Media: fear of seeming unpatriotic undermined Iraq reporting

MIELIKKI ORG
Associated Press

BERKELEY, Calif. - Competitive pressures and the fear of appearing unpatriotic prevented journalists from doing more critical reporting in the lead-up to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, according to reporters and other key figures at a conference analyzing the media's coverage of the war.

The journalists on the panels at the University of California, Berkeley, this week blamed the Bush administration for leaking faulty information, but said the media also has itself to blame for failing to report critically enough about justifications for the war in Iraq.

"The press did not do their job," said Michael Massing, whose scathing article in the New York Review of Books found the New York Times and The Washington Post particularly at fault for relying on Bush administration leaks that turned out to be false.

"The media was sucker-punched entirely by this administration," added Robert Sheer, a syndicated columnist for the Los Angeles Times.

The problem is that journalists fear they will be seen as unpatriotic if they challenge White House statements, Sheer and others said.

"There is no doubt that there is an atmosphere of fear in the media of being out of sync with the punitive government," Sheer said. "This has been the most shameful period of American media. It has been the most shameful moment for American democracy."

Complete article can be found here:

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/states/california/the_valley/8230072.htm

Bloody cowards, I say.