Iraq Burns as Bush & GOP Complain about NYT Ad
PILGRIM: We are back with Errol Louis, Miguel Perez and Diana West. And I would like to bring in the General Petraeus Iraq situation this week. The Senate voted 75-25 to condemn an anti-war ad that really took on the reputation of the U.S. commander in Iraq, General Petraeus. President Bush actually criticized Democrats for not being stronger in condemning that. Let's listen to what the president had to say first.</s>GEORGE W. BUSH, U.S. PRESIDENT: Most Democrats are afraid of irritating a left wing group like moveon.org, are more afraid of irritating them than they are of irritating the United States military.</s>PILGRIM: So he's accusing Democrats of playing politics with the war. What do you believe?</s>PEREZ: Yes. It's not the Democrats. The Democrats should be condemning MoveOn. I think the best friend Bush has right now is MoveOn. Sometimes I wonder whether republicans in disguise, because these ultraliberals are what supposedly have given ammunition to Bush and the Republicans to continue the war.</s>LOUIS: It's classic Bush politics. Split the country down the middle and try to come up with slightly more than half and just kind of inch along. That's how he's won his elections. That's how he's tried to govern. It hasn't worked particularly well. In this case, with the moveon.org ad, there was no particular reason Democrats had to denounce it. I think a fair number of Democrats felt the same way as the president, it was a disgusting ad, a distraction at best, an unwarranted attack on someone who has more important things on his mind than some ad in the "New York Times." So I think it was a distraction that the president tried to use for political reasons and it's about as unfortunate as the ad itself.</s>PILGRIM: Diana, Senate Democrats this week failed to pass any measure to change the course of the war. What's your view on how Democrats are proceeding through their own policy agenda?</s>WEST: Well, I'd like to address Errol's last comment because I don't think this is a matter of Bush playing politics. You had this really disgraceful attack on General Petraeus' honor and conduct as a commander and you had all of the Democrats to a man and woman not moving away from it, not denouncing it, indeed, finding nothing objectionable about it. And I think it put our whole debate last week onto the worst kind of footing and it distracted from the important questions. President Bush, in this case, I've been critical of him in terms of the war but in this case he said the only thing that could be said to defend the general and to really wonder where the Democrats are also joining him in doing so.</s>PILGRIM: Yeah. It was not a good episode. We have to end it there. Errol Louis, Miguel Perez and Diana West, thank you very much. And thank you for joining us. Please join us tomorrow. For all of us here, thanks for watching. Enjoy your weekend. Good night from New York. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.voxant.com