Later in this issue, James Bowman reports on the mainstream media’s coverage of the war with Iraq. It is an inglorious tale: a compendium of anti-American broadsides, half snide, half furious, almost comically wrongheaded and inaccurate. A few days into the conflict, major media institutions from The New York Times to CNN and the BBC could barely contain their glee. What, not yet in Baghdad? What happened to the “cakewalk” that Dick Cheney predicted? OK, OK, it turns out the vice-president did not predict a cakewalk, he was merely reported to have done so, and what is reported can be repeated. Still, disaster clearly loomed. The war, we were told, was proceeding much more slowly than the administration expected; casualties were mounting; civilians were being bombed; the coalition didn’t have enough troops; supply lines were over-stretched; we had forgotten about sandstorms and the fierce desert heat; natives greeted coa ...

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