Mixed Results For Katie's PR Surge

Katie Couric is trying to turn the page, and, like the surge whose effects she's ostensibly in Iraq to cover, she's having only limited success.

Officially, Couric is in Iraq this week, instead of at another time, to prepare for Gen. David Petraeus' report, due later this month, on whether the current military strategy there is working. Unofficially, the timing is clearly meant to head off the inevitable parade of one-year-anniversary stories about Couric's arrival at CBS, each of which must dutifully note how far ratings have fallen since she took over.

So much for that. While Howard Kurtz plays along in the Washington Post, leading with Couric's interview of President Bush, other columnists were somewhat less cooperative. "Couric has been sampled by the traditional 'old news' crowd, and largely rejected," notes Verne Gay in Newsday. The Los Angeles Times's Matea Gold, meanwhile, says Evening News staffers are "downtrodden," "dishearten[ed]" and "gloomy" over the state of their program.

No wonder Bush, who usually limits his access to Fox News, allowed himself to be interviewed. He must've assumed the embattled Couric's situation would give her some sympathy for his own.