Moyers Critique of Press called "Devastating"

Editor & Publisher, America's oldest journal covering the newspaper industry, has published a story labeling Bill Moyer's PBS documentary on "Buying the War" a "devastating" probe of the role of the press in promoting the war in Iraq. The documentary is scheduled to appear on Wednesday evening.

Here's a quote from the story on Editor & Publisher:

Of the 414 Iraq stories broadcast on NBC, ABC and CBS nightly news in the six months before the war, almost all could be traced back to sources solely in the White House, Pentagon or State Dept., Moyers tells Russert, who offers no coherent reply.

The program closes on a sad note, with Moyers pointing out that "so many of the advocates and apologists for the war are still flourishing in the media." He then runs a pre-war clip of President Bush declaring, "We cannot wait for the final proof: the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." Then he explains: "The man who came up with it was Michael Gerson, President Bush's top speechwriter.

"He has left the White House and has been hired by the Washington Post as a columnist."