Bloggers draw blood as CBS forced to apologise

By ARTHUR SPIEGELMAN

American journalism may never be the same.

To hear some press experts tell it, CBS's admission that it was duped into using questionable documents about President George W. Bush's National Guard service during the Vietnam War was a watershed moment brought on by a small army of internet-based commentators.

Their insistence, from the moment CBS aired its report almost two weeks ago, that the documents were fake turned the question into a national issue ending with CBS, its Evening News anchor Dan Rather, and the American media establishment in deep embarrassment.

Orville Schell, school of journalism dean at the University of California, said CBS's admission of error after days of stonewalling was "a landmark moment for the balance between the bloggosphere and mainstream media".

Bloggers were the first to challenge the authenticity of the documents and the first to publish detailed examinations of the evidence by dozens of self-declared experts, some of them with Republican party ties.

"The credibility of the media has taken another hit, especially when you consider the story is not Dan Rather but President Bush's service in the National Guard," Schell said.

That latter story - that said George W. Bush ducked military service in Vietnam by entering the Guard and then getting special treatment thanks to his powerful father - has been lost in the welter of complaints about the CBS story.

It was not the first time that bloggers have struck. Often working anonymously, bloggers have fanned the flames of controversies such as whether Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry deserved his Vietnam medals.

Schell and former New Republic editor Andrew Sullivan, among others, say there is a media revolution under way.

Writing in this week's Time magazine, Sullivan said: "The web has done one revolutionary thing to journalism. It has made the price of entry into the media market minimal.

"In days gone by, you needed a small fortune to start up a simple magazine or newspaper. Now you need a laptop and a modem."

Steven Miller, who teaches broadcast journalism at New Jersey's Rutgers University, said CBS fell victim to the economics and cut-throat competition in television news.

However, Tom Goldstein, former dean of Columbia University's school of journalism, dismissed the notion that American journalism has become sloppier in recent years.

Rather's report was another example of bad things happening to good news organisations, he said.

- REUTERS