USA Today provides this stunningly deceptive summary:

In October 2002, the House and Senate voted overwhelmingly to authorize force against Iraq. In November, the United Nations Security Council adopted a unanimous resolution offering Saddam "a final opportunity" to comply with disarmament. Three months later, Secretary of State Colin Powell said U.S. and European intelligence agencies believed Iraq was hiding its weaponry and seeking more.

The final U.N. inspection report stated that Iraq failed to account for chemical and biological stockpiles. U.N. inspector Hans Blix said he had "no confidence" that the weaponry had been destroyed.

In his 2003 State of the Union Address, Bush said: "Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike? If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words and all recriminations would come too late."

At 5:34 a.m., March 20, 2003, a U.S. force backed by 34 nations crossed into Iraq. The war was on.

A more accurate chronology of the weapons inspection--like this one from the Arms Control Association--reveals�that while inspectors expressed frustration with some�Iraqi behavior, they�were encouraged by the progress they were making. They determined rather early in the process, for instance, that there was no Iraqi nuclear program to speak of. That�was one of the Bush administration's most damning claims against Iraq; its falsehood should figure into any account of the pre-war period.
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He explains that he wasn't�"bothered by the doctrinal compromises the senator made to convince Arizona voters that he was, in fact, a conservative. McCain has always been a realist, doing what was necessary to survive a North Vietnamese prison camp or a tough political trap."

So a senator willing to do whatever it takes to get elected is apparently a badly needed�voice of conscience in Washington. OK.

McCain's role, according to Broder, should�be something like�this:

One obvious area where he will be needed is his favorite field, national security. Iraq, where he was prescient and persistent, still poses challenges, and Afghanistan, where Obama badly needs a Republican partner, is likely to be in crisis before it can be called a success. Behind them looms Iran, which could be this nation's next big test.

Wait--John McCain opposed the Iraq War? No, he supported every effort to escalate the war. Apparently that counts as being "prescient."
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The point of the piece is to attack Social Security. Bai cheers on the White House deficit commission, which he argues has�been unfairly attacked by liberals who are "mobilizing to discredit the panel's work" and "pre-emptively oppose the panel's findings." These critics don't get much time to explain�themselves, because Bai needs space�to malign their ideas as an attack on bipartisanship. As Bai quips: "In other words, the two parties might actually work together on something. They must be stopped!"

Then Bai goes on to explain how Social Security actually works--and turns in a remarkably�misleading explanation: [...] Read more»

I know. We, the news media, are not supposed to ask female candidates about their hairstyle or their choice of pantsuits over skirts or their shoes. It is irrelevant. It is trivializing. It is sexist. "You would never write about Chuck Schumer's shoes," Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand said in a New York magazine article in response to a question about her flats.

So why write this article that is irrelevant, trivializing and sexist? Because, as it turns out, the shoes worn by Reshma Saujani, who is challenging Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney to represent New York's 14th District, are not very unusual:

But the Kate Spade wedge heels are not just one candidate's shoes. They seem to be the shoes of a circle of younger women aspiring to power or already in it, women directly and indirectly passing on to one another ways of navigating the particular challenges of being a woman in the public eye.

This might be the first time that a reporter has attempted to justify covering a non-newsworthy topic on the grounds that it is not particularly newsworthy.
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