Buying the War, a 90-minute documentary from the new PBS series Bill Moyers Journal, explores the role of the press in the lead up to the invasion of Iraq.

How did the mainstream media get the story so wrong? How did evidence disputing arguments for war go unreported? Buying the War seeks to answer these questions through extensive analysis of pre-war press reports and interviews with Dan Rather, Tim Russert and Bob Simon among others.

Online material extending the broadcast coverage includes a pre-war media slide show, an article library of news stories leading up to the invasion, biographies of those included in the documentary, a post-broadcast chat with Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel, two Knight Ridder reporters wrote with skepticism about the Bush Administrations case for war, and a resource list for further reading.

The documentary premiers at 9:00pm EST Wednesday, April 25th on PBS. Check PBS’s broadcast schedule for local listings and for additional broadcast times.

The Washington Post’s Tom Shales writes about “Buying the War” today in his column A Media Role in Selling the War? No Question.