Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

NY Times Ombudsman Criticizes Paper Over Iraq [Pyloric Stenosis Alert]
Reuters ^ | May 29, 2004 | Reuters

Posted on 05/30/2004 11:18:04 AM PDT by O.C. - Old Cracker

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Institutional failures at The New York Times led to it being used in a "cunning campaign" by those who wanted the world to believe Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, the paper's ombudsman said on Sunday. Daniel Okrent, who has the title "public editor," wrote in a scathing review of the paper's coverage of the weapons issue ahead of the Iraq invasion last year that The Times had been guilty of flawed journalism.

"Some of The Times's coverage in the months leading up to the invasion of Iraq was credulous; much of it was inappropriately italicized by lavish front-page display and heavy-breathing headlines," said Okrent.

The newspaper's editors on Wednesday acknowledged they had failed to challenge adequately information from Iraqi exiles who were determined to show Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and overthrow him.

The editors said they "should have been challenging reporters and pressing for more skepticism." Among other things, they said the paper had relied on "misinformation" from Iraqi exile Ahmad Chalabi, once considered Washington's top Iraq ally.

No chemical, biological or nuclear weapons were found in Iraq after the invasion.

Okrent wrote that a series of articles on the search for weapons of mass destruction by a Times reporter who was embedded with U.S. troops in Iraq "constituted an ongoing minuet of startling assertion followed by understated contradiction."

But he said it would be unfair to pin the blame on specific reporters. "The failure was not individual, but institutional," he said.

Okrent blamed "the hunger for scoops," saying Times readers "encountered some rather breathless stories built on unsubstantiated 'revelations' that, in many instances, were the anonymity-cloaked assertions of people with vested interests."

He said some stories pushed the Pentagon line so aggressively "you could almost sense epaulets sprouting on the shoulders of editors."

Okrent, who was appointed in December as part of efforts to restore the paper's image following the Jayson Blair scandal, said editors needed to launch a series of "aggressively reported stories detailing the misinformation, disinformation and suspect analysis that led virtually the entire world to believe (Saddam) had WMD at his disposal."

"The aggressive journalism that I long for, and that the paper owes both its readers and its own self-respect, would reveal not just the tactics of those who promoted the WMD stories, but how The Times itself was used to further their cunning campaign."

The editor of the Times at the time of the Iraq invasion was Howell Raines, who resigned amid recriminations over the discovery that Blair had invented some stories and plagiarized others over a lengthy period.


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: chalabi; danielokrent; ignorantmedia; nyt; wmd
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-40 next last
But he said it would be unfair to pin the blame on specific reporters. "The failure was not individual, but institutional," he said.

Good grief! Every week it's a different tack with these liberals.


"We was all hyp-no-tized by da evil Medusa
from da Bush Aminastrashun!

1 posted on 05/30/2004 11:18:06 AM PDT by O.C. - Old Cracker
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker

bttt


2 posted on 05/30/2004 11:21:27 AM PDT by O.C. - Old Cracker (When the cracker gets old, you wind up with Old Cracker. - O.C.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
No matter how hard they push the idea, the NYT editors are never going to be able to convince the Iranians or the Kurds that Saddam Hussein didn't have "Weapons Of Mass Destruction".

After all, he used WMD on them and killed tens of thousands of people.

What I'd like to know is why the new management at the NYT wants to be part of what is quite clearly the AlQaida Ground Support Team in America?

These people are misusing freedom of the press and wasting valuable assets that deserve new owners and managers.

3 posted on 05/30/2004 11:26:04 AM PDT by muawiyah
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: muawiyah

They're just trying to sanitize their image for the fearful faithful who populate the Left. It's all part of a plan of preparation for the home stretch of the upcoming election. Their hatred for Dubya and everything honorable knows no bounds.


4 posted on 05/30/2004 11:30:00 AM PDT by O.C. - Old Cracker (When the cracker gets old, you wind up with Old Cracker. - O.C.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
..."cunning campaign" by those who wanted the world to believe Iraq had weapons of mass destruction...

So they're denying that Saddam ever killed over 40,000 Kurds with nerve gas? Gee, I just can't imagine why the NYT is hemorrhaging money and credibility.

5 posted on 05/30/2004 11:30:51 AM PDT by Excuse_My_Bellicosity (All the good taglines are taken...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Excuse_My_Bellicosity
"cunning campaign" by those who wanted the world to believe...

The lefties cannot decide whether Bush is an idiot or the leader of a far-reaching plot to rule the world. The flip-flops in reasoning explain their support of Kerry - he is as goofy and intellectually dishonest as they are.
6 posted on 05/30/2004 11:35:13 AM PDT by Army Air Corps (Communism failed because people like to own stuff.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
Okrent should be immediately fired. The man is a complete idiot. Does he want to apply his standards only to those stories which favor the Administration...or universally? There's no indication he favors the latter - and, in any case, the whole thing is impossible. Nobody can escape from bias and error, and newspapers needs scoops to survive.

Cut costs. Fire Okrent.

7 posted on 05/30/2004 11:40:45 AM PDT by liberallarry
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
"Some of The Times's coverage in the months leading up to the invasion of Iraq was credulous; much of it was inappropriately italicized by lavish front-page display and heavy-breathing headlines," said Okrent.

Of course no mention of the 28+ straight days of front-page coverage of the 5 month old Abu Ghraib business, which was being handled properly by the military and was already a non-story by the time the pictures were obtained a month ago.

8 posted on 05/30/2004 11:43:34 AM PDT by Morgan's Raider
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
"The failure was not individual, but institutional," he said.
By "institutional," I'm interpreting that he means the NYT institution, because he mentions "hunger for scoops," among other things. His "epaulets sprouting" comment is very juvenile. We're in a sad state when a paper the quality of the NYT is the newspaper "of record."
9 posted on 05/30/2004 11:43:43 AM PDT by Clara Lou
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
No chemical, biological or nuclear weapons were found in Iraq after the invasion.

Huh? Since when, since this morning?

It's like what Ann Coulter said, "The beauty of being a liberal is that history always begins this morning."

-PJ

10 posted on 05/30/2004 11:45:29 AM PDT by Political Junkie Too (It's not safe yet to vote Democrat.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Political Junkie Too
It's like what Ann Coulter said, "The beauty of being a liberal is that history always begins this morning."

LOL! Hadn't heard that one.

11 posted on 05/30/2004 11:51:31 AM PDT by O.C. - Old Cracker (When the cracker gets old, you wind up with Old Cracker. - O.C.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker

Okay. So they have established as fact that they have no jounalistic integrity. That stands alone. The issue is beside the point. If that is their journalistic character, then everything they print is suspect.


12 posted on 05/30/2004 11:52:09 AM PDT by The Ghost of FReepers Past (Legislatures are so outdated. If you want real political victory, take your issue to court.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
You won't read this in the NYT or in any other liberal "news" source...

The Sound Of Silence: Iraq's WMDs Found

13 posted on 05/30/2004 11:52:13 AM PDT by Bonaparte
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
It's from this column from last week.

-PJ

14 posted on 05/30/2004 11:53:23 AM PDT by Political Junkie Too (It's not safe yet to vote Democrat.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
They're just trying to sanitize their image for the fearful faithful who populate the Left.

The NYT should cut to the chase and just say it:
"Those evil minions of Dubya forced us to print news that caused the war!"
15 posted on 05/30/2004 11:54:43 AM PDT by VOA
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
"The aggressive journalism that I long for, and that the paper owes both its readers and its own self-respect,

This guy is an insult to the readers of the Slimes. For crying out loud, the Slimes circulation dropped during
the Gulf War, like 50,000 copies, daily, because of their failure to report the facts (i.e., the US was kicking butt) of the then current battles.

So, I like to know just how the Pentagon was using the Slimes?

This idiot's showing up in December of 2003 is no excuse for what appears to be either shoddy research, or he has his
own agenda and facts and history be damned.

16 posted on 05/30/2004 11:57:49 AM PDT by Calvin Locke
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
HA! The NYT Ombudsman has a complaint about the New York Times. What's his complaint? Is it that many stories have been shown to be outrightly false? Is it that there is an extreme leftward bias in the articles? Is it the excessive focusing on gay themes, or environmental caterwalling, or an anti-American agenda?

No, it's that the newspaper is not far enough to the left.

They need to stop printing in black ink and switch over to red. Just be done with it.

17 posted on 05/30/2004 11:59:25 AM PDT by Lazamataz ("Stay well - Stay safe - Stay armed - Yorktown" -- harpseal)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker

Here's the problem...to read that editorial you have to read the NY Times. Oh well, guess I'll never see it.


18 posted on 05/30/2004 12:14:47 PM PDT by Casloy
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Lazamataz
Actually there is a lot of truth in this article.

Bush cited five reasons for attacking Iraq; finding caches of mass weapons was not one of them. Bush never said that he believed that stockpiles of WMD existed.

The NY Times got their info from sources outside the government. The other old media repeated it and soon everyone, including me, believed that our objective was finding and destroying WMD, instead of replacing a genocidal tyrant who was developing a nuclear and WMD program.

The NY Times and other liberals have been digging for direct quotes from Bush that they can use to say he lied to America. The closest they could come was that reference to British info on "African uranium", which the NY Times changed to "Niger yellow cake". I think the NY Times is just now realizing that it was they, not Bush who was lying about WMD.

19 posted on 05/30/2004 12:18:29 PM PDT by bayourod (Kerry has no track record in negotiating with foreign nations, nor does Sec of State Sharpton)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

To: O.C. - Old Cracker
No chemical, biological or nuclear weapons were found in Iraq after the invasion.

Earth to NYT .... a Saren Gas weapon WAS used on US troops just a couple of weeks ago. THAT was a chemical weapon, and it was found in Iraq after the invasion. Where do you think it came from ... the United States???

In short, chemical weapons have been found. So ... you can start correcting your failures by firing your biased, hyper-liberal Ombudsman while, at the same time, refraining from spouting the DNC talking points on all issues. Until you do, you will always be suspect as the lie-factory that Jayson Blair so rightly typified.

"...editors needed to launch a series of "aggressively reported stories detailing the misinformation, disinformation and suspect analysis that led virtually the entire world to believe (Saddam) had WMD at his disposal."

Amazing ... you still persist in assuming that there must be "misinformation" and "disinformation" and "suspect analysis" ... EVEN IN THE FACE OF PHYSICAL EVIDENCE THAT THERE WERE WMDs. Your assumptions betray your bias. Evidence to the contrary will be ignored ... as you're currently doing relative to the discovery of a Saren Gas chemical weapon from earlier this May.
20 posted on 05/30/2004 12:26:08 PM PDT by TexasGreg
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-40 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson