I Cogitate

"Courage in journalism today takes all the obvious, traditional forms -- reporting from a war zone or from a totalitarian country where a reporter's life or safety are issues. In Washington, D.C., where I work, it's a far less dramatic form of courage if a journalist stands up to a government official or a politician who he or she has reason to believe is not telling the truth or living up to his or her responsibilities..."

"...A new element of courage in journalism would be for editors and reporters to decide not to cover the President's statements when he -- or any public figure -- repeats essentially what he or she has said before. The Bush team also has brought forward another totally PR gimmick: The President stands before a background that highlights the key words of his daily message. This tactic serves only to reinforce that what's going on is public relations -- not governing. Journalistic courage should include the refusal to publish in a newspaper or carry on a TV or radio news show any statements made by the President or any other government official that are designed solely as a public relations tool, offering no new or valuable information to the public."

A special Pulitzer for Knight Ridder's pre-war coverage?

Gilbert Cranberg says the DC bureau and Landay, Strobel, Walcott deserve high honors for their reports challenging the Bush administration during the build-up to the invasion of Iraq.

By Gilbert Cranberg
July 20, 2006

"Pulitzer prizes for journalism are awarded in the year after the work is published. Curiously, the letter nominating Knight Ridder's Washington reporting for an award in 2004 began by citing a Sept. 6, 2002, story. That story, by Jonathan S. Landay, was one of a number written in 2002 by Landay, Warren P. Strobel and Bureau Chief John Walcott that challenged and debunked the administration's case for war against
Iraq...

...When Kristina Borjesson gathered material for her 2005 book, "Feet to the Fire: The Media After 9/11," her collection of interviews with distinguished journalists, she reported, "By far and away, the most often mentioned and most highly recommended news source was Knight Ridder." Paul Krugman of the New York Times commented to Borjesson, "...with respect to the war, when all these supposed revelations about everything from aluminum tubes to mobile biological weapons vans came out, I said, 'I knew all that beforehand, why did I know all that? It's because I've been reading Knight Ridder all along, and the guys at Knight Ridder had been reporting on the doubts among the midlevel people in the intelligence community..."

...There were some 80 probing and revealing war-related pieces between January 2002 and May 2005. In a lecture at Stanford in May 2006, the now-retired Knight Ridder Washington editor, Clark Hoyt, observed of Knight Ridder's reports of bogus and distorted intelligence, "It all seems too tragically obvious today, but believe me this was lonely journalism in 2002 and 2003." How lonely can be judged by the hard time the veteran and respected Walter Pincus of the Washington Post had getting into his paper a major story questioning the administration's case for war. The story ran only after Bob Woodward lobbied Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. to publish it, but even then it appeared on Page 17...

...The press, whether consciously or otherwise, reflected public opinion, which then strongly favored a war to oust Saddam..."

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