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CounterPunch
March 5,
2003
Unbalanced Hawks
How the Washington
Post Pushes War
By RUSSELL MOKHIBER
and ROBERT WEISSMAN
What is going on at the Washington Post?
We would say that the Post editorial
pages have become an outpost of the Defense Department -- except
that there is probably more dissent about the pending war in
Iraq in the Pentagon than there is on the Post editorial pages.
In February alone, the Post editorialized
nine times in favor of war, the last of those a full two columns
of text, arguing against the considerable critical reader response
the page had received for pounding the drums of war.
Over the six-month period from September
through February, the leading newspaper in the nation's capital
has editorialized 26 times in favor of war. It has sometimes
been critical of the Bush administration, it has sometimes commented
on developments in the drive to war without offering an opinion
on the case for war itself, but it has never offered a peep against
military action in Iraq.
The op-ed page, which might offer some
balance, has also been heavily slanted in favor of war.
In February, the Post op-ed page ran
34 columns that took a position on the war: 24 favored war and
10 were opposed, at least in part. (Another 22 mentioned Iraq,
and sometimes were focused exclusively on Iraq, but didn't clearly
take a position for or against the war.)
Over the last four months, the Post has
run 46 op-ed pieces favoring the war, and only 21 opposed.
This constitutes a significant change
from September and October, when the opinion pieces were much
more balanced, and even tilted slightly in favor of peace.
A few words on our methodology: We reviewed
every editorial and op-ed piece in the Post over the last six
months that contained the word "Iraq." We looked at
the substance of the articles, and did not pre-judge based on
the author. We categorized as neutral pieces which mentioned
Iraq as an aside, or which discussed the war without taking a
position. For example, an article which assesses how European
countries are responding to U.S. Iraq-related proposals, but
does not take a position on the war itself, is categorized as
neutral. Neutral articles are not included in our tally.
The methodology tends to undercount pro-war
columns. We categorized as neutral articles which we thought
presumed a certain position on the war, but which did not explicitly
articulate it. Over the last four months, there were 17 "neutral"
articles which we believe had a pro-war slant, and only five
"neutral" pieces with an anti-war orientation.
Our methodology also tended to overcount
pro-peace op-eds. We tallied an op-ed as pro-peace if it took
a position opposing the drive to war on the issue of the moment
-- even if the author made clear that they favored war on slightly
different terms than the President proposed at the time (for
example, if UN authorization was obtained).
Someone else reviewing the Post editorial
page might disagree with our categorization of this or that article.
We concede it may be rough around the edges. But overall, we
think other reviewers would agree that our count is in the ballpark,
and tends to underestimate the disparity between pro- and anti-war
pieces.
Moreover, the dramatic quantitative tilt
in favor of the war if anything underplays how pro-war the Post's
editorial pages have been.
Among the regular columnists at the Post,
those providing pieces that we considered anti-war include E.J.
Dionne, a self-described "doubter" not opponent of
the war, Mary McGrory, who pronounced herself convinced by Colin
Powell's presentation to the United Nations (a position from
which she has backtracked) and Richard Cohen, who actually is
pro-war. Only William Rasberry could be labeled a genuine and
consistent opponent of war.
On the other side, the regular pro-war
columnists are extraordinarily harsh and shrill. George Will
labeled David Bonior and James McDermott, two congresspeople
who visited Iraq, "American collaborators" with and
"useful idiots" for Saddam. Michael Kelly, in one of
his calmer moments, says no "serious" person can argue
the case for peace. Charles Krauthammer says that those who call
for UN authorization of U.S. military action in Iraq are guilty
of a "kind of moral idiocy."
The Post op-ed page has been full of
attacks on anti-war protesters. Richard Cohen has managed to
author attacks on John Le Carre, for an anti-war column he wrote,
poets against the war, and Representative Dennis Kucinich. Cohen
joined war-monger Richard Perle in calling Kucinich a "liar"
(or at very least a "fool"), because Kucinich suggested
the war might be motivated in part by a U.S. interest in Iraqi
oil. (Is this really a controversial claim? Pro-war New York
Times columnist Thomas Friedman says that to deny a U.S. war
in Iraq is partly about oil is "laughable.")
Neither Le Carre, the poets, nor Kucinich
has been given space on the Post op-ed page.
Indeed, virtually no one who could be
considered part of the peace movement has been given space. The
only exceptions: A column by Hank Perritt, then a Democratic
congressional candidate from Illinois, appeared in September.
Morton Halperin argued the case for containment over war in February.
And Reverend Bob Edgar, a former member of Congress who now heads
the National Council of Churches, a key mover in the anti-war
movement, was permitted a short piece that appeared in the week
between Christmas and New Year's, when readership and attention
to serious issues is at a lowpoint.
Edgar only was given the slot after editorial
page editor Fred Hiatt, in an op-ed, characterized the anti-war
movement, and Edgar by name, as "Saddam's lawyers."
Does this shockingly one-sided treatment
on the Post editorial pages of the major issue of the day matter?
It matters a lot.
The Washington Post and the New York
Times are the two papers that most fundamentally set the boundaries
for legitimate opinion in Washington, D.C. The extraordinary
tilt for war in the Post editorial pages in the last four months
makes it harder for officialdom in Washington and the Establishment
generally to speak out against war.
Everyone who might be characterized as
an "insider" in the political-military-corporate establishment
knows there are major internal divisions on the prospect of war
among elder statesmen, retired military brass and present-day
corporate CEOs. There are many reasons those voices are inhibited
from speaking out, but the Post's extremist editorial pages are
certainly a real contributor.
The failure to give a prominent platform
to anti-war voices has also worked to soften the debate among
the citizenry. It's no answer to say a vibrant anti-war movement,
reliant on the Internet, its own communications channels and
dissenting voices in other major media outlets, has sprung up.
Sending out an e-mail missive is not exactly the same thing as
publishing an op-ed in the Washington Post.
The Post editorial page editors have
failed to fulfill their duty to democracy. The heavy slant on
the editorial pages, the extreme pro-war rhetoric offset only
by hedging and uncertain war critics, and the scurrilous attacks
on the anti-war movement to which minimal response has been permitted
-- all have undermined rather than fueled a robust national debate.
At this point, there is no real way for
the Post to rectify its wrongdoing. It could start to mitigate
the effect by immediately making a conscious effort to solicit
and publish a disproportionately high number of pro-peace op-eds,
and to let the peace movement occasionally speak for itself,
especially since the paper's regular columnists so savagely and
repeatedly attack it.
Unfortunately, the drive to war, which
the Post editorial pages have helped fuel, may not stop in Iraq.
There is good reason to believe that a war with Iraq will be
followed by calls from the hawks at the Post and around the administration
for more military action, against some other target. Will the
paper's editorial page editors find a better way to achieve balance
in advance of the next military buildup? Or are the paper's editorial
pages now simply devoted to the Permanent War Campaign?
Russell Mokhiber
is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter.
Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based
Multinational
Monitor, and co-director of Essential Action. They are
co-authors of Corporate
Predators: The Hunt for MegaProfits and the Attack on Democracy
(Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 1999.)
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