Bush in Prime Time

WHEN YOU PUT 'prime time' and 'Sunday night' in the same sentence, most people think about ESPN's football wrap-up show. But on this Sunday night, Chris Berman was replaced by George Bush as POTUS game yet another speech about the progress being made in Iraq. The difference between this speech and others, however, is that Bush was unusually subdued and contrite. Some highlights and newspaper commentary follows:

• Bush sounding like more of a realist: "This work has been especially difficult in Iraq -- more difficult than we expected. Reconstruction efforts and the training of Iraqi security forces started more slowly than we hoped. We continue to see violence and suffering, caused by an enemy that is determined and brutal, unconstrained by conscience or the rules of war." [WP, NYT, USAT]
• Bush was "uncharacteristically contrite"; speech "culminated a weekend in which his administration tried to retake lost ground" on Iraq and national security. [WP, NYT, NYT, USAT]
• Cheney made a surprise visit to Iraq this weekend, and had some suprising reactions to what he saw: "Well, Iraq's looking good. . . I think when we look back from 10 years hence, we'll see that the year '05 was in fact a watershed year here in Iraq." [WP, NYT, USAT]