A short “adaptation” of Howard Kurtz’s new book, “Reality Show,” is available in today’s Washington Post. An excerpt:

By the fall of 2006, an urgent tone began creeping into the anchors’ coverage of Iraq. No longer were they describing the war as a difficult battle whose outcome was in doubt, or depicting the military struggle as part of a larger effort to rebuild the battered country. Now it was all about the violence, and they were framing the situation as an unmitigated mess. The anchors were giving real weight to what had once seemed unmentionable, the possibility that the United States might have to pull out.
They were, to be sure, reflecting the rapid erosion of support for the war, and a level of killing and chaos that seemed to grow worse by the day. But given their huge platform, they were also shaping public sentiment, reinforcing the notion that nearly four years after the invasion, the situation was all but lost.
“In plain English,” Brian Williams said, “this has been a tough week to be hopeful about the prospects for victory in Iraq.”
Charlie Gibson spoke of a “killing spree,” a “horrific surge in religious violence, Iraqis killing Iraqis in unprecedented numbers.” After correspondent Terry McCarthy reported that 50 to 60 bodies were turning up each day, Gibson could not remain silent. “Sobering to see people simply driving by a body in the streets,” he said. “But such is life in Baghdad today.”
Couric, in particular, appeared to openly yearn for a pullout. One night she spoke of “opposition to the war in Iraq growing and no end in sight.” And at times she came close to describing the situation as hopeless: “The day everyone is hoping for, the day American forces can finally come home from Iraq, seems more and more elusive.”
The anchors looked for ways to dramatize the grim statistics. Williams, noting “the bloodshed that has become an all-too-common fact of life there for so many people,” highlighted a report on how Baghdad coffinmakers could not keep up with demand. Gibson, reporting a United Nations finding on Iraqi casualties in July and August, tried to bring the impact home: “And just to put the 6,600 Iraqi deaths over the past two months in perspective — if the U.S. lost an equivalent percentage of its population, that would represent 75,000 American dead.”

Drudge is teasing a Dan Rather story from the book as well.