The Missing Links

"Bush underscored GOP strategists' hopes that even a president plagued by low approval ratings can use his bully pulpit to fill the airwaves with a message designed to help the party's candidates. . . .

"Although he has often been accused of avoiding critical questioners, Bush's appearance suggested he was settling into a pattern of regular, wide-ranging interactions with reporters in which he can appear confident and presidential."

Paul Koring writes in Toronto's Globe and Mail: "With a rising Democrat chorus accusing Mr. Bush of waging a failed war on false pretenses and some calling to bring U.S. troops home -- after more than three years and 20,000 casualties amid worsening sectarian strife -- Mr. Bush made it clear that his Republican Party is girding for electoral battle this fall across the United States, and that an election fought over Iraq and the wider war on terrorism was fine with him. . . .

"Mr. Bush seems to be trying to push Democrats -- both those hoping to win key seats in Congress this fall and those eyeing a run for the presidency in 2008 -- into the political 'anti-war' minefield. 'I will never question the patriotism of somebody who disagrees with me,' he said, raising the very issue. In fact, questioning the patriotism of political opponents who crossed the Bush administration over the war in Iraq, both before it was launched and ever since, has been routine.

"In Mr. Bush's world, and on Republican campaign platforms this fall, those who challenge the wisdom of the war in Iraq or question the need for sweeping presidential powers to monitor international telephone calls or sift through billions of financial transactions are going soft on the threat posed by international terrorism."

On Television

Here's Kelly O'Donnell on the NBC Nightly News: "What was so noticeable was the forcefulness of the president, his animated defense that American troops will stay in Iraq, despite public anxiety over the war. Pulling them out too soon, he said, in his words, would be a disaster," she reported. "He was emphatic."

Tim Russert followed up with some astute political analysis: "Sixty percent of Americans are against the war, but he faces a critical midterm election 12 weeks from tomorrow. . . . That's why 15 times you heard him say today, Brian, by my count, until the job is done, or until the mission is done, we're not going to leave Iraq. And then basically saying: The terrorists are watching this election and that what we have to do is not leave an Iraq behind that would be similar to Afghanistan because if you do that, it could bring a terrorist back over here or another September 11.

"That in fact is the formulation the president for the next 12 weeks is going to lay out to the country. The Democrats are going to respond saying, 'Wait a minute, Mr. President, you got us into Iraq and that was a distraction from finishing the job in Afghanistan and Osama bin Laden and securing our ports and improving our airport security back here at home.' This is the entire election and the president tried to lay it out today."

On ABC's World News Tonight, Martha Raddatz told Charlie Gibson: "The President acknowledged that he is sometimes frustrated by the lack of progress in Iraq and worries about civil war. But he was adamant that the U.S. will stay the course."

On the much less viewed World News Webcast , Raddatz was a bit more critical: "There were moments of candor today, Charlie. In an hour where there weren't always moments of candor, there were a few of them. He said sometimes he does get frustrated with the situation in Iraq. But again and again, he goes over and over and says we can't take the troops out of there. He avoids specific questions about what might be going wrong, what is going well, but he is sticking to his course. He is sticking to his rhetoric."

On the CBS Evening News, Bill Plante reported: "One way or another, the president made the point more than a dozen times today: That the troops won't be pulling out of Iraq on his watch."

He played a clip from the press conference: "The American people have got to understand the consequence of leaving Iraq before the job is done."