In the wake of critical examinations of The New York Times’ coverage of the Bush administration’s case for war by the paper’s editorial board and public editor Dan Okrent, the mea culpas have begun.
Over the weekend, Washington Post ombudsman Michael Getler took a look at his own paper’s coverage and found it lacking.
In his column Saturday, Getler writes that “I have said many times that major news organizations should go back and take a nondefensive look at their prewar coverage.” He generally defends The Post‘s coverage of the administration’s case for war, saying that “My assessment is that The Post did not commit the sins of The New York Times.” (CJR Contributing Editor Michael Massing’s February article in the New York Review of Books about pre-war coverage of Iraq in fact singles out some of The Post‘s coverage for praise.) Rather, Getler suggests The Post erred by burying some of its coverage, and that “too many public events in which alternative views were expressed” were “missed, underreported or poorly displayed.”
Meanwhile, The New Republic this week chimes in with its own sheepish reconsideration of the entire Iraq adventure (not entirely surprising given the magazine’s left-leaning perspective). “In retrospect,” they conclude “we should have paid more attention” to evidence that cast doubt on the administration’s claims about Iraq’s nuclear program.
We don’t mean to make fun of The Times or The Post or The New Republic. Once in a rare while, when news outlets are getting it right, even if more than a little belatedly, a little pack journalism isn’t such a bad thing. But this virtual chorus of hand-wringing mea culpas has us wondering, who will be next to confess gullibility about weapons of mass destruction or Saddam Hussein’s non-existant ties to Al Qaeda: Maxim?
–Bryan Keefer
