I've been thinking about Tariq Aziz a lot since the New York Times printed a front-page story on the former Iraqi deputy prime minister in late May. A color photograph showed him decked out in what the article described as "an open-necked hospital gown, with a...
How Long Will MoveOn.org Fail to Oppose Bombing Iran?
MoveOn.org sent out an e-mail with the subject line "Don't Nuke Iran" to three million people on April 12. "There is one place where all of us can agree: Americans don't support a preemptive nuclear attack on Iran, and Congress must act to prevent the...
When War Crimes Are Impossible
Is President Bush guilty of war crimes? To even ask the question is to go far beyond the boundaries of mainstream U.S. media. A few weeks ago, when a class of seniors at Parsippany High School in New Jersey prepared for a mock trial to assess whether Bush has...
Blaming the Media for
Bad War News
Top officials in the Bush administration have often complained that news coverage of Iraq focuses on negative events too much and fails to devote enough attention to positive developments. Yet the White House has rarely picked direct fights with U.S. media outlets...
War-Loving Pundits
The third anniversary of the Iraq invasion is bound to attract a lot of media coverage, but scant recognition will go to the pundits who helped to make it all possible. Continuing with long service to the Bush administration's agenda-setting for war, prominent media...
Mahatma Bush
Evidently the president's trip to India created an option too perfect to pass up: The man who has led the world in violence during the first years of the 21st century could pay homage to the world's leading practitioner of nonviolence during the first half of the 20th...
The Iran Crisis: ‘Diplomacy’ as a Launch Pad for Missiles
The current flurry of Western diplomacy will probably turn out to be groundwork for launching missiles at Iran. Air attacks on targets in Iran are very likely. Yet many antiwar Americans seem eager to believe that won't happen. Illusion #1: With the U.S. military...
Domestic Lying: The Question Journalists Don’t Ask Bush
With great fanfare the other day, Oprah Winfrey asked James Frey a question that mainstream journalists refuse to ask George W. Bush: "Why would you lie?" Many pundits and news outlets have chortled at the televised unmasking of Frey as a liar. The reverberations have...
Axis of Fanatics Netanyahu and Ahmadinejad
With Ariel Sharon out of the picture, Benjamin Netanyahu has a better chance to become prime minister of Israel. He's media savvy. He knows how to spin on American television. And he's very dangerous. Netanyahu spent a lot of his early years in the United States....
The NY Times Fails Its Readers
Journalists should be in the business of providing timely information to the public. But some notably at the top rungs of the profession have become players in the power games of the nation's capital. And more than a few seem glad to imitate the...


