I believe he cares more about the here and now of politics more. You can bet your boots if the Republicans had held onto the Congress there wouldn’t be any mind-changing going on. And, naturally, Tony Snow makes sure to hammer the point home, speaking specifically about the new decision to diplomatically deal with Iran and Syria.

“You guys are getting it wrong, and I don’t know how to get you to get it through your heads that it’s not new,” Snow said. “I mean, it’s not new. What’s going on here is something that has a long-seated precedence. There are multilateral forums where, if the Iranians are there, we’re not going to walk out.”

Good work, Tony. Very tactful.

Stories like this make my heart hurt. After a suicide bomber attacked a military convoy in Afghanistan, a firefight broke out, and a number of civilians were killed or wounded.

Up to 10 people were killed and 35 wounded in the violence, officials said.

A suicide attacker detonated an explosives-filled minivan as the American convoy approached, then militant gunmen fired on the troops inside the vehicles, who returned fire, the U.S. military said.

As the Americans sped away, they treated every car and person along the highway as a potential attacker, said Mohammad Khan Katawazi, the district chief of Shinwar. But Maj. William Mitchell, a U.S. military spokesman, said those killed and injured may have been shot by the militants.

The troops in Afghanistan have fallen through the cracks of the American conscience, it sometimes seems. The debate on Iraq rages on, everyone feels terrible when a soldier dies in Baghdad, but yet no one seems to care that we have fewer soldiers in Afghanistan and they’ve been there longer than anyone. Yet discussions to get those boys home are, it seems, not occurring.

Five years later and they’re still fighting the Taliban and Al Qaeda, I’d be paranoid myself. And I’d be extremely demoralized if I turned on the news and every story was Iraq, Iraq, Iraq. I’d feel like my country stopped caring about me.

This is also less than encouraging:

The freelance photographer [working for AP Television News], Rahmat Gul, said he took photos of a four-wheel drive vehicle where three Afghans had been shot to death inside.

An American soldier then took Gul’s camera and deleted the photos. Gul said he later received permission to take photos from another soldier, but that the first soldier came back and angrily told him to delete the photos again. Gul said the soldier then raised his fist as if he was going to strike Gul.

Naturally, the military has yet to respond to the story.