Bush Reportedly Won’t Change Course But Will Launch New P.R. Offensive

Over the past few days there have been a host of fascinating news articles suggesting that a major White House re-evalution of the feasibility and efficacy of Iraq war policy was underway in light of various factors — including several major Republican lawmakers publicly turning against the war.

Stories suggested some big change was afoot. An ABC News story announced:’Crack in the Dike’: White House in ‘Panic Mode’ Over GOP Revolt on Iraq” and detailed how the White House was seeking to find ways of achieving consensus to reassure wavering Republicans and angry Democrats.

But the Washington Post reports that President George Bush has now rejected a change in course and is going to embark on what is essentially going to be a new p.r. offensive to reassure Republicans and the country that he, too, wants to bring the troops home one unspecified day:

President Bush, facing a growing Republican revolt against his Iraq policy, has rejected calls to change course but will launch a campaign emphasizing his intent to draw down U.S. forces next year and move toward a more limited mission if security conditions improve, senior officials said yesterday.

Top administration officials have begun talking with key Senate Republicans to walk them through his view of the next phase in the war, beyond the troop increase he announced six months ago today. Bush plans to lay out what an aide called “his vision for the post-surge” starting in Cleveland today to assure the nation that he, too, wants to begin bringing troops home eventually.

The White House devised the political strategy after days of intense internal discussions about how to respond to several prominent Republican senators who have broken with Bush’s war policy recently. Bush decided against heeding their proposal to begin redeploying U.S. troops as early as this summer, but he and his team concluded that he needed to shift his message to show that he shares the goals of his increasingly restless Republican caucus and the broader public.

So the message will apparently now be “George Bush cares as much as Democrats and Republicans who are alarmed at the progress and end of the war and as much as you do. But policy won’t change but it will be over one day except we can’t give you any idea when.”

Will it work?

“Look, the president understands the American people are frustrated,” said a senior official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid upstaging Bush. “We’ve been at this a long time. We’ve sacrificed some of our best and brightest. . . . But they want to see that we have a vision for success that will allow us to gradually downsize our role and reduce our footprint. The president needs to and wants to remind everybody that he shares that frustration.”

MAJOR MISTAKE:

Bush is not down in the polls and heading south faster than Leonardo DiCaprio standing on the nose of the Titantic because he has not made enough speeches — or given enough verbal reassurances saying he cares about the war and wants it to be a success.

He and his administration are losing support even among Republicans because the administration and — Bush in particular — has a major, historical credibility problem. They have also repeatedly eschewed consensus for party-base mobilization tactics. Meanwhile, virtually every day newspaper reports and experts talk of an Iraqi government that hasn’t met the basic assumed benchmarks. An increasing number of American also reject the administration’s constant efforts to link Iraq up with 911. And war critics and many Americans now also reject recent attempts to portray most insurgent attacks in Iraq as the handiwork of Al Qaeda.

Bush and the administration are now in trouble because the Iraq war has now seemingly become much as Bush described the war on terror — as a war without a perceived end.

Most Americans cannot see a light at the end of the tunnel.

But many believe they CAN hear an administration that’s whistling in the dark.:

Bush intends to argue that Congress and the public should look past this week’s scheduled status report on Iraq and wait for the fuller assessment due in September. A drawdown, administration officials said, must be the result of the troop increase, not in place of it. “The drawdown is an effect,” the official said. “It’s not a cause.”

The key question isn’t whether Democrats or progressive bloggers or Air America talk show hosts or even whether the 70 percent of independent voters who’ve broken from the administration voters will buy it.

The question is whether Republicans in Congress will buy it — apart from the fact that many of them are up for re-election in 2008.

And, the Post suggests, chances are they won’t:

Yet key Republican senators have indicated that they would not be satisfied with a change in political spin over a real change in strategy. In a speech on the Senate floor after a White House meeting yesterday, John W. Warner (R-Va.) set the tone, declaring this “a time in our history unlike any I have ever witnessed before.” Warner recalled that Congress has voted to require Bush to demonstrate progress in Iraq or detail how he will alter his strategy, adding that he warned the White House to take it seriously.

“I was asked by the press whether I thought they’d brush it off,” Warner said of the White House, “and I resoundingly replied, ‘No.’ “

Will Warner be eventually seen as a prophet?

Or as a Pollyanna?

If the Post’s story is accurate, he might want to discreetly put away his crystal ball….