The Big Brave Beeb

Nick Robinson attracts a fine flock of sycophants following his question to Bush suggesting that he was "in denial" over Iraq: "Well done Nick! I admire your guts" etc

Obviously I'm too detached from the journalistic world to realise how 'brave' a question this was.

It is true that Bush floundered but, far from being floored by the originality of the question, perhaps it was simply his incredulity at being asked the same question in different forms again, and again, and again?

All this talk about detailed plans for Iraq and all the Beeb can manage is "are you quite sane, Mr Bush?"

Richard Sambrook, it seems, found this an electric moment.

What I find is, first, that Bush's view of Iraq is still limited in its detailed feel for how to proceed, but that, secondly and most importantly, the media has absolutely no desire to point out where the confusions may lie and what their solutions might be. The BBC and fellow-travellers have no interest even in minimising US loss of life through highlighting what the sources of disorder in Iraq might be- militias, Al Sadrs, Iran and Syria- in all their gruesome detail, and how they might be dealt with. Instead, they want a humiliated president and a USA with as bloody a bloody nose as possible.