MEDIA

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WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU ASK A REAL QUESTION AT A WASHINGTON PRESS BRIEFING

YEAS & NAYS, DC EXAMINER - An awkward moment took place at the White
House on Tuesday and it had nothing to do with President Bush and the
English language.
After meeting with Bush to discuss the war in Iraq, House Speaker Nancy
Pelosi and Sen. Harry Reid fielded questions from reporters outside the
Oval Office.

CBS White House reporter Jim Axelrod mentioned to Pelosi that, come
November 2008, the number of American troops in Iraq likely will be the
same as in November 2006, when Democrats were swept into power. Then, he
asked, "How do you view your stewardship of Congress as anything other
than a failure to make the president change course?"

Pelosi was instantly taken aback. "What a lovely objective question on
the part of the press!" she remarked.

Axelrod later told Yeas & Nays, "I knew immediately that she didn't like
it."

So off-base was the question in the eyes of both Pelosi and Reid that
the Senate majority leader had to butt in. "Madam Speaker, I can't stand
here without defending you," he said, but Pelosi would have none of it.

"You don't have to defend me," she told Reid. (It's a woman's world on
Capitol Hill nowadays, Mr. Leader, and don't you forget it.)

http://www.examiner.com/blogs/Yeas_and_Nays/2007/9/13/Pelosi-Reid-take-on-reporter


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