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The Iraq Study Group dominated last week's news. Now it is the President's turn. George Bush began his public relations counterattack against the ISG's stinging criticisms with a series of consultations. Both ABC and NBC led with his so-called listening tour. He visited the State Department and then hosted a briefing at the White House. Prominent among his guests were critics of the ISG's proposals. CBS countered with its own data: the network's own poll showed public support for the Iraq War plummeting.

CBS' Bob Schieffer likened public disapproval for the Iraq War effort with Vietnam: 62% now think sending troops to Iraq was a mistake; 60% called Vietnam a mistake in a Gallup Poll in 1973, at the height of opposition to that war. Support has eroded so fast because of Bush's own base: in the single month since the midterm elections, support for the war among Republican voters has nosedived from 70% to 47%.

Both ABC and NBC found their own in-house military analysts included among the White House guest list. ABC's retired general Jack Keane was "withering" in his condemnation of the ISG's recommendations, according to Martha Raddatz: "It is wholly inadequate, a cover story to accept defeat," he declared as he gave it a grade of F. NBC's Brian Williams interviewed his network's more dovish former brass. Barry McCaffrey and Wayne Downing both rejected adding US military reinforcements.

Andrew Tyndall 12/12/06 1:52:36 pm

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