I've been saying for a while now that McCain takes positions that make himself look good at the expense of the Republican party. I didn't realize that the surge was a perfect example.

California Yankee at RedState provides some insight:

I also have a problem with Senator McCain pinning the perceived lack of instant success in Iraq on Rumsfeld. He has come up with a very simplistic story that Rumsfeld was bad and Petreaus is good. But successful counterinsurgency campaigns take time. A lot of time. More than a year. Everyone, including Senator McCain is willing to credit General Petraeus with the success of the surge. But maybe we should look at the General's first two tours in Iraq for the secrets of his success, and maybe we should consider who promoted General Petraeus, more than once, and who recommended General Petraeus to be the Iraq commander--the very same Donald Rumsfeld that McCain vilifies.

I could go on here, but I think I've made my point, which is that McCain takes too much credit for the surge, especially since I'm not sure he was as involved in the strategy shift as he says he was. This makes me wonder about how he will behave as Commander in Chief. Will the military appreciate his eagerness to grab the limelight and denigrate the long, difficult and frequently unpopular work that leads to success in a mission like Iraq?

To put this in perspective, McCain was running around in 2002 saying the war in Iraq would be "easy". Then when it wasn't the cake walk that was promised McCain turned the blame on Donald Rumsfeld for not meeting the outlandish expectations McCain had set forward.