Canada Notices Change In U.S. Media

Tide is changing in U.S. coverage of war in Iraq

One thing that could be driving the coverage — aside, of course, from the very real damage the torture photos have caused to the U.S. mission in Iraq — is plain old journalistic guilt.

The truth is, the media blew this one right from the moment they started waving the flag in the sad and shocking aftermath of 9/11. Research conducted by many reputable organizations shows that disbelief was suspended, dissent was quashed, questions went unasked and, almost without exception, the media helped march the nation unto war.

Now slowly, slowly, the big media guns are starting to point in new directions. Last week, The New York Times' Thomas Friedman wrote about how President George W. Bush botched Iraq while CNN's Tucker Carlson, who defends the war much less enthusiastically nowadays on Crossfire, childishly confessed that the war has been "a total nightmare and disaster, and I'm ashamed that I went against my own instincts in supporting it. It's something I'll never do again. Never. I got convinced by a friend of mine who's smarter than I am, and I shouldn't have done that."