Newsweek Apologizes for Quran Story Errors - Yahoo! News

And a fine time to do it--after fifteen people have died in rioting in Afghanistan and elsewhere, over something that didn't happen!

Of course, ill-natured people, like Muslim terrorists, can always find an excuse. But when a news organ provides such an excuse--that's giving aid and comfort to the enemy. That's treason.

Our society frankly needs to decide whether such a thing as treason is even prosecutable under subsequent amendments to the Constitution. Either that, or recognize what principles of natural law limit the freedoms of speech and of the press.

UPDATE: Muslims all over the world don't believe Newsweek now that it's admitting that it made a mistake. Maybe they don't want to believe, or admit, that the Koran-in-the-toilet story was false. Maybe they know that if the story is false, they have no excuse for their continued anti-American attitude. (But remember: ill-natured people don't need an excuse.) In any event, they're saying that Newsweek was right the first time and only caved in response to government pressure.

Of course, you'd expect one of their governments to interfere with the news. They do it all the time. Everything is propaganda in that part of the world anyway. But Newsweek should have thought about that before they ran with a story from one uncorroborated and anonymous source. Such negligence is unforgivable.

(I was about to say that it would never have happened during World War Two. Unfortunately, I think it did happen at least once: to Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, Jr., USA, while he commanded the Seventh Army in the Northern Africa and Mediterranean Theatre, on the occasion of his alleged slapping of a soldier he encountered in a field hospital in Sicily. Even that had an element of truth to it. This does not.

UPDATE: WorldNetDaily weighs in on this--as does Secretary Rice.