One of the frequent critical comments about our occupation of Iraq is that "the best thing to do when you have dug yourself into a hole is to stop digging." This reminds me of the Uncle Remus tale about Brer Raccoon and the frogs. Apologies to Joel Chandler Harris for the liberties I have taken with this story.
The frogs see their enemy Brer Raccoon dropping dead on the bank of the river Mesopotamia and are convinced by Brer Rabbit that the best way to get him out of the way is to bury him in the ground. So the frogs get out their little frog shovels and start to dig.
Finally, they start getting tired, so their leader, a toad named W, asks Brer Rabbit "Is is deep enough?"
Brer Rabbit replies "Can you get out?"
"Yes we can" says W.
"Well it aint deep enough" says Brer Rabbit, "You've got to dig that hole really deep."
So the frogs get out their little frog shovels and start digging again. Now they are getting really tired.
They stop and the frog leader W asks Brer Rabbit "Is it deep enough?"
"Can you get out?" asks Brer Rabbit.
"No we can't" answers W.
Brer Rabbit then starts to laughing and tells Brer Raccoon to get up (turns out he was playing possum all along) and get his dinner (frogs are raccoon's favorite meal). In a final surprise, it turns out that Brer Rabbit wasn't really Brer Rabbit after all, but the arch enemy of the frogs, Brer Osama.