The fact is that there is almost no more important job for the news media than to demand answers to these sorts of questions before a president takes the country to war.
There is also some context specific to Trump: He’s erratic, deranged, and impulsive. There can be no assumption that this is a reasoned decision. Journalists should make that clear as well.
And did no one learn the lessons from the cowardly, cheerleading mainstream-media coverage of the run-up to the Iraq War? I’m really agog at how understated the coverage is.
As I wrote last June, I believe journalists have a particular obligation to inform the public about the dangers and horrors of war. They are a repository of certain truths about war: That it is horrible; that it is easier to get into a war than get out of it; that war is often entered into under false pretenses; that when it comes to war, governments lie.
This time though our intentions are pure and war is going to work!
They are failing but its mostly due to two things:
The media is controlled by the ultra wealthy making sure the story they want told is priority.
In their defense (but only slightly), there is a horse loose in a hospital. Again. And it’s hard to cover EVERY bat shit crazy thing that’s happening. And because it’s all controlled by the ultra wealthy, they have the option of curating what information gets covered.