In early 2003, Greg Mitchell was one of the few mainstream journalists to seriously question the stated reasons for invading Iraq. In the years since, he has repeatedly challenged the media to probe the conduct of the war and its toll on our troops. Now, after five years of war, he traces the conflict — from the “runup” to the “surge” — and the media’s coverage of it, in this important collection of commentaries with significant new additions: an original introduction and dozens of pages of fresh material that unify the essays.
If a free press is the watchdog of democracy, then Greg Mitchell must be the watchdog of the watchdogs, tracking the performance of the media at Editor & Publisher, the influential magazine of the newspaper industry. Over the past five years, in his widely read column, “Pressing Issues,” he has repeatedly been ahead of the curve in intensely scrutinizing both the president and the press—and the controversies swirling around Donald Rumsfeld, Pat Tillman, “Scooter” Libby, Ann Coulter and numerous other figures.
His book is a unique history of the entire war—and as topical as today’s headlines. Whether writing early warnings that anticipated a long and bloody war, analyzing Stephen Colbert’s in-his-face mockery of George W. Bush, or imagining the president confessing his sins to Oprah Winfrey, Greg Mitchell explores how we got into the war in Iraq—and why we just can’t seem to get out. With tens of thousands of American troops still in Iraq, debate over the war continues to rage on TV news and across editorial pages. Against this backdrop of controversy, Greg Mitchell is the rare journalist who has seen it all with clear eyes. In So Wrong for So Long, he can finally tell the whole story.
