There's good information in Karen Hughes Washington Post op-ed about Osama bin Laden's declining popularity in the Middle East. There's also a little unnecessary political sleight of hand.

Hughes points out that OBL and al Qaeda aren't as popular as they once were. She hurls a slew of poll numbers which seem mostly positive. But Hughes has an agenda: she wants to make it seem that America can somehow take credit for these declines in the popularity of terrorism and terrorism tactics. She claims the shift in attitudes toward al Qaeda can be seen in the endlessly promoted collaboration of Sunni sheikhs in Anbar province.

She then goes on to talk about the public diplomacy work of the United States -- admitting that we've still got a lot of work to do. But in the space between her words there's a disturbing hint that Muslims are just coming around, and barely five years ago, they were a bloodthirsty mob of al Qaeda followers that wanted nothing more than to see Americans die by the dozen. She says:

Muslim populations are increasingly rejecting bin Laden's attempts to pervert their faith. WorldPublicOpinion.org found in April that large majorities in Egypt (88 percent), Indonesia (65 percent) and Morocco (66 percent) agree: "Groups that use violence against civilians, such as Al Qaida, are violating the principles of Islam. Islam opposes the use of such violence."

Perhaps Hughes drank too deeply of the Bush Administration's special post-9/11 Kool-Aid back in 2002 and 2003. The whole Muslim universe wasn't pounding away at the Madrassah walls calling for blood back then, so it's no surprise they remain mostly mild about terrorism today. But Hughes also uses this graph to elide over some key findings from that very piece of poll data:

An in-depth poll of four major Muslim countries has found that in all of them large majorities believe that undermining Islam is a key goal of US foreign policy. Most want US military forces out of the Middle East and many approve of attacks on US troops there.

Most respondents have mixed feelings about al Qaeda. Large majorities agree with many of its goals, but believe that terrorist attacks on civilians are contrary to Islam.

There is strong support for enhancing the role of Islam in all of the countries polled, through such measures as the imposition of sharia (Islamic law). This does not mean that they want to isolate their societies from outside influences: Most view globalization positively and favor democracy and freedom of religion.

Hughes has lots of good stuff to talk about, though she may be interested in distracting people from her slow start. It's good to see an outline of the kinds of public diplomacy she hopes to build in the year ahead: citizenships skills, English lessons, exchange programs and interactions with opinion leaders like newspaper editors and clerics.

Hope is a strange thing, though. Where are these programs right now? It has been more than two years since her appointment, and as this attempt to take credit demonstrates, real progress is hard to come by. Why hasn't more happened?