Connect: Thirteen months ago a Pew Research Centre poll reported that 74 per cent of Americans described their media's coverage of the "war" in Iraq as "excellent" or "good". Such lavish praise was telling. After all, a simultaneous ABC News poll found that 42 per cent of Americans believed Saddam Hussein was directly responsible for the September 11th, 2001 attacks.
These polls made a bizarre composite. They revealed that almost three in every four Americans acclaimed media that left more than four in ten of them believing codswallop. Indeed the failure of the US media in the last few years has been one of the most alarming of all aspects of Bush's debased America.
One year ago this month, the New York Times apologised to readers because one of its reporters, Jayson Blair, had fabricated and plagiarised dozens of stories. The paper prides itself as America's foremost bastion of media rectitude. Generally (stories to do with the Israel-Palestine conflict starkly excepted) this pride, while undeniably pompous, is not utterly without foundation.
This week however, the paper was again apologising. On Wednesday, in an article on page A10 ("A" designates the main news section) labelled as being "From the Editors", it condemned key aspects of its own coverage of Iraq. In particular, it said its reporting in a number of stories leading up to the attack and the early occupation "was not as rigorous at it should have been".
It's a mea culpa of sorts, although critics, urging the paper for months to assess its Iraq coverage, have certainly helped produce the apology. In February, the New York Review of Books criticised US media (including the NY Times and the awful Washington Post) for their Iraq coverage. Other publications such as Editor & Publisher and Slate have likewise questioned the NY Times.
But it is merely a mea culpa of sorts. It's true that America's prime media propagandists such as Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, CNN, the New York Post and the Mark Steyns of Bushland would never apologise. In that sense, the NY Times is to be commended but it doesn't really measure itself against such abjectly propagandising tripe.
Consider it this way: last year's Jayson Blair yarn received front-page - A1! - coverage, which included an apology. The tale of the paper's rogue reporter was not buried on a left-hand inside page like this week's apology over Iraq. He had brought shame on himself and on the NY Times. Such was the extent and depth of this shame that it cost the paper's editor his job.
Of course Jayson Blair was indefensible. He just made up and stole stories and simply had to scram in disgrace. His was not just a lapse of judgment. He had repeatedly told lies to the public, to his employers and to his colleagues. While there's got to be room in journalism for lapses, old Jayo was, let's face it, taking liberties.
And yet, for all that, the results of his deception have been minuscule compared with the results of his former paper's coverage of Iraq. Within American journalism, the New York Times still wields extraordinary influence and cachet. In drama, for instance, its critic - quite ridiculously - can still tell far too many people what to think. In news, its coverage regularly acts as an imprimatur.
That being so and even though this week's apology didn't mention her by name, the paper's reporter Judith Miller has done incalculably more damage than the delinquent Jayson Blair. Six articles were posted with the self-critique and Miller had a hand in four of them - writing two on her own and co-authoring two others.
For instance, her page one reports in the lead-up to the attack included one about an Iraqi scientist who allegedly claimed all Bush's assertions about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were true. Miller never spoke to this character. She simply relayed claims made by Bush officials. That's great journalism - real A1 stuff - with thousands of lives at stake.
The prominence given such a story invested propaganda with the considerable imprimatur of a NY Times front page story. Jayson Blair was clearly a rogue who plundered journalism but Judith Miller was - at very best - grossly misguided. It's clear that in the paper's view as well as in that of thousands of readers she's the main culprit causing this latest apology.
Miller's most famous source was Ahmad Chalabi. He used to be the Pentagon's favourite to succeed Saddam Hussein but recently lost all favour with the US. It has accused him of passing sensitive information to Iran and last week US soldiers raided his home and offices. Spies, politicians and journalists - it always ends in tears! Before the attack on Iraq, Miller's reports pleased Bush and cronies as well as Chalabi and a then hawkish public. She boosted public ignorance and smoothed the way for the bombs. Maybe she was duped; maybe not. Either way, page A10 is burying a story. For journalism, the apology is a start but people buried because of US bombs deserve better, far better.