Stewart Lays Into Judith Miller: You Pushed Us Into ‘Devastating’ Iraq Mistake

Jon Stewart really pressed ex-New York Times reporter Judith Miller on her infamous and major role in the lead-up to the Iraq War. “I believe,” he said, “you helped the administration take us to, like, the most devastating mistake in foreign policy that we’ve made in, like, 100 years.”

“But you seem lovely,” he added.

From there, Stewart just really grilled Miller on specific points about her reporting, what she was being fed, and the placement of certain facts and stories. He said the Bush administration has a pretty clear goal to go to Iraq and used whatever pretext they could, and then Miller wrote about it without much skepticism.

When Miller asked if she was just not supposed to report on the administration’s point of view, Stewart said she should have done it “in the context that this administration was very clearly pushing a narrative.”

He ended the interview by lamenting how discussions like these ‘always make me incredibly sad” because they point to “institutional failure at the highest levels.”

Watch both parts of the interview here, via Comedy Central:

Part 1:

Part 2:

[image via screengrab]

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Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

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