Most of the leftist print media (including the Los Angeles Times and the Minneapolis StarTribune) are coming to the aid of Newsweek.  This support comes even after the magazine’s editor publicly retracted the story about supposed Koran abuse that caused uproar in the Muslim world.  In the process, the leftist media is condemning the Bush Administration.  That comes as no surprise. The StarTribune (May 18, 2005) said that Newsweek “shouldn’t have” taken responsibility for the rioting in Afghanistan that killed at least seventeen people.  According to the newspaper, the violence would have happened anyway because the insurgency was trying to prevent reconciliation in the country.  The StarTribune went on to suggest that the only real problem with the Newsweek article was that the editors didn’t require a second source.  According to the paper, “It would have been prudent, and more responsible, for Newsweek to have confirmed the story with a second source; the failure gave the White House the opening it has now seized to such good effect”. 

As was the case when Dan Rather lied in order to bring down President Bush, the press always comes to the aid of the press.  This is the case today regarding Newsweek.  Not only do they pull out all the stops to defend themselves, they try at the same time to further weaken the administration and therefore the nation.  One “tried and true” way of doing this is to refer back to WMD every time a media source tells a lie or runs with a story that is at best unfounded.  For example, the StarTribune wrote “Besides, the White House itself committed much more egregious errors in the way it so casually used dubious intelligence to make a case for going to war in Iraq”.

I have written before about the maze of confusion that is created when people on the left choose to create relativistic realities.  Here is yet another example.  The StarTribune acknowledges that Newsweek did not gain confirmation of its story through a second source.  The story gave terrorists a weapon to use against America and resulted in death for many and in danger or death for many more in the future.  The goal of the article was clearly to undermine the Bush Administration, our war on terror, and as a result, our country.

By contrast, President Bush joined with leaders of other nations.  The leaders of the coalition relied on information concerning weapons of mass destruction from a wide range of intelligence operations.  They did not rely simply on a second source; they relied on multiple sources.  At the time, every intelligence agency believed that Iraq held major weapons of destruction.  Saddam did nothing to dispel that belief.  There is NO comparison between the WMD issue and the use of single source information to write stories that will result in the weakening of America at war and in the deaths of many now and in the future.

The same people who worked as interns and student editors at university newspapers during the last years of the Vietnam War are now the editors of the leftist press.  They did everything possible during the Vietnam War to destroy American credibility and resolve.  They succeeded, and thousands were killed as a result.  They are doing it again.  Their distaste for standing up to evil and for those who are trying to lead us in that effort outweighs anything else.  Their belief that America is always wrong colors all that they write. 

Newsweek did something that was very wrong.  The editor has retracted the article.  He needs to do more.  He needs to do everything possible to make sure that the Muslim world understands that the story was not based in fact.  And he needs to fire all involved at the magazine.  That is the least he can do for the people killed as a result of their actions.