Knight Ridder: the last unicorn

I was shocked beyond words when I saw a variation on this story in this morning's paper:

KR Washington Bureau: In challenging war's critics, administration tinkers with truth

That's right, folks. actual analysis and critical thinking in a major newspaper. Good stuff like this:

ASSERTION: In his speech, Bush noted that "more than a hundred Democrats in the House and the Senate - who had access to the same intelligence - voted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power."

CONTEXT: This isn't true.

The Congress didn't have access to the President's Daily Brief, a top-secret compendium of intelligence on the most pressing national security issues that was sent to the president every morning by former CIA Director George Tenet.

As for prewar intelligence on Iraq, senior administration officials had access to other information and sources that weren't available to lawmakers.

Cheney and his aides visited the CIA and other intelligence agencies to view raw intelligence reports, received briefings and engaged in highly unusual give-and-take sessions with analysts.

Moreover, officials in the White House and the Pentagon received information directly from the Iraqi National Congress (INC), an exile group, circumventing U.S. intelligence agencies, which greatly distrusted the organization.

Incredible. I can't remember the last time I saw such a thing in a major paper.

Alas, this stirring example of actual journalism is likely a swan song. Knight Ridder is on the block, facing pressure from the monied class to sell to a more pliant publisher. K-R has been the best of a bad lot over the last few years -- there were small moments of actual reporting, such as bona fide skepticism about the pre-war WMD charade. But amidst the spectral presence of the ghosts of Post and Times past, K-R is dead newspaper walking. I applaud their focus while facing the prospect of a hanging. But they, too, will soon be swallowed by darkness.