How the NewsHour Changed History

When the anchor of public television's main news program goes out of his way to tell viewers that he's setting the record straight about a recent historic event, the people watching are apt to assume that they're getting accurate information. But with war intensifying in Iraq, a bizarre episode raises some very troubling concerns about the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.

Here's what happened:

During a panel discussion April 7 on the NewsHour, while battles raged in close to a dozen Iraqi cities, a retired US Air Force colonel referred to the American authorities' closure of a newspaper that had served as a megaphone for the anti-occupation Shiite leader Moktada al-Sadr. "The immediate problem we have to remember is we started this... with the aggressive policies towards Sadr that came from us, shutting down his press," Col. Sam Gardiner said.

The program's anchor spoke next.

Jim Lehrer: "The reason we shut down his press is because it was calling for violence and anti-American..."

Col. Gardiner: "Sure."

Lehrer: "I just want to get that on the record."

But Lehrer's comment--ostensibly setting the record straight--was at odds with the available factual record about Sadr's newspaper. In sync with other news accounts, the New York Times had reported two days earlier that "the paper did not print any calls for attacks."

I contacted the NewsHour and asked whether Lehrer's statement had been based on information contrary to what had been reported in the April 5 edition of the Times. If so, I asked for any citation that backed up his assertion. Or, if Lehrer did not have such a citation, I asked if there were plans for an on-air correction to set the factual record straight on the program (which reaches nearly 3 million viewers across the United States each night).

In reply to my inquiry, a NewsHour spokesperson cited two articles: A Chicago Tribune piece, dated April 5, said that "the pro-Sadr newspaper Al Hawza was shut down ... for allegedly printing false information that incited violence against the coalition." And an April 6 New York Times piece said that the Sadr newspaper "was closed last week after American authorities accused it of printing lies that incited violence."

The NewsHour spokesperson, Lete Childs, told me: "I hope these two articles help you understand the citations for Jim Lehrer's statement to Col. Gardiner."

But the two articles that the NewsHour cited only seemed to underscore the disconnect. Apparently, the NewsHour staff hadn't been able to find a single source to back up Lehrer's on-air statement that "the reason we shut down his press is because it was calling for violence." And the NewsHour did not provide any explanation for why, in sharp contrast to the flat-out report in the New York Times that "the paper did not print any calls for attacks," Lehrer had gone on the air and claimed that it did.

I reached the reporter in Baghdad who'd written the Chicago Tribune article, Vincent Schodolski, and asked if he was aware of any evidence that the American authorities shut down Al Hawza because it was "calling for violence." Schodolski replied: "I have no other citations than the reasons given by the CPA itself." My search of the official Web site for the Coalition Provisional Authority, the US-led occupation authority in Iraq, turned up briefings and news releases with references to Sadr's newspaper--but no backup for what Lehrer had said on the air.

At a March 30 press conference, Dan Senor of the CPA charged that Al Hawza had tried to "incite violence." That was very much in keeping with what the April 5 New York Times reported--that while "the American authorities said false reporting, including articles that ascribed suicide bombings to Americans, could touch off violence," nevertheless "the paper did not print any calls for attacks."

Lehrer's refusal to correct his evident error is especially striking because he had emphasized his incorrect statement on the air by immediately adding: "I just want to get that on the record." (My request to a NewsHour spokesperson for a direct comment from Lehrer did not yield any statement from him.)

When I asked whether a decision had been made, one way or the other, about doing a correction on the NewsHour to set the factual record straight, the last piece of stone in the damage-control wall moved into place. I got the message: "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer stands behind the 'Iraq: What Now?' discussion segment from April 7 and will not be making a correction."

Journalists should scrutinize US government spin, not contribute to it. Here we have what some people believe to be the nation's most credible news program compounding a factual error by refusing to make a correction.

First-rate journalists change history. But not this way.

The Quest for a Monopoly on Violence

With warfare escalating in Iraq, syndicated columnist George Will has just explained the logic of the occupation. "In the war against the militias," he wrote, "every door American troops crash through, every civilian bystander shot--there will be many--will make matters worse, for a while. Nevertheless, the first task of the occupation remains the first task of government: to establish a monopoly on violence." A year ago, when a Saddam statue famously collapsed in Baghdad, top officials in Washington preened themselves as liberators. Now, some of the tyrant's bitterest enemies are firing rocket-propelled grenades at American troops.

Hypocrisy about press freedom has a lot to do with the current Shiite insurrection. Donald Rumsfeld had an easy retort seven months ago when antiwar protesters interrupted his speech at the National Press Club in Washington. "You know, I just came in from Baghdad," he said, "and there are now over 100 newspapers in the free press in Iraq, in a free Iraq, where people are able to say whatever they wish." But actually, Iraq's newspapers "are able to say whatever they wish" only if they wish to say what the occupiers accept.

A week before a militia loyal to Moktada al-Sadr began to assault US soldiers, the American occupation authorities ordered a 60-day shutdown of Sadr's newspaper Al Hawza. The New York Times reported near the end of an April 5 article: "Although the paper did not print any calls for attacks, the American authorities said false reporting, including articles that ascribed suicide bombings to Americans, could touch off violence."

There's an idea--closing a newspaper for "false reporting" that could "touch off violence." By that standard, most of the daily papers in the United States (beginning with the New York Times) could have been shut down in late 2002 and early 2003 as they engaged in "false reporting" about purported weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

That false reporting certainly touched off violence. Thanks to the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the number of dead is in the tens of thousands, and rising by the hour. True to form--as was the case during the Vietnam War--the president certainly knows how to keep ordering the use of violence on a massive scale.

"We took space back quickly, expensively, with total panic and close to maximum brutality," war correspondent Michael Herr recalled about the US military in Vietnam. "Our machine was devastating. And versatile. It could do everything but stop."

Despite all the belated media exposure of the Bush administration's prewar lies, we are now seeing a familiar spectrum of response in mainstream US media--many liberals wringing their hands, many conservatives rubbing their hands--at the sight of military escalation. Numerous commentators have criticized President Bush for policy flaws. The tactical critiques are profuse, as when an April 6 editorial by the New York Times lamented that Washington "and its occupation partners" are now "in real danger of handing over a meaningless badge of sovereignty to a government that is divided internally, is regarded as illegitimate by the people and has no means other than foreign armies in Iraq to enforce its authority."

Such carefully chosen language is notable for what it does not say: Get US troops out of Iraq.

Year after year, of course, the White House and the editorialists insisted that complete withdrawal of GIs from Vietnam was an irresponsible notion, a bumper-sticker idea lacking in realism. But withdrawal had to happen. Sooner, with fewer deaths and less suffering? Or later?

In contrast to the wavering bugles of Bush's circumspect critics, we hear the certain trumpets from the likes of George Will. "Regime change, occupation, nation-building--in a word, empire--are a bloody business," he wrote at the end of April's first week. "Now Americans must steel themselves for administering the violence necessary to disarm or defeat Iraq's urban militias, which replicate the problem of modern terrorism--violence that has slipped the leash of states."

As for the carnage that results from unleashing the Pentagon's violence, the rationales are inexhaustible. "There are thugs and terrorists in Iraq who are trying to shake our will," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters on April 6. "And the president is firmly committed to showing resolve and strength."

Martin Luther King Jr. said: "I never intend to adjust myself to the madness of militarism."

That madness is here.

Norman Solomon is co-author of Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You.