The Wash Post's Battle Fatigue
Original "Libertarian Democrat" and occasional Reason contributor Terry Michael lays into the Wash Post's recent house editorial on the fourth anniversary of the Iraq war (which the Post supported):
I live in Washington, DC. I know surreal when I see it. And I saw it in vivid blotter acid color this past Sunday on the editorial page of a paper that once helped bring down a president who also undercut America's moral authority several decades ago….
"It's tempting to say that if it was wrong to go in [claims the Post's editors], it must be wrong to stay in. But how Iraq evolves will fundamentally shape the region and deeply affect U.S. security. Walking away is likely to make a bad situation worse. A patient, sustained U.S. commitment, with gradually diminishing military forces, could still help Iraq to move in the right direction."
"Tempting" to say that "if" it was wrong? "Likely" to make a bad situation worse? "Could still" help Iraq move in the right direction? That's as bold as The Washington Post editors are willing to be, in their assessment, four years later, of a war to which they loaned the gravitas of the nameplate of the newspaper-of-record in the capital of the free world?…
Hopefully, it may just be a weak, but long overdue, effort of a great newspaper to restore its institutional credibility by moving a step closer to admitting it was wrong, and having the courage to call for an end to this mis-projection of American military might, now.
Original Post editorial here.
