MediaWatch: February 1996
Table of Contents:
- MediaWatch: February 1996
- A Social Problem Blamed on Reaganomics Fades Away in Clinton-Era Media Coverage
- NewsBites: Tricky Dick's Tax Break
- CBS Reporter Bernard Goldberg Charges Colleague
- Networks Scared of Flat Tax
- Global Warming Shtick Returns The Heat Is Off
- Transportation's Travel Bill
- Knowledgeable Limbaugh Dittoheads
- Janet Cooke Award: The Evangelical Right Wing That Wasn't
Janet Cooke Award: The Evangelical Right Wing That Wasn't
Pro-life activists gather together in the nation's capital every January 22 to mark the anniversary of the 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. This year, 60,000 came to Washington for the annual March for Life, but the networks didn't pay much attention.
NBC Nightly News and CBS Evening News each gave the event 19 seconds. CBS followed up with a long story about the federal investigation into anti-abortion violence. CNN also had an anchor brief, although reporter Anthony Collings did a story the night before. On the day of the march, CNN's Inside Politics didn't mention the march, but devoted more than seven minutes to an interview with pro-choice Republicans Ann Stone and Julie Finley.
ABC's World News Tonight didn't even mention the march. But just nine days later, on January 31, Peter Jennings announced a "major demonstration on behalf of the environment designed to pressure those congressional Republicans who wish to eliminate or dilute many of the country's environmental laws. ABC's Barry Serafin reports that the pressure comes from a group of the Republican conservatives' strongest supporters." For ignoring the march of religious conservatives against abortion and then promoting the activities of a small group of religious liberals as if they were conservatives, ABC earned the Janet Cooke Award.
Serafin explained: "Protecting the environment is a relatively new issue for evangelical Christians. But a group called the Evangelical Environmental Network [EEN] says it will spend a million dollars on a campaign to block efforts by congressional conservatives to weaken the Endangered Species Act, starting with a television commercial in 18 states." ABC aired a section of the ad which asserted: "The Endangered Species Act has rescued dozens of God's creatures from extinction. But today, the Act itself is threatened."
Serafin added that the group encouraged children to write letters lobbying Newt Gingrich to stop the GOP bill, before concluding: "The evangelical delegation in Washington delivered some of the children's letters, but it was unable to meet with Gingrich today. Gingrich's position on the Endangered Species Act is still a question. A bigger question is how congressional conservatives will deal with opposition from those they usually consider political allies."
ABC's report was grossly misleading for a number of reasons. Despite Jennings' insistence, there was no "major demonstration." ABC showed no video of a demonstration, only a shot of a few professionals in overcoats walking outside the Capitol. In other words, ABC had ignored a major demonstration of 60,000 pro-lifers, only to cover one that did not even occur. The Environmental Information Center (EIC), which other news accounts identified as the million-dollar funder behind the evangelical group's ads against GOP reform of the Endangered Species Act, told MediaWatch there was no demonstration, only a press conference.
In an August 19, 1995 Washington Post story about the activities of the liberal environmental groups Greenpeace, U.S. Public Interest Research Group, and the Sierra Club to stop Republican proposals to strengthen the rights of property owners, reporter Gary Lee noted the liberal strategy behind the founding of EIC: "The major conservation groups and a few private donors and foundations pooled their resources last spring to create the Environmental Information Center, a new lobbying organization charged with doing whatever it takes to stop the anti-environmental tide in Washington."
The Post noted EIC spent $1.3 million during last year's House debate on regulatory reform on TV ads saying "Don't let Congress roll back 25 years of environmental progress." But ABC identified these liberal activists as "a group of the Republican conservatives' strongest supporters" and "those they usually consider political allies."
Not only has the Environmental Evangelical Network taken sides on the environmental issues, it has taken sides against the religious right as well. The February 1 San Diego Union Tribune noted EEN leaders "were critical of the environmental stands of some conservative Christian groups, such as the politically influential Christian Coalition." ABC aired a soundbite of Ron Sider, President and founder of Evangelicals for Social Action, the EEN's parent organization. But they did not note he signed a document last May called the "Cry for Renewal." The primary authors of the letter, leftist Sojourners magazine editor Jim Wallis and Clinton friend Tony Campolo, declared their intention to create a "progressive evangelical caucus" to challenge traditionally conservative evangelical events and hold town meetings to address community problems like "gay bashing." ABC did not reconcile Sider's partisan press conference with his signature on the "Cry for Renewal" document, which declared "religion as a political cheerleader is inevitably false as religion."
ABC denigrated Republican stands with pejorative adjectives ("eliminate," "dilute," "weaken") without allowing the GOP to explain their side of the debate. Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, and Rep. Richard Pombo (R-Calif.) issued a press release the day after the ABC telecast asking the Evangelical Environmental Network to be honest in their characterization of the Republican bill, which currently has 126 co-sponsors in the House. Among the major provisions of the bill is an actual increase in funding for Endangered Species Act programs.
ABC's blindness to opposing views extended to free-market environmental experts like Ike Sugg of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who told MediaWatch the Young-Pombo bill "doesn't go nearly far enough. They tried to pre-emptively compromise, and Gingrich is seeking to water it down further. The Republicans are not guilty of what they're accused of."
Sugg added: "The Young-Pombo bill is a step in the right direction since it weakens the federal government's power over private land use. But the current Endangered Species Act has created perverse incentives for property owners to remove any possibility of endangered species appearing on their property. It creates an enmity between wildlife and land owners. The ESA's supporters care more about saving the act than saving wildlife."
Serafin did not return phone calls to discuss his story. ABC's story contrast suggests the irony of their biases. Their focus suggests heart-tugging concern for the kangaroo rat, but not the unborn child. ABC sometimes labels the religious right as "ultraconservative," but the religious left receives no label, or worse yet, is portrayed as conservative. But the worst characteristic of their reporting is the absolute refusal to acknowledge that issues they advance with partisan passion have more than one side.
