Gilbert Cranberg: LAPDOGS AT WORK

On February 18 MSNBC aired ”Hubris: The Selling of the Iraq War.” The hour-long program was a searing look at how Bush administration officials, from the president on down, manipulated intelligence to bamboozle the country into attacking a country that had done us no harm.  A repeat showing is scheduled for March 22 at 9 p.m. Eastern. 

MSNBC covered the events “Hubris” describes, but the program does not engage in introspection. In fact, it devotes just seconds to press coverage of the build-up to war. If you sneezed, you would miss it.

Not so, with journalist Eric Boehlert’s “Lapdogs: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush.” As the sub-title suggests, the book is about the press’s failure to report adequately on the Bush administration’s drive for war. It was a monumental failure, says Boehlert, that led directly to war.  He writes:

”In truth, Bush never could have ordered the invasion of Iraq – never could have sold the idea at home—if it weren’t for the help he received from the mainstream media, and particularly the stamp of approval he received from so-called liberal media institutions such as the Washington Post, which in February of 2003 alone, editorialized in favor of the war nine times.  Between September 2002 and February 2003, the paper editorialized 26 times in favor of the war. The Post had plenty of company from the liberal East Coast media cabal, with high profile columnists and editors…all signing on for a war of preemption…..Being weak and timid and [regurgitating] administration spin amidst a wartime culture is one thing. But to be actively engaged in the spin, to give it a louder and more hysterical voice, is something else altogether. In fact, the compliant press repeated almost every administration claim about the threat posed to America by Saddam. The fact that virtually every one of those claims turned out to be false only added to the media’s malpractice.”

Boehlert spent 333 pages describing the press’s dismal performance that “Hubris” virtually brushes aside. “Lapdogs” reports that MSNBC threw off the air Phil Donahue, a consistent critic of the war, and quotes an internal memo that Donahue presented “a difficult public face for NBC in a time of war.” It relates further that MSNBC’s Chris Mathews hosted a discussion about the war that featured an unbalanced panel of mostly cheerleaders for the war.

So does MSNBC’s “Hubris” steer clear of how the press covered the Iraq war because the network’s own skirts need cleaning? It’s a tempting thought, but attributing motive is risky and unfair. A very good editor once advised against speculating about motive because that’s akin to mindreading. Instead, discuss what is said and done, he advised, because those are verifiable facts

If you did not watch "Hubris" when it aired earlier, you are well advised to see the repeat. It’s just too bad that MSNBC’s account of how we came to fight an unnecessary war has such an unexplained and troubling gap.