Rove Worrier

"* Correct journalists' mistakes. . . .

"* Don't leak; speak. . . .

"* Stop helping media foes. The New York Times does not deserve leaks, exclusives or anything beyond its subscription fees. . . .

"* Cultivate friendly media outlets. Share exclusive interviews, presidential essays, and special news alerts with sympathetic and fair journalists. President Bush's next article should appear on the Wall Street Journal editorial page. Make the New York Times's reporters gnash their teeth as they quote from the president's exclusive interview with New York Post correspondent Deborah Orin. Chuckle as incoming CBS newsreader Katie Couric airs footage of the President's tête-à-tête with Fox News Channel's Wendell Goler. By favoring the center-right media, the president will enhance their prestige while the anti-Bush establishment media play catch-up."

Here's what Fred Barnes suggests in the Weekly Standard:

"Be willing to be disliked. . . .

"Don't address old columns. . . .

"Don't fall for the old advice that the key to recovery is giving the press more access to president--then they'll learn to like him and cover him more favorably. Hogwash. Every president in trouble has tried this and it's never worked. So don't waste the president's time."

Is Snow Just a Flurry?

Michelle Cottle writes in The New Republic: "Insomuch as journalists are longing for someone to deliver more entertaining sound bites as he spins them silly and to stroke their famously fragile egos even as he stonewalls them through the next three years, then, yeah, Snow should dramatically improve media relations. But beyond that, I'm not sure anyone should get all that excited about the new era of openness at the Bush bunker.

"Admittedly, the storyline the White House is feeding journalists is genius in its appeal to their sense of self-importance and wounded pride: We're so sorry we were mean to you. We know better now. Give us another chance and we'll be ever so much more open and honest and respectful of your needs. See! We're even bringing in one of your own to tell us how to make this relationship work.

"But coming from this administration, such sweet talk is about as credible as that of an abusive husband trying to woo back his serially battered bride."

Snow's Politics

Is Snow actually a radical pick for the White House?

Bill Steigerwald of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review unearthed a December 2005 phone interview with Snow:

"Q: A few years ago when I talked to you, you called yourself more libertarian than Republican. Is that still true?

"A: Yeah, I think so."

Disaster Disaster

Ron Hutcheson writes for Knight Ridder Newspapers: "In a scorching account of government failure, a bipartisan Senate committee on Thursday blamed the botched response to Hurricane Katrina on a failure of leadership that stretched from the White House to the mayor's office in New Orleans. . . .

"Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, the panel's top Democrat, was even more critical of the president. . . .

"'Despite the clear warnings before landfall that Katrina would be catastrophic, the president and the White House staff were not sufficiently engaged and failed to initiate a sufficiently strong and proactive response,' Lieberman wrote. 'After the hurricane, the White House continued to demonstrate a lack of understanding of the magnitude of the catastrophe.'

"He also accused the Bush administration of stonewalling the panel's investigation."

Here's the report: Here's the report: Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Unprepared .

Jim VandeHei writes in The Washington Post: "President Bush on Thursday wrapped his arm around a symbol of the devastation and hope of this ravaged city: Ethel Williams, one of the thousands of people who lost almost everything to Hurricane Katrina.

"Making his 11th trip here since the deadly storm and floods, this time to the obliterated Ninth Ward, Bush came here on National Volunteer Day to implore more Americans to help Williams and others like her. His motorcade wound through the deserted, storm-damaged streets that offered stark reminders of the work that lies ahead: shuttered houses, littered lawns, lifeless roads."

Bush also did a short, newsless interview with NBC anchor Brian Williams .

Can't Get a Break?

John Roberts reports on CNN: "You know, you might get the sense that President Bush just can't get a break these days. He was in New Orleans today, hurricane reconstruction, but all Washington could talk about was how unprepared the government is for the next hurricane season. Yesterday, he was trying for a bright moment with Tony Snow, his new press secretary, when Karl Rove got called to that grand jury for a fifth time. . . .

"It has been a year of missteps and miscues -- the ports deal, the vice president's adventures in hunting, the Libby indictment, the Rove investigation, the Myers nomination, the disastrous response to Hurricane Katrina. . . .

"Mojo. The president used to have it in spades, and approval ratings soared along with it. But the steady drumbeat of bad news from Iraq, Republicans say, is the prism through which all else is seen, magnifying small stumbles into massive falls. . . .

"So, how does the president get his mojo back, change his karma? The White House staff shuffle may help. But ultimately, say advisers, President Bush may need to look inside himself."

Emissions

Steven Mufson and Shailagh Murray write in The Washington Post: "President Bush sought to show that he was responding to calls for action in the face of rising gasoline prices. While visiting a gasoline station in Biloxi, Miss., Bush renewed his call for Congress to give him the authority to 'raise' mileage standards for all passenger cars. White House officials said later, however, that they didn't know when or how the president would use that authority.

"Congress has the authority to approve changes in mileage standards for passenger cars, and the executive branch can set them for light trucks without approval from Congress. But neither Congress nor the administration has shown much interest in raising passenger car standards, which were set in the 1970s and haven't changed since 1985."

Domestic Spying Watch

Walter Pincus and Charles Babington writes in The Washington Post: "New expressions of frustration over how little information the administration has shared about the National Security Agency's warrantless eavesdropping on Americans flared yesterday in the Senate, one day after House Republicans barred amendments that would have expanded oversight of the controversial program.

"Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said yesterday that he will file an amendment to block the NSA program's funding -- but said he will not seek a vote on it at this time -- in hope of stirring greater debate on the warrantless surveillance, part of the agency's monitoring of alleged terrorists.

" 'Where is the outrage?' asked Specter, who has chaired hearings that questioned the NSA program's constitutionality."

Well, I have my own question: Where are the newspaper stories? Where is the investigative reporting on this story? Where is the continued drumbeat of revelations?

Azerbaijan Watch

The Bush Doctrine: Freedom trumps stability -- but oil trumps freedom?

Tom Raum -- writes for the Associated Press: "Searching for energy supplies and allies against Iran, the Bush administration is reaching out to leaders who rule countries that are rich in oil and gas but accused of authoritarian rule and human rights violations.

"The presidents of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Equatorial Guinea are all getting special attention. The effort sometimes seems at odds with President Bush's stated second-term goal of spreading democracy. . . .

"Bush meets Friday at the White House with the president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliev. Vice President Dick Cheney next week visits the central Asian nation of Kazakhstan and its leader President Nursultan Nazarbayev."

David S. Hilzenrath and Bradley Graham write in The Washington Post that "court documents filed by the Justice Department mention members of the Azerbaijani leader's family in describing a nearly decade-old scheme to sell a state-owned oil company to private investors in return for bribes."

Dubai Redux?

Jim Rutenberg and David E. Sanger write in the New York Times: "President Bush is expected on Friday to announce his approval of a deal under which a Dubai-owned company would take control of nine plants in the United States that manufacture parts for American military vehicles and aircraft, say two administration officials familiar with the terms of the deal."

Drumheller (Non) Watch

Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Dick Polman , in his blog, tries to fathom why so much of the media is ignoring former CIA official Tyler Drumheller's public statements (first on CBS's 60 Minutes , then on MSNBC's Hardball ) in which he describes how the real failure in the run-up to war in Iraq was not in the intelligence community but in the White House.

Here's Polman's best guess: "Bush's credibility on Iraq is at such a low ebb (check even the Fox News poll) that it's no longer considered 'news' when his WMD stance is publicly contested by credible people who are adding new facts to the historical record. A majority of Americans have already concluded that Bush was selling a bill of goods, so much of the press reaction to Drumheller is basically, 'Yeah, tell us something we don't know already.' "

Robert Scheer writes in The Nation that it was a version of this 60 Minutes story that CBS so famously suppressed before the November election.

Cartoon Watch

Slate's Today's Cartoons feature focuses on Tony Snow, and includes these gems from Mike Luckovich and Stuart Carlson .

Jon Stewart Watch

From "The Daily Show" last night: "The long-rumored merger between Fox News and the White House was made official this week, with the hiring of Fox News commentator Tony Snow to serve as the press secretary. A rebranding is in the works, and the new company will be called: 'Integralux; The New Way to Govern.' The company is expected to go public -- never."