In the book, 21 reporters reflect on the Bush administration's case for the preemptive invasion of Iraq in 2003.

WASHINGTON, November 22 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – US media organizations are now skewering President George W. Bush over his case for ousting Saddam Hussein, but few questioned the pro-war juggernaut in the run-up to battle.

Now, with the White House's once feared public relations machine misfiring, Bush's approval ratings plumbing their lowest depths, US troops still dying in foreign fields and suddenly bold Democratic rivals trade bilious charges over Iraq with Republicans, a new book demands an accounting from the media on its own pre-war errors, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

"Feet to the Fire, the Media after 9/11," by award winning journalist Kristina Borjesson, features a roll-call of Washington reporters and war correspondents, including veterans Peter Arnett, Walter Pincus, and ABC News correspondent Ted Koppel.

It prompts questions over whether the US media was duped by the White House, was negligent or complicit in the rush to war, and whether senior reporters were too close to government sources.

In the book, 21 reporters reflect on the Bush administration's case for the preemptive invasion of Iraq in 2003, on the grounds Saddam could offer weapons of mass destruction to terrorists.

A recent US presidential report revealed that the United States was "dead wrong" on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and its officials made the case for invading the oil-rich country despite intelligence doubts and strong voices of dissent.

Debate over the roots of the Iraq war has been further fanned by the indictment last month of senior White House aide I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby in a CIA leak case.

Fake News

"There is propaganda and fake news masquerading as real news courtesy of the US government," says Borjesson.

Many of those interviewed in the book penned questioning reports before the war, but were muffled by a drumbeat of bombastic television and newspaper coverage.

"The bottom line is that in this era of twenty-four hour cable news, there is less hard news and real information than ever on television about what is going on in this nation's arena of power and around the world," Borjesson writes.

"There is propaganda and fake news masquerading as real news courtesy of the US government," she wrote of a media establishment in which many luminaries seemed as keen to wage war as anyone in the White House.

Independent intelligence expert and reporter James Bamford blasted in the book the "entrenched mindset" of reporters before the war.

"The problem was, these people were fighting an entrenched mind-set that was accepting the Bush administration's rationales for going to war, when they should have been doubting," he said, referring to a few exceptions like Washington Post's Pincus and the Knight Rider operation which feeds regional US papers.

No Excuse

Some argued that as the administration began to argue for war with Iraq, the country was still wallowing in wounded patriotism after the 9/11 attacks.

Helen Thomas, grande dame of the White House press corps, argues in the book the media was cowed by the fallout from the September 11 strikes in 2001.

"From 9/11, the American press suddenly had to be the superpatriots," she said. "The press went into a coma."

But that was no excuse for journalists not to ask awkward questions about the expansion of the "war on terror" to Iraq, said John MacArthur, president and publisher of Harper's Magazine.

"It was just pathetic, it was the worst it's been since before Vietnam," Borjesson quotes him as saying.

Several top reporters, including former New York Times correspondent Judith Miller, stand accused of allowing themselves to be used by top officials peddling now discredited intelligence.

The Times and some other newspapers have published reviews and clarifications of their coverage, following the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

The paper admitted in an unusual mea culpa substantial problems with its coverage of Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction and links to terrorism, saying it was misled by Iraqi exiles and American intelligence.

"We have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been," said a message from the editors, entitled "The Times and Iraq."

"Looking back, we wish we had been more aggressive in re-examining the claims as new evidence emerged -- or failed to emerge."

Courting Officials

Some observers told AFP they believe the US press, its freedoms enshrined in the US constitution, is less inclined to challenge power than more adversarial colleagues abroad.

"Nobody wants to be isolated socially," said MacArthur, drawing a comparison between modern day Washington and the court of France's King Louis XIV.

"Everybody wants to be at Versailles. Versailles is Washington ... they want to be part of the power structure, and if taking the leak from the official source gets you credit within your news organization ... getting close to Cheney, getting close to Rumsfeld ... if that brings you credit and gets you more promotions, it's a great way to live."

Borjesson argued in an interview with AFP that the lessons of the last few years show the media needs to change.

"Official source reporting needs to be given less emphasis, reporting from first hand sources who are lower down than official sources is the way to go."

Borjesson, an independent producer and writer for almost twenty years, has won an Emmy and a Murrow Award for her investigative reporting on "CBS Reports: Legacy of Shame" with correspondents Dan Rather and Randall Pinkston.