It sounded like the kind of friendly interview that administration officials expected when they invited 42 mostly conservative radio hosts to broadcast yesterday from beneath a long, heated white tent on the president's doorstep.
"The American people, in my humble opinion, don't realize we're at war," Neal Boortz, an acerbic libertarian based in Atlanta, told presidential counselor Dan Bartlett. "How do you communicate to the American people that there is a grave threat that must be addressed?"
Moments after Bartlett moved down the rows of folding tables to the next interview, however, Boortz said during a break: "I've adopted the opinion that maybe I'd like to see the Republicans take it in the teeth in this election, lose the House and lick their wounds. They just haven't done enough to be rewarded with continued control in Washington."
(snip)
"The corps of Bush supporters are just seething, angry and disappointed," said Jan Mickelson, a fixture in Des Moines radio. Iraq, he said, has become "ungovernable," voters are upset about "perceived corruption in the Republican Party," and "social conservatives feel like they've been used again." But in a point echoed by several of the hosts, Mickelson said that "immigration is the number one issue" fostering disgruntlement with the Republicans, because his listeners are "seeing the effects of lack of border control every single day."
Asked whether he wants the Democrats to win the midterm elections, Mickelson said: "I don't really give a rip. The conservatives would say, 'What's the worst that can happen? We're not getting anything we want now. We're getting nothing but frustration and ulcers.' " Charlie Sykes, a Milwaukee host, told Bartlett during an interview: "If the Republicans lose control of the House, they won't have anybody but themselves to blame."
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/24/AR2006102401223.html
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