Bush to speak on Iraq handover process
White House: 'Important' address set for Monday night
From Dana Bash
CNN
BATON ROUGE, Louisiana (CNN) -- President Bush will deliver an "important speech" about the transfer of political power in Iraq on Monday night, a White House spokesman said Friday.
Bush's address, to be delivered at 8 p.m. at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, will be the first in a series of prime-time speeches intended to lay out the way forward in Iraq, according to White House officials.
White House spokesman Trent Duffy, traveling with the president on a trip to Louisiana, described Monday's pending address as an "important speech."
Duffy said the White House will not ask TV networks to break into regular coverage, but he made it clear that he hopes they will.
White House officials said the speech will be the first of a number of presidential addresses leading up to the June 30 handover of sovereignty to Iraq to try explain the process and to prepare Americans for what will likely be continued violence and casualties.
Grim news from war
The broad topics laid out Friday by the White House include Iraqi security, sovereignty, humanitarian efforts, civil infrastructure and the international and diplomatic fronts of the transfer.
"It's all in the context of keeping Iraq on a path toward democracy," Duffy said.
Bush aides conceded the news coming out of Iraq -- U.S. casualties in the face of an insurgency and the prisoner abuse scandal -- has diminished support at home for the mission and affected the president's approval ratings.
Bush's job approval rating continued a downward spiral in a poll released May 14 by CNN and Time.
Bush's overall job approval rating tumbled from 49 percent to 46 percent since the last CNN/Time poll on April 8, while his disapproval rating rose from 47 percent to 49 percent -- the first time in his administration that more people disapproved of his job performance than approved.
One aide said it is important to be more aggressive in "getting Bush's voice" into the mix.
President to use bully pulpit
While acknowledging there's little the administration can do about the bad news, the aides said they believe they can try to reassure Americans by using the bully pulpit.
"We've learned -- with so much happening on the ground -- the president's speeches have a very short shelf life, and he needs to be out speaking at this critical time as often as possible," one senior Bush official said.
"He will also be cautioning the public there will be difficult days because of the nature of the enemy."
White House officials said a June 2 presidential address at the Air Force Academy in Colorado also will focus on Iraq and the transfer of power.
