Bush Fails to Persuade Newspaper Editorial Pages

By: Ari Berman and Greg Mitchell For apparently the first time in modern history, the U.S. government seems poised to go to war not only lacking the support of many of its key allies abroad but also without the enthusiastic backing of the majority of major newspapers at home, according to E&P's fifth and (presumably) final prewar survey of the top 50 newspapers' editorial positions.

The doubts suggest that the editorial pages will be quick to attack President Bush if the invasion does not go smoothly.

Following Bush's 48-hour ultimatum to Saddam Hussein, newspapers on Tuesday took their last opportunity to sound off before the war starts. Of the 44 papers publishing editorials about the war Tuesday, roughly one-third reiterated strong support for the White House, one-third repeated their abiding opposition to it, and the rest -- with further debate now useless -- took a more philosophical approach.

But, in the end, the majority agreed that the Bush administration had badly mishandled the crisis. Most papers sharply criticized Washington's diplomatic efforts, putting the nation on the eve of a pre-emptive war without U.N. Security Council support -- and expressed fears for the future despite an inevitable victory.

The Houston Chronicle said it remained "unconvinced" that attack was preferable to containment, and The Orange County Register of Santa Ana, Calif., declared it was "unpersuaded" that the threat posed by the "vile" Hussein justified military action now. The San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News wrote, "War might have been avoided, had the administration been sincere about averting it."

"The war will be conducted with less support than the cause should have commanded," The Washington Post, in backing the attack, wrote. "The Bush administration has raised the risks through its insistence on an accelerated timetable, its exaggerated rhetoric and its insensitive diplomacy; it has alienated allies and multiplied the number of protestors in foreign capitals."

There was always a group of roughly a dozen papers that strongly supported regime change as the only acceptable vehicle toward Iraq's disarmament. They included The Wall Street Journal, New York Post, New York Daily News, Chicago Sun-Times, and Boston Herald. They continued their praise of the president this week and celebrated the fact that "the regime of Saddam Hussein is doomed," as The Kansas City (Mo.) Star put it.

The majority of papers, however, remain deeply troubled by the position the U.S. finds itself in. Even large papers such as the Los Angeles Times, The Oregonian in Portland, and Newsday of Melville, N.Y., which have long advocated (or at least accepted) using force to disarm Hussein, criticized their President as he prepared to send young men and women into battle.

"The road to imminent war has been a bumpy one, clumsily traveled by the Bush administration," The Buffalo (N.Y.) News wrote. "The global coalition against terror forged after the atrocities of 9/11 is virtually shattered. The explanation as to why Iraq presents an imminent threat requiring immediate action has not been clear and compelling."

Many papers expressed hopes that a better world could prevail. "So the United States apparently will go to war with few allies and in the face of great international opposition," the L.A. Times said. "This is an uncharted path ... to an uncertain destination. We desperately hope to be wrong in our trepidation about the consequences here and abroad."

Newsday agreed: "At this point, we can only hope that the U.S. military campaign in Iraq is better coordinated and implemented than the hamhanded diplomatic maneuvers that led to it."

The Philadelphia Inquirer detailed nine specific hopes, particularly wishing that America's new pre-emptive invasion against Saddam doesn't turn into "the first step toward an American empire that rules arrogantly and alone," further weakening the United Nations and inflaming global resentment.

Once equivocal editorial pages got straight to the point. "This war crowns a period of terrible diplomatic failure," The New York Times argued, "Washington's worst in at least a generation. The Bush administration now presides over unprecedented American might. What it risks squandering is not Americans' power, but an essential part of our glory."

Other papers were even more blunt. The Sun of Baltimore, consistently one of the most passionate dissenters on the war, began their editorial with the sentence, "This war is wrong. It is wrong as a matter of principle, but, more importantly, it is wrong as a matter of practical policy."

USA Today asked Bush to finally disclose risks, costs, and democratic government estimates for Iraq while the St. Louis Post-Dispatch wondered "what 'the peaceful entry' of 280,000 troops would look like." The Arizona Republic in Phoenix said that Bush and his "coalition of the willing," with prodding by the French, "have left the United Nations in tatters."
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