A lot of people have rushed to surficial judgment on the Newsweek/Koran story.

From WarrenKinsella.com:

This is appalling. Not only they did they "get it wrong," they actually contributed to DEATHS of people around the globe. This is one of those rare instances where the Muslim community, and the U.S. military, have a shared interest in putting behind bars any of the journalists and editors associated with this extraordinary libel. But, thanks to the absurdities of the First Amendment, that isn't likely to happen anytime soon.

It depends on what your definition of "wrong" is.

Here is an excerpt from a CJR Daily commentary by Brian Montipoli:

Consider the central question of the story about the story: What exactly has the magazine retracted? Most reporters, particularly on television, are reporting that Newsweek has retracted the allegation that U.S. interrogators desecrated the Koran at Guantanamo Bay. But that's wrong: The magazine has said only that it no longer stands by its claim that allegations of Koran desecration appear in a forthcoming report from U.S. Southern Command. That's a very different point. There have been numerous other reports -- mostly from detainees -- suggesting that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo did abuse the Koran. We don't know exactly what happened, but we do know that there's a significant difference between what Newsweek said -- that its source can no longer be sure that the allegations appear in an upcoming military report -- and what the press is reporting the magazine said -- that no desecration of the Koran ever took place.

As reporter Michael Isikoff told CBC Radio's As It Happens (Part One) tonight, "the bottom line is, given the very firm, strong denial by the Pentagon that references to the Koran and the toilet was not in the SouthCom report. We didn't have a copy, and our original source could no longer be certain, so we had no choice but to retract."

(Note: SouthCom means U.S. Southern Command, which has responsibility for facilities at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It has prepared a report looking at allegations of prisoner abuse.)

 But he added: "We can't stand by the story based on what we know now. I hope that we will know more in the future."

In some ways, Newsweek was  careful with its May 9 story.

Isikoff made this point: "Remember the Pentagon is e-mailed a draft of the entire item, the entire 10 sentence, two-paragraph item.

"A senior Pentagon official is sent it with the question, 'is this correct or not?' ... before we published.

"The senior Pentagon official looks into it, checks, comes back and says, 'we think you should change the wording of what you're saying about General Miller ...' That seemed to them to be the most sensitive part of the item."

(Note: Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller was the former commander at Guantanamo Bay)

This is an excerpt from a Poynter Institute commentary by Scott M. Liblin critical of Newsweek:

Newsweek editor (Mark) Whitaker's Monday column said, "before deciding whether to publish (the Quran claim) we approached two separate Defense Department officials for comment. One declined to give us a response; the other challenged another aspect of the story but did not dispute" the Quran charge. 

Saying somebody "did not dispute" something is far from saying somebody confirmed it. And the magazine's second source "lacked detailed knowledge," Newsweek now says, according to The New York Times.

When the piece is published, the Bush administration said nothing for 11 days, Isikoff said.

(Note: That's not quite true. SouthCom put out a news release -- purportedly on May 11 -- saying it was investigating the Koran abuse allegation).

"At a minimum, if they had some idea this particular reference to the Koran was going to set off riots in the streets of Afghanistan and endanger the lives of U.S. troops, you would think they would have moved very quickly ... to put out that potential fire by demanding that Newsweek retract that story then. But it sat  there for 11 days without a peep from the Pentagon."

Isikoff said the magazine had no inkling the article would set off an international incident.

In terms of the sourcing, "this was a reliable, senior U.S. government official who had been a trusted source for the magazine in the past, and we had every reason to rely on what he told us," he said.

(Note: Isikoff had also done some reporting on Abu Ghraib, as had Mary Mapes, the 60 Minutes producer fired over Memo-gate. Now both have been burned by sources. Hmmm ... :) ).

However, as I said in an earlier posting, if you're going with a single source, you should demand some documentation too, because if the story blows up and the source backs down, you're screwed.

I found this a bit rich today.

``We appreciate the step that Newsweek took yesterday,'' White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. ``It was a good first step. And what we would like to see now is for Newsweek to work to help repair the damage that has been done, particularly in the region, and Newsweek certainly has the ability to help undo what damage can be undone.''

While offering few specifics, McClellan said Newsweek should explain ``what happened and why they got it wrong, particularly to people in the region.''

``They can also talk about policies and practices of the United States military. Our United States military goes out of its way to treat the holy Koran with great care and respect,'' he said.

While U.S. interrogators may use stressful interrogation techniques that stretch right to the very edge of torture, might intimidate Muslim prisoners with attack dogs and then sexually humiliate those same prisoners, but the Koran? Inviolate!! :)

Alas, I'm forgetting all that was done by a very few bad apples.

Anyway, over at Media Matters for America, they noted that top U.S. military officials, including commanders on the ground in Afghanistan, said they doubted the article was responsible for the unrest there.

To sum up, while Newsweek was imperfect, they weren't reckless, and they may well have been burned -- if somewhat inadvertently -- by their source.

While the Bush administration is trying to politicize their error, senior military commanders don't think the article was the trigger.

And let's remember this isn't the first time allegations have been made about U.S. personnel desecrating the Koran. The Pentagon said they haven't come across "credible" allegations; what do they consider "credible" -- cases in which the evidence is so overwhelming the military has no choice but to admit they are true? (with apologies to Joey Slinger's 1980s definition of "gotcha journalism.")

Another excerpt from the CJR commentary:

It's easy to imagine why the White House is taking this approach. As a Newsweek journalist told the Los Angeles Times -- speaking, ironically, from a position of anonymity -- "The issue of how prisoners are treated at Guantanamo has not gone away. Now they want to deflect that by talking about how irresponsible Newsweek magazine was."

What's harder to explain is why reporters covering the story have swallowed this red herring. But let's try: Producers, it seems, would rather stir viewers' emotions that provide them with the truth. The story, in its oversimplified form, plays well into television news' longstanding bias towards conflict. It's Newsweek vs. the government, the liberal media vs. conservatives, and, for some, overeager advocacy journalists vs. America.

The reality is much muddier, of course, but also less likely to drive our emotions -- if viewers realize that the riots aren't necessarily Newsweek's fault, and that the desecration might actually have happened, it's harder for them to become fired up about the story. And producers fear that means lower ratings. So they keep the story simple, and they keep the story wrong. That is the reality of our journalistic environment today -- a serious examination of the truth simply isn't a priority for bottom-line oriented, unapologetic executives who would rather hook viewers via emotions than honest reports.