Syrian officials and state-run media on Tuesday welcomed an ongoing visit of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Damascus, hoping that it would help alleviate tense relations between the two countries.

Elias Mourad, director general and editor-in-chief of Syria's ruling al-Baath party's organ the Baath newspaper, told local press that Pelosi's visit represents an affirmation of Syria's role in the Middle East.

He said differences inside the U.S. administration over Pelosi's visit showed that there are more and more opinions for engagement with Syria.

Meanwhile, Mahdi Dakhlullah, Syria's former information minister, said Pelosi's visit was "a step towards the right direction" which indicated a failure of the U.S. policy to isolate Syria.

Syria believed the visit signaled a sign that the U.S. policy regained a balance in dealing with the Mideast issues, he added.

"We think dialogue between Syria and the United States has restarted," Dakhlullah said, hoping that it would continue in a bid to pressure the Bush administration to reverse its unsuccessful Middle East approach.

Syrian official media, for its part, widely hailed Pelosi's trip as the government-run Damascus Radio welcoming it as "a step in the right direction ... because closing gates of dialogue is a flagrant mistake."

In addition, the Syria Times newspaper described Pelosi as a "brave lady" on an "invaluable" mission while the Tishrin daily stated in an editorial that Pelosi would discover herself that Syria was ready for serious and sincere dialogue with U.S. officials.

Pelosi, a staunch critic of U.S. President George W. Bush's Iraq policy, is scheduled to hold talks with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and other officials on Wednesday about which she had "no illusions but great hope."

The trip, however, has met strong criticism from the White House which rebuked it as a "really bad idea."

On Tuesday, Bush criticized Pelosi's trip to Damascus as sending "mixed signals" that undermine U.S.-led efforts to isolate Syria.

Defending her trip to Damascus on Monday in Beirut, Pelosi argued that the journey was "an excellent idea" and she would discuss with Assad "the overarching issue of the fighting against terrorism and the role that Syria can play to help or to hinder."

Pelosi, the highest-ranking U.S. politician to visit here in years, arrived in Damascus Tuesday afternoon with a congressional delegation that grouped U.S. lawmakers from both Democratic and Republican parties.

Relations between Washington and Damascus have been strained since 2003 as Syria strongly objected the U.S. invasion of Iraq and blamed the U.S.-led occupation for the turbulences in the country ever after.

The White House, on the contrary, has been accusing Syria of supporting terror organizations and doing little to stop weapons and militants from infiltrating into Iraq and destabilize situation there.

Damascus supports the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) and the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement which Washington labels as terror organizations. Syria, however, insists that they are legitimate resistant movements.

U.S.-Syrian ties further deteriorated following the murder of former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri in February 2005 after which Washington withdrew its ambassador to Damascus for its alleged role in the killing.

Syria denied any involvement in the murder although a UN probe has implicated senior Syrian officials in the case. Washington, which had since refused high-level contacts with Damascus, has been under pressure to engage directly with Syria to help quiet down upgrading turmoil in Iraq.

The U.S. bipartisan Iraq Study Group has urged the Bush administration to engage in talks with Syria and Iran over Iraq. However, the White House has largely ignored the suggestion.

The lawmaker promised to make the fight against illegal immigration the cornerstone of his 2008 bid, the report said. "The crisis of illegal immigration threatened not only our economy and our security but our very identity," he said in a statement.

"That ends today," said Tancredo, who, with the announcement, joined a crowded field that includes better-known hopefuls such as former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and Arizona Senator John McCain.

Born in Denver, Colorado, in December 1945, Tancredo has served as a House member since 1999. He supports deporting all illegal immigrants and has criticized a plan by the President George W. Bush, McCain and others to give some illegal immigrants a chance for citizenship.

An estimated 12 million illegal immigrants now live in the United States. A recent USA Today/Gallup Poll shows immigration ranks fourth behind the Iraq war, terrorism and corruption as an issue that Republicans want the president and Congress to address.

President Bush, making a brief statement to reporters in the Rose Garden, struck an optimistic tone that echoed how aides said Snow was feeling. Mr. Bush said he looked forward to the day when Snow returns to the White House.

"His attitide is one that he is not going to let this whip him," Mr. Bush said. "My attitude is that we need to pray for him."

Snow underwent surgery Monday to remove a small growth in his lower abdomen, a procedure he said last Friday was being done "out of an aggressive sense of caution" because he had colon cancer two years ago.

Doctors determined that the growth was cancerous, and found during the surgery, which was exploratory, that his cancer had metastasized, or spread, to his liver, Perino said.

On the floor of the House of Representatives, Congressman Roy Blunt, R-Mo., said, "I've known Tony, we've all known Tony, for a long time and my belief is if anybody has the stamina and the fortitude and the positive nature to deal with this challenge, he has it," Blunt, who has also battled cancer, said.

"We're wishing him well and frankly hope he is back to work soon, because we need him," Blunt said.

The ad's reach -- it has received more than 1.7 million hits on YouTube in just a few days -- and the unmasking of its maker offer a glimpse of the changed media landscape of a nascent presidential campaign that is bitterly competitive 10 months before first voting.

The new popularity of web video allows broad distribution of clever political messages, which are often negative attack ads that may not readily be traced to their creators.

Phillip de Vellis, a strategist with the Washington-based consulting firm Blue State Digital, which hosts the Obama campaign web site, said he made the ad.

"I did it. And I'm proud of it," Mr de Vellis said in a response posted on a website site this week.

Mr de Vellis said he had acted on his own, without the knowledge of the Obama campaign or his employer.

Its creator remained anonymous.

But for political strategists, ad experts, even journalists, the ad presents a series of other fundamental unknowns.

- How will Web content outside the control of campaigns affect voters?

- How should campaigns react to anonymous but highly viewed attacks?

- When is Web content, no matter how provocative, newsworthy?

As the Internet looks more and more like an electronic community, politicians are increasingly devoting resources to their Web sites, planting themselves in electronic gathering places such as Facebook.com and MySpace.com and posting their videos on YouTube.

With some exceptions, however, what draws viewers is content that politicians don't control. A video clip of former Sen. John Edwards combing his hair to the dubbed-in tune of "I Feel Pretty" has drawn more than 150,000 views. A clip of Clinton singing a slightly off-key version of the Star-Spangled Banner has drawn more than 1 million views.

What's more, Internet content does not have to meet the strict reporting standards that television and radio ads must observe. That makes the Web the medium of choice for stealthy tactics by partisans operating outside the campaigns.

For candidates caught in the crosshairs, one way to respond is to brush it off, preferably with humor.

Asked about the Macintosh video on Tuesday, Clinton said: "I'm just happy if it's taking attention away from my singing. My singing was bad enough. I'm just happy that nobody is tuning in to that."

Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee say the Bush administration needs to be more straightforward about the White House's role in the dismissals of eight federal prosecutors.

"I've told the attorney general that I think this has been mishandled, that by giving inaccurate information ... at the outset, it's caused a real firestorm, and he better get the facts out fast," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the chairman of the committee, pledged to get the public testimony of White House officials involved in the case whether they want to testify or not.

On Monday, the Justice Department planned to turn over to Congress documents that could provide more details of the role agency officials _ including Attorney General Alberto Gonzales _ and top White House officials played in planning the prosecutors' dismissals.

The White House was also expected to announce this week whether it will let political strategist Karl Rove, former White House counsel Harriet Miers and other officials testify or will seek to assert executive privilege in preventing their appearance.

Leahy delayed a vote on issuing subpoenas until Thursday as the president's counsel, Fred Fielding, sought to negotiate terms. But on Sunday, Leahy said he had not met Fielding nor was he particularly open to any compromises, such as a private briefing by the administration officials.