When journalists fail to ask the right questions, inevitably the majority of Americans will believe the wrong answers.

It's that simple and that potentially devastating, this relationship between journalists and the public. Especially in a democracy, where a free and aggressive press is supposed to be a crucial check against the abuses of power.

We are the watchdogs, but too many of us journalists who are stateside have been all bark and no bite in covering the war in Iraq. While our colleagues in Iraq and Afghanistan risk their lives to cover the war, we sometimes fail to ask the most rudimentary questions, such as, "What is your personal stake in this war?" or "Do you have ties to the current administration?"

In a long and jaw-dropping piece in Sunday's New York Times, reporter David Barstow documented just how badly television news has failed to ask the right questions. He recounted how, in numerous interviews on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox, dozens of former military officers masqueraded as independent observers, cheering on this never-ending war without mentioning that they had been intensely courted and coached by the Pentagon. They also didn't disclose their ties to military contractors profiting from the very war policies they were asked to evaluate.

Time and again, and not remotely coincidentally, these retired officers repeated Pentagon talking points on TV. Some of them did this even when they didn't agree with the administration. They were afraid of jeopardizing their access to classified information — and to power.

Newspapers aren't off the hook here. We regularly quoted from these interviews, and many papers ran op-ed pieces by some of these men.

Meanwhile, the American public was duped.

There are many jarring moments in Barstow's exhaustive story that illustrate not only the complicity of the ex-officers but also the cynicism of an administration convinced of its exemption from accountability.

"Again and again, records show, the administration has enlisted analysts as a rapid reaction force to rebut what it viewed as critical news coverage, some of it by the networks' own Pentagon correspondents," Barstow wrote.

"For example, when news articles revealed that troops in Iraq were dying because of inadequate body armor, a senior Pentagon official wrote to his colleagues: 'I think our analysts — properly armed — can push back in that arena.'"

"Properly armed"? What a curious choice of words.

Barstow's story, which came about after the Times sued the Defense Department for documents, started with an example from the summer of 2005. Criticism was mounting over the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay. Amnesty International had just branded it "the gulag of our times." Human rights experts from the United Nations had issued new allegations of abuse. Many were calling for Guantanamo to be shut down.

Journalists were banned from visiting Guantanamo. Instead, the administration flew in a group of retired military officers, the first of six such flights. Immediately after their tour, they appeared on various news shows describing Guantanomo in glowing terms and blasting critics for circulating lies.

How effective were they?

I learned how effective they were just recently, when I wrote a column about a little book of poetry written by Guantanamo detainees, most of whom have been imprisoned for years without charges.

Reader response overwhelmingly parroted the Pentagon briefings. They condemned the book and me for writing about it. Stop and listen to the voices behind these messages:

"These prisoners never had it so good," one woman wrote. "They have clean clothes, clean bedding, three meals a day, prayer time, exercise time, etc. etc. etc. That's suffering?"

On his company e-mail, a man wrote, "During saner and better times in this country, a piece of filth like you wouldn't dare write such trash."

Another man responded specifically to accounts of detainees' suicides: "They're committing suicide at Guantanamo Bay? Good. 'F' 'em. It saves the USA a bullet."

Are these the voices of an informed public?

Connie Schultz is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and the author of two books from Random House: "Life Happens" and "… and His Lovely Wife." To find out more about Connie Schultz (cschultz@plaind.com) and read her past columns, please visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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