When it comes to covering U.S. politics in recent years, journalists failed, says American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh.

Hersh spoke on the CBC cultural affairs show Q October 9th, just before he is set to start off the Shaw Festival’s fall lecture series at Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. 

He said journalists “didn’t do our job” when it came to understanding what George Bush and Dick Cheney were doing in Iraq and “went along with them and became a part of the team.” He continued:

“When you have editors who want stories and are willing to take risks,
you have a great newspaper. But most of the people who get
promoted [to top editors] fit the corporate model, are malleable and
predictable … less interested in stories and more interested in not
making waves.”

During the interview, Hersh also commented that bloggers have “replaced the mainstream news media as cutting-edge news gatherers.”