The Enabler Speaks

Bob Woodward, who has done more than almost anyone to propel Bush Administration lies in the press, with his celebrity books and failures to report on news in a timely fashion, now worries about his handiwork. Typically, he casts blame on unrealistic deadlines, but the fault is not being able to recognize when he is being used.

The celebrated Washington Post reporter said the media should have done more to verify whether Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had secret weapons as alleged by US President George W. Bush as a reason to go to war.

"We should have been much more aggressive," Woodward told a conference in Tokyo.

"I've thought what I could have done," he said. "The only way to find out if (weapons of mass destruction) really existed is to get on the ground."

But he said the round-the-clock deadlines of the modern media were hampering investigative journalism.

"It's a crazy media environment. We need to slow it down. We need weeks, months or even years to work on stories," Woodward said.

... "The real impulse is to make the government accountable so we do not get a secret government," Woodward said.

"The nightmare is that the president gets so closed off, so secretive, so convinced they are doing the right thing or just unable to face the possibility that they've made a very, very serious mistake," he said.

Too late, Bob! Just take a look at Dick Cheney - if you can find him! And the nightmare applies to the press, too. After all, you had a significant piece of the Plame puzzle (the identity of Richard Armitage as the prime leaker) in your hands, for years, and didn't report on it because it seemed like such a nothing, and so contrary to the interests of the Bush Administration, and maybe useful in a future book. Thanks a lot, Bob, for the 'closed off, so secretive, so convinced they are doing the right thing' press! How people like you are going to make the government accountable, when they are busy doing the government favors, is beyond me!