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Skriven 2007-05-02 23:30:52 av Whitehouse Press (1:3634/12.0)
Ärende: Press Release (0705025) for Wed, 2007 May 2
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Press Briefing by Tony Snow
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For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary May 2, 2007

Press Briefing by Tony Snow White House Conference Center Briefing Room

˙ /news/releases/2007/05/20070502-5.wm.v.html ˙˙Press Briefings


1:03 P.M. EDT

MR. SNOW: Fire away. Questions.

Q From his remarks this morning, the President didn't seem to be much in a
compromising mood, still pretty critical of the Democrats. What's going to
be his opening remarks?

MR. SNOW: Well, we'll let him make those to Democrats. Let me make a couple
of points about -- it's interesting, it appears that the discussion about
compromise is all the White House needs to compromise, it's never asked
what the Hill is going to do. Fortunately, when there are talks today I
think both sides are going to be working in a spirit of trying to get
something constructive done. But as tempting as it may be, I'm not going to
tell you what precisely the President is going to say. You'll have
opportunities to hear from people who will have been involved in the
meeting and they can give you their readout.

What the President is not in the mood to compromise about is an attempt to
try to tie the hands of generals or troops on the ground. He's not in the
mood to compromise about an approach that creates a sense of doubt among
our allies, weakens the Iraqi government. Instead what he wants to do is to
pull together a package -- and I think both sides want to do this -- that
is going to make it possible to give the troops the full funding and also
the flexibility necessary to create conditions that are going to -- of
greater security and safety within Iraq, and at the same time, also, as you
know, part of the funding here is for ongoing economic development efforts
-- all of this is very important for building a secure and stable Iraq.
That remains the ultimate endpoint, and anything that works against those
goals is not going to be serving our national interest.

Having said that, the President certainly is going to be listening to
members of Congress and their concerns. They have known for a long time
that they are not going to be able to pass into law the measure that
finally made its way up here yesterday. Now we've got to find something
that will make its way into law and that will meet the basic requirements
that the President has laid out. He will not compromise on issues that
involve the effectiveness and the security and the operational ability of
U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Q Can I follow up on that?

MR. SNOW: Yes, sure, Terry.

Q Did the President read the bill before he vetoed it?

MR. SNOW: The President -- we have had plenty of time to review the bill.

Q Can you talk about the spirit of these meetings today, then? Is the
spirit to compromise? I know you're saying you won't compromise on this,
that or the other --

MR. SNOW: Let me put it this way --

Q -- he's listening, but is he willing to compromise in some way to get
this through?

MR. SNOW: The President is going to be working with Congress to get
something done. Again, you may -- maybe I wasn't listening, but I haven't
heard the question asked of congressional leaders. The fact is, both sides
have to work together. You may describe it as compromise, you can describe
it any way you want. There has to be a constructive effort to get a bill
that is going to serve our national interest, meet the basic conditions the
President has laid out, and provide the kind of -- the support that the
troops need.

Q I'm sure our congressional counterpoints are probably handling that end
of it, but can you tell us from the White House podium what spirit the
President goes into these meetings with?

MR. SNOW: It's going to be -- it's going to be a spirit of saying, let's
work together. It is not -- it is not going to be an antagonistic spirit.
And the President does look forward to working with both sides.

Look, he said on a number of occasions in recent days, Martha, that he
feels confident that we are going to get acceptable legislation out of
this. How that takes place, we'll find out. But this is not going to be an
antagonistic meeting where people are sort of glowering at one another.
Instead it's going to be one where the President says, okay, let's work
together.

Q We want to know if there's going to be any give, any give out of the
President -- from the rule of the people to move out of this war.

MR. SNOW: Yes, we want to move out of this war by succeeding.

Q Violence escalating every day.

Q Tony --

MR. SNOW: Wait a minute, let me stop. Helen, the people have been -- if you
take a look at what's been going on recently, there have been a number of
al Qaeda attacks that had have the -- that have killed innocents --

Q Did every Iraqi attack --

MR. SNOW: No, but if you take a look at the MO of al Qaeda -- bombing
attacks -- as a matter of fact, you've seen some reports, for instance, of
Iraqis, even those who are opposed to the government, going after foreign
fighters. There's a real and recognizable problem there, and it has to be
dealt with. So those who say we need to fight al Qaeda, part of what we're
trying to do is to build greater capability there.

Q We brought them into Iraq.

Q Tony, on that point, this morning the President said that al Qaeda seems
to be a bigger problem than sectarian violence. That seems to fly in the
face of what we've heard in recent weeks and months on the ground in Iraq.

MR. SNOW: Well, you've got a shifting series of circumstances, Bret. If you
take a look, for instance, what al Qaeda -- it's interesting, because it's
impossible to segregate them entirely. You take a look at what happened at
the Golden Mosque in Samarra -- very likely an al Qaeda attack that, in
turn, spawned sectarian violence over the last year and some months. So al
Qaeda's explicit goal, as Abu Musab al Zarqawi said many times, was to
create sectarian violence, which was to try to use acts of violence that
would set Shia against Sunni, and Sunni against Shia, and therefore, would
destabilize the government and also create the opportunity to establish a
safe ground for al Qaeda within the confines of Iraq.

So they're not neatly divisible. Having said that, you have seen, for
instance, the signs of sectarian violence -- the kind of murders that were
taking place within Baghdad, those are way down. General Petraeus has laid
some of that out, as has the President. So there are some of the things
that would be sort of signatures of sectarian violence.

But this is not to say that sectarian violence does not remain a concern,
or that it is not something that is going to continue to be a problem. Of
course, it will. But what you have seen is sort of a shifting of what's
going on, but that is kind of normal in the course of war. There are
different things that take place at different times, and a simple
categorization of the violence is very difficult to make; things do
continue to change.

Q If I could follow. You say you're not going to negotiate from this
podium, but can you say that the President is willing to consider
benchmarks with some punitive action if the Iraqis don't meet them?

MR. SNOW: I am not going to negotiate from this. Let me tell you, there are
two -- let me give you two things to think about. Number one, it's very
important to have metrics by which to measure success with the Iraqi
government. The Iraqi government is not our enemy, it's our ally. We are
here -- we want to support the Iraqi government and help it build
capability so that it can handle security operations, economic development,
diplomatic relations, political evolution, and so on. All those things are
important. So the key is how do you work with them. And I think if you talk
to Democrats, ultimately, the question is how do you build that capability
and how do you put together the right set of policies so they're going to
be able to move forward?

The second thing is that, again, I am not going to be telling you precisely
what we're going to be discussing. But the President is looking for ways to
--

Q Will he consider it?

MR. SNOW: The President will consider anything that anybody offers. The
question is what will people have to say when they get there, and certainly
he'll be fair. So, again, we're going to be listening to what everybody has
to say. This has to be a constructive exercise. But, again, it also has to
be one -- and respect shown on both sides, and also respect ultimately for
the goal of trying to build conditions for a successful Iraqi government,
along the lines where a lot of the basics everybody does agree on,
including metrics, which the President laid out a number of those a while
ago and you do need to find ways to be able to measure progress.

Q Tony, the President sort of framed the argument today saying, Americans
don't have to choose between being in between warring sectarian sides in a
"civil war" -- using that term -- instead, it's a fight against al Qaeda.
Wasn't the whole point of the surge to quell the capital and really to
diminish the sectarian violence? And now he seems to be saying the enemy is
more al Qaeda, rather than --

MR. SNOW: But, again, as I pointed out just a minute ago, Kelly, what
you've done is you've indicated that there has been some change in status
on the ground since the new Baghdad security plan began to be implemented.
And I think that's true. On the other hand, again, nobody wants to take
victory laps. For instance, when it comes to sectarian violence, what did
you see? You saw members of the Mahdi Army publicly laying down arms. You
saw Moqtada al Sadr leaving Baghdad. You saw a series of very swift changes
simply upon announcement, and there have been areas in which you have seen
reductions in sectarian violence. That reflects the facts on the ground.

You've also seen an attempt by al Qaeda, in response to this, to put
together, for instance, coordinated car bombings and the kind of thing,
especially near holy sites, not only in Baghdad, but around the country,
that probably ought to be construed as attempts to do what happened with
the Samarra Mosque bombing, which is to reignite the sectarian tension.

So what the President -- the President is not shifting the analysis; the
Baghdad security plan was there to try to learn from the mistakes that we
made with the two Baghdad security plans last year. In other words, we
didn't keep a 24/7 presence; we didn't move in quickly with economic
development; we weren't as fully integrated on a 24/7 basis with Iraqi
forces; we weren't the developing -- we didn't give the Iraqis a big enough
chip in the game. All of those things are things we've learned from. And
you've got David Petraeus, then, who also has considerable success -- he
did it in Mosul with counter-insurgency, and is somebody who is our
acknowledged expert on the topic.

So what you want to do is you want to keep in mind --

Q Tony, is it politically persuasive to say the enemy is al Qaeda and not
getting in between sectarian groups?

MR. SNOW: The characterizations here are not part of a sales pitch, they're
an attempt to try to reflect what's going on on the ground. General
Petraeus, when he does this, is laying out what he sees. Now, it's entirely
conceivable that a month from now you'll have sectarian problems. We hope
not. But again, I think you're trying to use a political lens for
statements that really are designed simply to say, look, we have shifting
realities on the ground.

The President laid out plenty of evidence for that last week. And so has
MNFI on a pretty regular basis. They try to do what they can to make the
statistics known and the data available to everybody. So it's not an
attempt to try to change the characterization for political reasons.

Q Can I just clarify, following Kelly's question, when the President laid
out that construct in the speech today, the civil war-al Qaeda construct,
it seemed that he was saying there is a civil war.

MR. SNOW: No, if you go back to the National Intelligence Estimate, what
you had was -- again, look at what NIE said, which is that you have some
clashes that are consistent with civil war, and inconsistent with the
notion of a civil war. I am not going to get us back into that whole sort
of debate about how you define a civil war. The fact is that we have a
situation where we are working to develop for the Iraqis the ability to
establish institutions and also conditions on the ground that are going to
be conducive not only to creating a stable democracy, but giving people an
active incentive to join in. But I'm just --

Q I don't want to go back there, either, except the fact that the President
seemed to say it clearly today.

MR. SNOW: Again, it's -- the position -- it's just much more complicated
than that.

Q Okay, let me follow one more time on the idea of -- the compromise, which
you said the Democrats have not come out and said what they wanted, that
everything seems to be us asking you what the White House is willing to do,
but we're not hearing it from Capitol Hill.

MR. SNOW: I'm just curious from a questioning point of view that -- yes.

Q Well, there's been reporting and the Democrats said very clearly
yesterday that the time to push troop withdrawal deadlines was over, but
they were willing to do some work on benchmarks, attaching --

MR. SNOW: Okay, well again, we look forward to the conversation. I'm still
not going to --

Q No, but wait a minute. They're being very clear about what they're
willing to do and what they're pushing as far as an approach. And I think
it's only fair that you give some indications as to whether or not that's
something in the ballpark here.

MR. SNOW: The fact is that there have probably been four or five separate
proffers from a number of individuals in the Democratic Party, none of
which seem to reflect yet a consensus on the part of the party, which is
one of the reasons we're asking the leaders in. So what you're asking me to
respond to is one of many ideas that have been floated.

Again, I think it's more constructive -- let everybody have their
conversations, and you're going to have to be patient. There are going to
be discussions. People will be at the sticks today, they'll have comments
to make. But I think what you're going to see is a good-faith effort out of
the White House, and we think also that the signs we've gotten from Capitol
Hill are a good-faith effort to try to get something done that will achieve
the basic goals that the President laid out and will allow us to move
forward.

Q Tony, I want to go back to the notion of al Qaeda versus sectarian
violence. One of the things you and the President have cited is progress in
al Anbar recently. That was taking place before the new strategy even
began.

MR. SNOW: Yes.

Q So you keep trying to tie that in with the new strategy, when, in fact,
it's really the long war strategy from before it even started.

MR. SNOW: All right, let me break this down for you. What's happened in
Anbar, it's not -- what happened in Anbar is, Sunnis were tired of having
foreign fighters come in and kill their people, and they decided to turn
against them; God bless them. What has happened --

Q Right, and it happened months ago.

MR. SNOW: Okay, but since the beginning -- but my response was still
germane about Baghdad, which is -- and you know the figures -- that the
benchmarks for sectarian violence, the killings, where you had people going
in and killing people wholesale, seemingly merely on a sectarian basis, you
had individual murders and that sort of thing going on in areas of Baghdad,
those numbers, fortunately, are down. But I do not want to, again, give the
impression that we're trying to say, the sectarian violence is at an end.
But by the measures that people have been using to gauge such things,
they've been down.

Now, if you take a look at, again, the things that have been indicative and
typical of al Qaeda activity, such as a single driver going in, blowing
himself up, killing a lot of people, or on a timed basis, and the use --
foreign fighters being involved in these activities, those, in fact, have
increased in recent weeks. That is primarily what we've been seeing of
late. So all that's doing is reflecting as accurately as we can what has
been going on on the ground.

Q But answer that question about al Anbar. I mean, the President, again,
cited progress in Ramadi and al Anbar, because that seems where the most
progress is, and that was before the new strategy.

MR. SNOW: Well, the strategy -- but on the other hand --

Q So what are we supposed to take from that?

MR. SNOW: What you're supposed to take is there's good news. Thank you for
reporting it.

Q But it has nothing to do with the Baghdad security plan, but we keep
tying it to it.

MR. SNOW: Well, Anbar is not -- no, no, it does -- actually, it does --

Q -- the progress, the real progress -- I saw last August.

MR. SNOW: I know, Martha. But also what you have seen is -- and you might
want to call your buds, because a lot of people in Anbar do make this point
-- when it was announced that there would be another 4,000 U.S. forces in
Anbar, it did, in fact, have the effect of strengthening both the
confidence and the resolve of the people there. There have been many
attempts over time to try to roll back the progress that had been made
there. As a matter of fact, that is not new. You've seen progress in places
like Ramadi, and you've seen the resurgence of violence. In this particular
case, you have seen an effective and extended period of success there that
we hope will continue.

And it is worth noting that as part of the Baghdad security plan there was
also a complement of 4,000 U.S. forces that would be there to supplement
ongoing efforts in Anbar. You're right, the progress began before, but it
has continued. And I think it is reasonable to argue that this will
certainly help sustain the success. But also a lot of credit has to go to
tribal leaders and also Iraqis in Anbar who have decided to lay down arms,
or to go from being people fighting the government to folks who stand in
lines and sign up to become members of the police forces, while others are
trying to keep the peace.

Q Are there 4,000 more there? I don't know.

MR. SNOW: I don't know that all of them are there yet. I'll find -- you can
actually call the Pentagon --

Q Are any of them there?

MR. SNOW: We'll find out.

Q The veto message the President sent up to the Hill argues that what the
Democrats are doing is unconstitutional. How can that be unconstitutional
when they seem to be exercising their power of the purse?

MR. SNOW: No, they're also -- but when you start getting into operational
details that impinge upon the President's prerogatives as
Commander-in-Chief, that does raise legitimate constitutional issues.

Q The President earlier today defined success in Iraq. He said, "Success is
not, no violence. There are parts of our country that, as you know, have a
certain level of violence to it. But success is a level of violence where
the people feel comfortable about living their daily lives, and that's what
we're trying to achieve." What is the President talking about when he says
there's parts in our own country where a certain level of violence that
people will accept?

MR. SNOW: It means that you have places with high crime rates. And it is
something that is quite often a fact of American life that we don't like
and it is something that is a matter of constant and ongoing concern. But
you could construe that as violence, and it is. If you take a look at
drug-related violence that has wracked many of our cities -- and now,
increasingly, in rural areas, as well as suburban -- that is a form of
violence. If you read stories over the years that constantly take a look at
murder rates and rape rates, and every time we come out with either the
Bureau of Justice statistics or FBI with its reports, it's a standard part
of reporting.

So what he's really talking about is that there's certain kinds of violence
that do, unfortunately, exist in a society, but he was not arguing, for
instance, that there are militias afoot or that sort of thing. He was
simply saying, at some point, you need a level of violence in a society,
crime or whatever, that is not going to be undermining your ability to have
a functional democracy. And of course, the endless experiment within
democracy is always to make it more effective and attending to the needs
and safety of the people.

Q If the President is using that as an example of saying that the Iraqis,
if they find a certain level of violence that is acceptable, that's defined
now as success?

MR. SNOW: Yes, in other words, what he's saying is that if you can have a
society that can function more or less normally, where you will have
effective police forces that are able to dispense justice fairly,
regardless of who you are; you have a growing economy; you have a rule of
law; you have political institutions that reflect and protect the rights of
all; you have a political system that is able to adjust over time and to --
amid compromise and full debate; you have diplomatic roots set down so you
are a strong and functional player within the region. All of those are
parts of being a successful state.

Q But the President -- he argued that this is about freedom, this is about
democracy. But when the President defines success as a level of violence,
where people feel comfortable about living their daily lives -- that bar is
very, very low. That's much lower than a democracy or freedom agenda.

MR. SNOW: No, it's not. No, it's not. I mean, look, Washington for many
years was the murder capital of the United States of America. I believe we
are still able to do our jobs. Now, really what he's talking about -- he's
talking about that. He is not talking about --

Q How do you define an acceptable level of violence? I mean, how can that
possibly be defined?

MR. SNOW: That's a very good question. I don't have an answer.

Q Can I follow up on --

Q Excuse me --

MR. SNOW: I was going to recognize Sheryl, but, April, you'll be next.

Go ahead.

Q When you talk about -- you said, operational details before, with respect
to the President's assertion that what the Congress has done is
unconstitutional. Are you saying that Congress does not have it within its
purview to appropriate money and say what purpose that money can be used
for, that they cannot say, this money will be used for support troops, as
opposed to combat troops, for instance?

MR. SNOW: Sheryl, if there are attempts -- the President has -- the
President needs the ability to operate effectively as Commander-in-Chief,
and when people start trying to micromanage that legislatively, that raises
constitutional issues.

Q So it's your position that it's unconstitutional then for the Congress to
try to say what kind of troops --

MR. SNOW: I'll give you a general characterization --

Q -- the money can be spent on?

MR. SNOW: I actually think that this is a very interesting abstract
question that's completely irrelevant because I don't think it's going to
be a part of the conversation.

Q It is part of it because the Democrats want to limit the mission. They
want to change -- they want to use this bill to change the mission and to
move us away from combat troops and into support missions and other
missions --

MR. SNOW: Well, I'm not sure that that is -- we'll find out. We'll find as
we go.

Q -- talking about what's acceptable in this country. It seems to be a wave
of gang violence, as you said, in urban, as well as rural communities.
Initiations are creating murders, gang violence itself -- and when you have
community leaders to include, black leaders, say genocide of black --
black-on-black crime in urban America. What is acceptable about those --
and they are crippling communities.

MR. SNOW: And this is where -- you're getting into an apples and orange
thing, but it's a very good question. Look, no level of violence in the
abstract is acceptable. You want people to be able to live in a condition
of peace. On the other hand, what the President is talking about is that
there will be levels of violence in a society that do not, in fact, cripple
the society's ability to function on a daily basis. That's merely what he's
referring to.

He has also spoken many times and eloquently about the tragedy of violence
within our cities. It remains a concern, and, boy, do I hope that the
Iraqis will be in a position where they now can start worrying about those
levels of concerns, as opposed to al Qaeda violence, or the possibility of
sectarian violence within their boundaries.

Q Well, I hate to paint a drastic picture, but there is a drastic picture
in this country. We talk about what's happening in Iraq -- curfews and
things of that nature. We have people scared to leave because of sectarian
violence and civil war in their country. You have people in this country
scared to leave their homes, scared to go out at night because of violence,
because of gang problems -- so, unacceptable may be something that --

MR. SNOW: Again, what we're trying to -- look, that's not acceptable; you
understand that. What we're trying to do is to come up with a metric of
saying, there's going to be a level of violence in a society. But I think
you would agree, April, that if that were the kind of violence that were
existing, say, in Baghdad, it would not be a cause to have extended
American presence there. That's something that the Iraqis ought to be able
to take care of.

Q And also on Sudan --

MR. SNOW: Yes, yes.

Q -- on the warrants for the arrests of -- the war crime arrests. Do you
have anything -- what's the White House saying about that?

MR. SNOW: We very strongly support accountability for those who are
responsible for Darfur, and we expect the government of Sudan to comply
with the obligations under United Nations Security 1593 to cooperate with
the ICC.

Q The President, in the course of this speech, said that casualties will
likely stay high. He spoke of a systematic al Qaeda attack, the choice of
responding to the -- he chose the article "the" not "a" civil war -- he
said there's no easy way out. Why this grim tone to this speech today,
heading into these talks with Congress?

MR. SNOW: No, I don't think it's a grim tone. What the President is trying
to do is be realistic. You got problems there. You have violence. For
instance, if you recall in the State of the Union address, when we were
talking about a way forward, it has always been known that when you go in
and you're engaging the people who have been responsible for organizing
violence, they're going to fight back. And, therefore, you have seen rising
casualty rates within Baghdad. That is -- we predicted that from the very
start. We have known that that is going to be the case.

On the other hand, there's also been a rapidly rising casualty rate on the
part of the people who are responsible for the violence. What you have also
seen is Iraqi forces not only more deeply engaged, but also more successful
in going in and rooting out some of these cells, in going in and helping
pacify various parts of Baghdad.

The President wants people to understand that a war is a tough thing, and
furthermore, that one of the reasons why we need to support our forces
fully is to go ahead and meet the threat now, rather than to allow it to
worsen, and also to send a clear message to the Iraqi people, we know that
you're facing difficulty, a lot of it is from foreign forces, and what we
want to do is to make sure that you have the ability to enjoy the democracy
that millions of Iraqis voted to put into place originally, knowing that
there were going to be difficulties, knowing that there is always the
possibility of sectarian violence, and also knowing that it is really
important for the Iraqi people to be industrious and creative in trying to
overcome those.

We saw today, for instance, the council of ministers has passed on to the
council of representatives the draft oil law. That is something that they
have been working on for a very long time. And that does not mean that
you've got instant passage, but you're going to have -- you've got a
process where people are working very hard to try to create incentives that
reach past historic enmity and instead give people economic, social and
political reasons to look at one another as -- not only as countrymen, but
as people who have a stake in your success and you have a stake in their
success.

Q Tony, sorry, just one more related question. For the first time, the U.S.
Commission on Religious Freedom has put Iraq on a watch list of countries
where worship is under siege. Among other things, its report cited
arbitrary arrests and torture and rape. Is this the kind of thing that U.S.
troops are in the middle of here?

MR. SNOW: Peter, I haven't seen the report, so I can't comment on it.

Goyal.

Q First of all, welcome back.

MR. SNOW: Thank you, sir.

Q When President Bush made an announcement on mangoes from India, I was
with him in India in Hyderabad. And yesterday his dream came true.
Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns and Susan Schwab, the U.S. Rep, and
also Ambassador Ronen Sen, they had a celebration yesterday at the Commerce
Department by the U.S.-India Business Council. Mangoes from India arrived,
and here is a basket for President Bush, and also for the First Lady
mangoes from India. My question is that, what message does mangoes bring,
as far as India-U.S. relations are concerned -- trade and other issues?

MR. SNOW: I don't know, it is my first mango-related inquiry. (Laughter.)
Goyal, I think what you do see is constantly -- India is a very important
partner for the United States. You saw the civil nuclear agreement, also
agricultural cooperation. India is going to be vital part also in pursuing
the Doha Round. So I think it, once again, reflects what we see, which is
not only increasing closeness between the two governments, but also
increasing interdependency.

Q Tony, back to success again for just a moment. Previously, success has
been defined as Iraq defending itself, sustaining itself, and so on.

MR. SNOW: Governing itself.

Q Governing itself. And today we saw success defined as kind of a lower
level of violence. Is there a difference?

MR. SNOW: No, this is not inconsistent. This is part of what we discussed
before. No, it's not at all inconsistent.

Q Not a new definition --

MR. SNOW: No.

Q Tony, I've got a couple of questions. The first one is, does the
President intend to move at all in terms of his position?

MR. SNOW: The President -- again, I know it's really tempting, "the
President moved" -- I am sure that everybody is going to have -- when this
is all done, I will allow each and every person to decide how much people
have moved or boogied or done whatever they've done during the course of
legislative compromise. But the fact is that there will be discussions that
we think are going to lead to an acceptable measure that both sides are
going to be able to take pride and credit. He's going to be listening and
it is his determination to work with Congress to get something that's
acceptable.

So my guess is, I will let other people do the definitional stuff later.
Why don't we wait and see first what we see, in terms of the body language
after today's meeting, and also what we begin to see in terms of
cooperation on both sides and discussions -- Democrats, Republicans and the
White House, together, House and Senate -- to try to come up with a measure
that we hope very quickly can get passed into law, because there is a
certain amount of urgency in getting this funding in the pipeline.

Q In his speech today, he was asked a question about the media and media
coverage. And in his reply he referred to free speech. And then he said,
"without glossing over the inherent dangers." What "inherent dangers" in
free speech was he referring to?

MR. SNOW: That I don't know, because, frankly, I was not at the speech. And
I'll get back to you.

Q Would you, please? It was interesting.

MR. SNOW: Yes, I'm sure it was.

Q I have a related one.

MR. SNOW: Okay. Let's try to keep this in sort of a related -- that's a
good idea.

Q Thank you. You mentioned the need for metrics and ways to measure
progress, but I'm wondering, is there also a need to find ways to hold
people accountable for reaching those --

MR. SNOW: Do you think that it's a matter that the Iraqis do not want
peace, do not want security? I think they do. So you can look at it one of
two ways. Again, you can treat them as the wayward party that you're going
to punish, or you can treat them as the partner you want to assist. And it
is our desire, in every way possible, as constructively as possible, to
help them go ahead and gain those capabilities. Does it mean that you might
try to nudge them? Are you going to have conversations with them? That
happens on a very regular basis.

But I think there's a characterization sometimes that tends to demean the
government of Iraq, where people are laying their lives on the line and
it's a very difficult business, and we want to see that government succeed.

Q Well, how is it demeaning? I mean, people love their children and
children are given punishments. Why wouldn't we want to take some way to
hold -- or would the President at least consider some way to hold the
government accountable for reaching certain goals as a way to prod an ally?

MR. SNOW: Again, you can look at it two ways: Do you prod an ally, or do
you weaken the government? Let me put it this way: There are some concerned
within the region that the way -- when you frame a question that way, it
says we have no faith in the government. Therefore, it creates difficulties
within the country because partners to the coalition ask themselves, does
this mean that the Americans are not going to help out? Are they going to
walk away? Are they going to bail out? If you go back to -- and the fear of
the United States doing what the Baker-Hamilton commission called
precipitated withdrawal, is palpable. They want to know that we're going to
help them succeed.

And so it's important to figure out how you frame it. I think Democrats and
Republicans, again, have the same goal, which is, how do you get the Iraqis
into a position as swiftly as possible that they succeed in doing these
things they need to do? And that will be part of the conversation.

You will notice that I am not going to answer your question when it comes
to the way in which you create those incentives. That is properly a matter
for discussion between the people who are going to be around the table, and
I'm sure they're going to have those conversations. But, again, what you
want to do is to find a way to assist that government that does not
undermine it, that does not undermine American credibility or prestige in
the region, but instead helps to strengthen our interest, helps to
strengthen our credibility and helps strengthen that government.

Les, I know that you're not going to be on this issue --

Q You do? How do you know?

MR. SNOW: ESP. Am I correct?

Q You're right. (Laughter.) Will you come back?

MR. SNOW: Yes.

Q Thank you.

Q You said there's a certain amount of urgency in getting this done. Care
to be more specific about what it needs to get done?

MR. SNOW: No, because, you know what, as I pointed out, for all the talk
about benchmarks, Congress can't meet its benchmarks. If I set up a
benchmark it's not necessarily going to be productive. I think everybody
wants to get this done quickly. But, no, I do not want to -- I don't want
to start the egg timer.

Q Congressional Research Service has said until July there is not really a
problem with funding. Is that incorrect?

MR. SNOW: Well, again, if you talk to the Pentagon, there's already been --
it depends on how you define a problem. You've already got the situation
where you have to start moving money between accounts. That is not optimal.
And I think probably the best thing to do for our military is to go ahead
and keep all parts of it fully funded. And that means going ahead and
finishing up this emergency supplemental as quickly as possible.

Q "Not optimal," does that mean we're in a problem already, or is it just
not optimal?

MR. SNOW: I'm saying that -- I'm not going to get into characterizing it,
but I think you would agree that if you have a situation where you have to
start moving between accounts, that's less good than one where all the
accounts are fully funded.

Q Tony, a senior DOD official said that we have time until June. Is that
true? Where there's some leeway for about a month?

MR. SNOW: Again, I'm not going to try to characterize exactly what's going
on, other than we're moving money between accounts and that's not the way
you want to run an operation.

Q So we should see the President standing firm for about another two to
three weeks --

MR. SNOW: You'll see the President standing firm on principle throughout.
Look, I want you to understand, because there's a tendency in Washington to
say, this is a kind of a legislative chess game and we've got to do this,
so this guy moves this far and this guy moves this far -- no. The purpose
of this bill, it's an emergency supplemental bill to finance ongoing
military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. You have to do that in a way
that will allow you to conduct effectively ongoing military operations in
Iraq and Afghanistan.

This is not a chess game. The people over there are not chess pieces. They
are American citizens fighting for something that is very important for our
long-term national security and our immediate national security. And,
therefore, the idea of somehow saying, will the President sort of change in
two weeks -- the conditions that he's laid out, in terms of providing
funding and flexibility are not going to change. That's not going to
change.

But on the other hand, you've got a lot of members who agree with him.
Probably a majority. So here is a chance to answer a lot of concerns that
members of Congress have about how we look at this, work collegially with
members of the House and Senate, then provide the funding and flexibility.

Q So do you agree with the person from DOD that the hardship is worse in
June, and that's when --

MR. SNOW: The hardship continues to get worse. We've already said that
there's already been a transfer, it tends to accelerate the middle of this
month and it will get worse as time goes on.

Q Tony, one of the Democrats' arguments is that the American people are on
their side in this debate. I'm just wondering, how does the President, how
does this White House balance or incorporate the will of the people at the
same time as the President taking a principled stand?

MR. SNOW: Well, on the other hand, the American people also have said that
if the veto is sustained, Congress ought to go ahead and pass the bill.
That's the will of the American people. CBS, Axelrod. The fact is that
there are a number of polls. But the problem a lot of times with the polls,
it will take a cut at one little sort of a sliver of a much broader debate.
And I think what the American people -- of course, the American people want
the troops home. The President wants the troops home. Nobody likes a
situation of war. But you also don't want a situation that's going to make
this nation less secure in the short run or the long run.

Again, you take a look -- one of the things -- here is the National
Intelligence Estimate: If coalition forces were withdrawn rapidly, this
almost certainly would lead to a significant increase in the scale and
scope of sectarian conflict in Iraq, intensify Sunni resistance, have
adverse consequences for national reconciliation. One of the things it also
says in the Baker-Hamilton commission report is: al Qaeda would depict our
withdrawal as a historic victory. If we leave and Iraq descends into chaos
-- which it judges likely -- the long-range consequences could eventually
require the United States to return. Question: Would you like that
situation? The American people would say, no.

The interesting thing about public opinion polls is that you can get people
to respond to a headline. But the President can't respond to a headline. He
has to respond to a war that has enormous complexity --

Q That he started.

MR. SNOW: -- and has a lot of different pieces to it. And, therefore, the
real key is, as Commander-in-Chief his solemn obligation is to make this
country safe and to fulfill our security interests, which is what he's
going to do. And it's a lot easier, again, to sort of argue about a
particular poll question. But there are real security interests that you
have to deal with.

Les.

Q Thank you, Tony. Two questions. Does the President agree or disagree with
what page one of The Washington Times this morning reports is D.C. City
Councilman Marion Barry's proposal to charge all U.S. citizens tolls if
they come to our nation's capital? Or does he believe Mr. Barry should
either pay his income taxes or go to prison, as prosecuting attorneys have
asked?

MR. SNOW: Les, I'm going to send you Article I of the Constitution. You can
sort of look through some of the executive powers and we'll get back to
you. But that's --

Q Okay, page one of The Washington Post quotes President Reagan as
describing Connecticut's former Senator Lowell Weicker as "a pompous
no-good fathead." Does President Bush believe that President Reagan was
wrong in this statement, or right, or will your refusal to comment leave
everyone wondering?

MR. SNOW: C. (Laughter.)

Q What? C. You'll leave everyone wondering. (Laughter.) You're a funny man.

MR. SNOW: Suzanne, has a question. Let's --

Q The President said earlier today, he said, "Either we'll succeed or won't
succeed" regarding the Iraq mission. And six months ago, he was asked, are
we winning? He said, absolutely. And then it turned to, we're not winning,
we're not losing. Now we're here at, we'll either succeed or won't succeed.
It doesn't sound like a vote of confidence for the Iraqi -- what should the
soldiers make of that statement?

MR. SNOW: I think the soldiers should make that they've got somebody who
supports them. And they understand that the mission is not to leave, but to
succeed and then leave.

Q But he says, we'll succeed or we won't succeed. He doesn't sound very
confident in our ability to succeed.

MR. SNOW: What he's really talking about is the nature of political debate.
Will the United States send a message that we are going to provide the
support that will enable the forces to do what they want? As you know,
Suzanne, again, the testimony General Petraeus has been giving indicates
that there has been some marginal progress. He does not want, again, for
people to reach too far in the analysis, but it's there -- not only in
Anbar, which predates the Baghdad security plan, but within Baghdad proper.

The point is that the goal here is success, and the President -- success is
still an Iraq that can sustain, govern, and defend itself. It's one where
you will have levels of violence that will not jeopardize the ability of
the government to function on an ongoing basis.

So, no, this is not a stepping back, this is not the President embracing
gloom, but realizing that it is a complex situation that ultimately the
American people -- and you have to understand what the military
understands, which is it is tough business, but it is vital, absolutely
vital for our long-term security. This is not -- this is a place where
failure really is not and should not be an option.

Q Sustain, govern, and defend, could Iraq do any of those three now?

MR. SNOW: I don't think it is in a position independently to do the three
at this juncture. That's one of the reasons why.

END 1:43 P.M. EDT
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