"THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned from a military source close to the investigation that Pvt. Scott Thomas Beauchamp--author of the much-disputed 'Shock Troops' article in the New Republic's July 23 issue as well as two previous 'Baghdad Diarist' columns--signed a sworn statement admitting that all three articles he published in the New Republic were exaggerations and falsehoods--fabrications containing only 'a smidgen of truth,' in the words of our source."
What is this guy the brother of Stephen Glass or something? This going to hit the magazine hard, this is the second major scandal of this nature in recent history, and is going to damage its credibility. It is understandable that it is hard to do fact checking on stories that take place in a war zone, so I want to give them a break on that one. Where they run into problems is the relationship one of their staff members has with the author, and what effect that may have had on the stories being accepted.
In the larger picture, I don't think this tells us anything about the war in Iraq or those who oppose the war. Members of the left, took to his stories when they came out because they fit they world that they wanted to believe. We all take the information that confirms what we believe much easier than that which does not confirm what we believe. That doesn't mean that the whole of the movement against the war is peopled by persons who would lie and cheat to get their agenda through.
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