Two points first-
1. The reviews for Todd on MTP that I have read have been pretty good. Every review harkens back to Russert and NOT ONE has mentioned his embarrassing "Syria" statement. As you will see below Todd is consumed with Syria (which is, not surprising, a RW talking point).
2. The whole thing is totally disrespectful to the President and the person. The RW has been trying to put words in Obama's mouth and endlessly criticizing him for not saying the words they want to hear. They have demanded that he say TERROR (SAY IT!!) from day one. Romney proceeded into that trap during the debate.
Anyway, here is Chuck Todd's magic decoder ring analysis.
During the panel’s discussion of the foreign policy portion of the interview, Todd revealed why he, and many other pundits, believe Obama is insisting on saying “ISIL” while the rest of the media (including Mediaite) seem to have agreed on “ISIS.”
“Obviously, we refer to it at NBC News as ISIS,” Todd explained to anyone who may have been confused by the two different names. “The Obama administration, the president says the word ISIL. The last ‘S’ stands for Syria. The last ‘L’ they don’t want to have stand for Syria.”
As Todd said, ISIS stands for the “Islamic State in Iraq and Syria,” a designation that could indicate the best way to combat the group is to take them on militarily in both of those countries. ISIL stands for the “Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.” The Levant is a larger area of the Middle East that actually includes Lebanon and Jordan in addition to Syria. But since the Obama administration has shown much more willingness to attack ISIS in Iraq than they have to attack them in Syria, they seem to have decided it is in their best interest to leave the “S” out of the name.
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/chuck-todd-knows-why-obama-prefers-isil-to-isis/