NBC Hypes 'Tough Times' for GOP With Out-of-Touch Analysis of McCain's War Stance

Photo of Geoffrey Dickens.

Whatever Andrea Mitchell has it seems to be catching. Repeatedly, NBC's Mitchell has claimed John McCain's declining support in the polls has to do with his pro-war stance, a stance that quite frankly isn't unpopular within the GOP base. Well on this morning's 'Today' show her colleague David Gregory, in a piece about low Republican morale, claimed the very same thing. Gregory claimed: "John McCain has lost ground in the polls because of his support for the Iraq war."

Now any GOP insider could tell them McCain's support for the war is one of the key stances that is keeping McCain afloat with the base of the party. One has to wonder if Mitchell and Gregory are just having the same conversation with themselves and coming to the same inaccurate conclusions.

The following is the full segment as it aired on the April 9th Today show:

Matt Lauer: "Now to Decision 2008. The Republicans call their party the GOP, it stands for the Grand Old Party but many of the faithful are not feeling too grand these days. NBC's chief White House correspondent David Gregory has more on that story. David, good morning to you."

[On screen headline: "Curbed Enthusiasm, Tough Times For the GOP."]

David Gregory: "Good morning, Matt. It's true. From the White House to the campaign trail this is a difficult time to be a Republican, even as the '08 candidates jockey for advantage one GOP operative says of the party faithful, there is a quote, 'morale deficit.' With the country at war in Iraq, an unpopular president and a GOP presidential field outperformed by the Democrats in the money primary Republicans are in desperate search of a turnaround."

Byron York, The National Review: "With the exception of two successful Supreme Court nominations, for Republicans things have been all downhill since the 2004 election. Katrina and then Iraq, Iraq, Iraq."

Gregory: "The party's top contenders for the White House in '08 have been knocked off their stride with polls showing a majority of Republicans dissatisfied with their choices for president. John McCain has lost ground in the polls because of his support for the Iraq war. He made matters worse during a recent trip to Iraq suggesting that Baghdad had become safe enough to walk around, a claim undermined by pictures of heavy security accompanying the Arizona senator to a local market. In an interview with 60 Minutes, Sunday, McCain admitted it was an overstatement."

Sen. John McCain: "Of course I'm gonna, I'm gonna misspeak and I've done it on numerous occasions and I probably will in the future. I regret that."

Rudolph Giuliani: "I feel I made a mistake in recommending Bernie Kerik to the President."

Gregory: "Though still the frontrunner Rudy Giuliani has seen questions about his relationship to embattled former New York police chief Bernard Kerik as well as criticism about his views on social issues affect his standing. Mitt Romney had a strong showing in the money primary hauling in $20 million only to see that overshadowed by a campaign claim-"

Mitt Romney: "I purchased a gun when I was a young man. I've been a hunter, pretty much all my life."

Gregory: "-that turned out to be untrue."

Romney: "I'm not a big game hunter."

Gregory: "His campaign said he had been hunting only twice."

Gregory: "For months Republicans have been in foul mood. A poll from the Pew Research Center found that only 35 percent of Americans consider themselves Republicans while 50 percent identify with the Democrats. Five years ago the parties were even with 43 percent. And in campaign '08's first quarter fundraising drive Democrats out-raised Republicans $80 million to $50 million."

Rich Galen, Republican strategist: "Well I think the fundraising reports, as one indication, show clearly that Democrats are more excited about what's coming down the pike than Republicans seem to be at this exact moment."

Gregory: "If there is a chance for GOP unity White House officials hope it will come around the issue of funding for the war in Iraq. The President has said that Democrats who want to end the war with a deadline for troop withdrawal are short-changing U.S. forces. Matt."

—Geoffrey Dickens is the senior news analyst at the Media Research Center.


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GOP Insider

Perhaps Andrea's GOP insider is David Gergen?

Insiders

I think that Andrea is hearing voices again.  Doesn't she know that if she stays on her meds the voices will go away?

I actually heard Tom Oliphant

I actually heard Tom Oliphant this morning say that it would be mistake to count out McCain at this early stage. He specifically said about 2/3 of the GOP still favor the reasons going to war in Iraq. I wonder where Mitchell and Gregory get their information or do they just make it up as they go along?

NBC: Mr. Romney, do you pic

NBC: "Mr. Romney, do you pick your nose?"

ROMNEY: "Well.. no not really."

NBC: "Mr. Romney, what would you say if we could produce a witness that SAW you pick your nose, while driving, 15 years ago?"

ROMNEY: *mumbles under his breath* "I would say you guys are Idiots."

MM: I agree with Romney.

"There are two types of people in this country; those who provide freedom and those who enjoy it." MM says...

Mitchell and Gregory are the

Mitchell and Gregory are the definition of classic Washington insiders.  Because of that they know what they are saying about McCain is absolutely untrue.  That they say what they say doesn't surprise me.  It used to surprise me they would say things so brazenly.  I'm no longer surprised at any of this crap, just disgusted.

No one needs to be worried ab

No one needs to be worried about the Democrats’ current edge in fundraising, since the vast majority of that surplus money will be spent attacking fellow Democrats.

Nearly every demographic voting bloc has poured out its support already. By law, many of those blocs can't contribute any more. The one bloc of contributors that hasn’t front-loaded their support is traditional conservatives. My prediction is that after the early primaries next year, there will be precious little money available, except from traditional conservatives. The candidates who emerge from the February Shredding Machine will have nowhere else to go except to traditional conservatives.

That means three things about the liberal media:

  • The best thing to happen for conservatives is for the February primaries to leave a standoff. The more liberal and moderate candidates, the better. However, if it’s all over quickly, the Republican will still look for conservative money, but the Democrat will have nowhere to go. That’s when the Democrats will look to the MSM to rescue them. You can bet the MSM will pull out scandals, financial snooping, and kitchen sinks. The media will invent what they cannot prove. It’ll be nasty.

  • No matter how close the result, look for the MSM to jump on one Democrat bandwagon as soon as possible.

  • The Newt strategy might be the smartest and most economical. After all, what do you use all that money for? Answer: face-time on television and radio. Newt already gets TV free on Fox, and he’s a regular on talk radio. Look for CNN to come up with an anti-Newt for TV, even if there is no talk radio for liberals. Fred Thompson has mostly the same advantage. He doesn’t need to pay for face-time because he’s already on TV. So, look for NBC to try to replace him, or force Law & Order to turn him into a bad guy.

The leftoid media already dec

The leftoid media already decided who will be the frontrunner(s) for the GOP- these are candidates that the democracks will defeat. I'll say this to you democracks and leftoids. A true conservative is not out there yet. So, Mitchell, Gregory and all you leftoids stop insinuating/alluding/focusing only on these three "big" names and do not ignore the rest of them. Give them all equal coverage.  

Only in the leftist msm's dre

Only in the leftist msm's dreams can they possibly think that the people on the conservative side of the aisle are not unhappy with McCain about the war at all, that is the only thing most of us have left that we like him for...the leftists know it well, just attempting to serve their own purpose once again...ad nauseum...repeat often enough and it will be so.

Here is an interesting article I saw this morning about polls/polling, the last sentence cracked me up...as if oh really, you just now figuring that out are you?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/09/us/politics/09web-nagourney.html

LMAO!

Gregory's comment about McCai

Gregory's comment about McCain was bizarre. As Geoffrey pointed out, support for the war does play very well with the GOP base and they dominate the primaries.