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In a few weeks, Gen. David Petraeus, commander of U.S. troops in Iraq, will visit Congress, as promised, and report on how things are going. It may not matter, however.

Long before Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid offered his unconditional surrender, it's obvious the far-left members of Congress had made up their minds about Iraq: We're going to get out, if it's the last thing we do.

However, last spring, as the troop surge began in earnest and the Bush administration had finally admitted - by its actions if nothing else - that its approach to winning in Iraq wasn't working, congressional leaders on both sides said they would await Petraeus' September evaluation before deciding whether they would pull the plug.

Today, there are indications that the surge, along with a growing movement inside the country against al-Qaida, is making a difference. In a recent interview, Petraeus said that Iraqi security forces, military and police are increasingly taking responsibility for their streets.

"If you look, Samawa, Nasiriyah, Najaf, Karbala - we (the United States) hardly have any forces in those locations at all," Petraeus told Fox News' Alan Combs on Aug. 7.

Petraeus' comments came on the heels of the now-renowned New York Times' op-ed penned by Brookings Institution scholars Michael O'Hanlon and Ken Pollack. After touring Iraq, O'Hanlon and Pollack, supporters of the invasion but bitter critics of the president since, wrote that they "were surprised by the gains (they) saw." They said there is now the "potential to produce not necessarily `victory' but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with."

Around the same time, retired Gen. Jack Keane was telling the House Armed Services Committee that "progress was being made." He said, "We're on the offensive, and we have the momentum."

Apparently, this good news was offensive to Rep. Nancy Boyda, a Kansas Democrat, who pointedly rose and left the hearing. There was only so much good news she could take, she said, adding that she feared more people might hear assessments like Keane's and Petraeus's and "further divide this country."

That says a lot about the anti-war left, I suppose. Imagine Gen. Dwight Eisenhower reporting that the Allies had reclaimed Italy, only to have a member of Congress walk out on him, worried the good news would "further divide this country." Who would take such news on the chin? Nazi sympathizers?

One wonders whose feelings Boyda is concerned with and why. Boyda's House colleague, Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, actually admitted the good news from Petraeus in September presents "a real big problem" for liberal Democrats.

Admittedly, political progress in Iraq hasn't matched the reported military advances. But, as O'Hanlon and Pollack allow, military gains set the stage for potential political gains. Will that possibility be too hard for the left to bear as well? We'll see in a couple of weeks.