Analysis: Iraq Report Won't Help Bush

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ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: July 12, 2007

Filed at 5:22 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Half full, half empty. No matter how you spin it, the Iraq report won't help President Bush make his stay-the-course case to a skeptical public and Congress.

The president's approval rating is 33 percent in a new AP-Ipsos poll. The Democratic-run Congress, elected to curtail U.S. military involvement in Iraq, is even lower: 24 percent.

The nation's mood has soured on the mission.

Bush acknowledged as much Thursday. ''There's war fatigue in America. It's affecting our psychology,'' he told a White House news conference. ''I understand that. It's an ugly war.''

The president is trying to use the new report to buy time, at least until September, when Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, issues a far more comprehensive one.

But patience is running thin. A growing number of senior Republicans -- including Sens. Richard Lugar of Indiana, John Warner of Virginia, George Voinovich of Ohio and Pete Domenici of New Mexico -- already have defected.

And military analysts are growing increasingly gloomy, even those who were earlier supportive of the decision to topple Saddam Hussein's government.


report: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Bush-Iraq-Analysis.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print