Press Briefing by Tony Snow

Business Wire, Sept 12, 2007

WASHINGTON -- James S. Brady Briefing Room

12:38 P.M. EDT

MR. SNOW: (Enters to applause.) Well, let me say, back at you. Let me start on an unusual note for a press briefing, just to give a lot of thanks to a lot of people, and I want to start with you.

This job has been the most fun I have ever had, the most satisfying, fulfilling job. I'm sorry I have to leave it, but I have got to say it has been a real honor and a pleasure working with everybody in this room. And I'll miss it. You know, everybody talks about what a horrible job it is to brief the press -- I love these briefings and I'm really going to miss them. On the other hand, it's left in Dana's capable hands and the business of keeping the press informed will continue to be the object of the press office and life will continue, including for me.

Let me begin by doing some thanks, though, for people in the White House. I want to start with Scott McClellan, because when I first came here we had a transition week and Scott could not have been more gracious and helpful -- and simply in learning the difference between a gaggle and a briefing, the first gaggle, as you may recall, an occasional little discomfort. I still remember Ann out in the hall saying, "I can't hear anything you're doing." (Laughter.) So there were some experiments that didn't quite work out the way we wanted, but Scott just could not have been classier or more helpful and I want to thank him.

And thank everybody here in the press office: Dana Perino, Tony Fratto, Scott Stanzel, Gordon Johndroe, Emily Lawrimore, Josh Deckard, Carlton Carroll, Ryan Graham, Pete Seat, Stuart Siciliano, Rachel Williams, Lois Cassano -- who did my makeup on FOX News Sunday for many years, before I came here. I want to thank all the stenos, who I have beleaguered with neologisms, foreign words, obscure words and everything else and sent them scrambling to try to figure out what I was talking about.

And finally, a special thanks to Ed Buckley, who as an assistant has -- anybody who has worked with Ed knows that he is just a delightful guy. One of the real pleasures of working at the White House is you have a lot of very bright, motivated young people who come in, they work hard -- they don't get paid a lot -- but I'll tell you what, they give real service to their country and it is an honor to work with every single one of them. Ed has -- it's just been a delight working with you, and I really appreciate everything you've done.

And with that, let me also add one little --

Q Any regrets? (Laughter.)

MR. SNOW: No, not really. The only regret is that I'm not able to stay longer.

One scheduling note. The President will be making a trip to Quantico on Friday. He will talk a bit about the speech he delivers Thursday night. We will give you details later on that, but that is the reason why I'm not giving a Friday briefing. So this will be the last on camera, but I'll be here all week.

So with that, let's go to questions.

Q Speaker Pelosi said that General Petraeus's strategy amounts to a strategy for an endless war, a war without end. What's the administration's view -- how do you answer that charge?

MR. SNOW: Well, you answer the charge by pointing to General Petraeus's testimony. It's pretty clear that it is not a war without end. As a matter of fact, it is a war that actually has victory as its aim. And victory is defined as helping the Iraqis develop the capability of defending themselves and governing themselves.

It's, furthermore, a strategy -- if you take a look at the way he laid it out before members of Congress, if memory serves, what he was trying to do is talk about ways in which you can reduce the American footprint while increasing the safety and security of the Iraqi people and the stability of the Iraqi government.

Furthermore, it is a strategy that is not strictly military; it has very important developmental components, including the provincial reconstruction teams; it involves not only the military, but State Department and, really, people throughout the federal government. It is one that also has a strong diplomatic component, seeking greater cooperation and interaction with regional powers and regional allies. It is one that has expectations in terms of what the neighbors ought to do, including Iran and Syria.

So I think in order to try to caricature it as a war without end is simply to ignore two days of testimony, including 11 hours yesterday in front of the United States Senate. It's just not true.

Q But you don't have any -- you said that there are no parameters in timing here.

MR. SNOW: Yes. But on the other hand, to say that you don't know when a war is going to end doesn't mean that you don't think it's going to end. The idea that anybody can come up with a firm prediction about precisely how history is going to unfold is simply wrong. But on the other hand, what General Petraeus did lay out was what he thought would be a reasonable schedule for drawing down troops. And we will leave it at that. I'll let General Petraeus argue his own brief. The President will give his analysis tomorrow night.