MediaWatch: November 1991

NewsBites: Please Tax Us

PLEASE TAX US. Citizens Against Government Waste declared October 19 "Taxpayer Action Day." NBC's reaction? Assert that taxes are just too low. As Nightly News drew to a close, anchor Garrick Utley announced: "American tax rates today are, relatively speaking, low. Repeat low. About half the top rate in the rest of the industrialized world. Our sales taxes are equally low. Fact: the United States is a tax bargain, believe it or not."

Utley urged Americans to follow Europe by becoming more reliant upon government: "The difference, of course, is that in other countries people see their tax money coming back to them to make life more agreeable and secure. In Western Europe, health care for everyone. In Scandinavia, day care centers for mothers and children." Too bad he didn't mention that Sweden just threw out its socialist government.

BEHIND THE TIMES AT TIME. Last year, MediaWatch pointed out that at Time, which talks a good game about women's rights and promoting working women, only 12 of the top 47 editorial jobs are held by women. In the midst of self-righteous indignation at sexual harassment in Time's pages, the New York Post reported that Time Deputy Chief of Correspondents Joelle Attinger collected stories from female Time staffers about sexual harassment.

But after receiving a number of reports about one high-ranking Time employee, the piece was spiked. One source told the Post "it was a silly idea to air our own dirty laundry." The source said sexual harassment may have been "rampant in the past. It's not so much a problem now." Rather, "The real problem we have here is sex discrimination. There's a pervasive atmosphere of discrimination here." Sounds like a topic for Time's feminist essayist, Barbara Ehrenreich of the Democratic Socialists of America.

DISTRIBUTING DUNCE CAPS. This should win an award for the dumbest story of the year. In an October 8 CBS Evening News story, reporter Bob McNamara used public confusion about abortion laws as an argument against overturning Roe v. Wade. "It could be the future in all fifty states if Roe v. Wade is overturned," he surmised, "abortion, legal in some places, illegal in others. A state of confusion that's already happening....[Doctor] Jackson says that confusion over the law has endangered patients."

Some women, he warned, take desperate measures to end pregnancies, like drinking cleaning fluids or quinine. "In rural Utah...questions over whether abortion is legal have led some women to try ending a pregnancy themselves," he claimed. McNamara ended his story by putting the blame on legislatures for even considering anti-abortion laws: "And if there are victims already in this battle for the future of abortion, they are casualties mostly of confusion."

FAYE'S FREE RIDE. ABC reporter Sylvia Chase offered the latest glorifying profile of Planned Parenthood President Faye Wattleton on Prime Time Live September 5. But unlike other media tributes, Chase brought up Margaret Sanger: "In 1916 when Planned Parenthood was established, founder Margaret Sanger was jailed for speaking about contraception. Today, Faye Wattleton is worried that history is repeating itself."

But Chase ignored a more substantial angle. Not once did Chase ask Wattleton how she, as a black woman, could preside over a group founded by a woman who said birth control was needed "to create a race of thoroughbreds." Sanger advised Planned Parenthood to "hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social service backgrounds and engaging personalities....We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."

DESPERATELY SNEAKING SUSAN. Susan Estrich popped up as an expert on sexual harassment in several stories during the Thomas hearings. On the October 8 NBC Nightly News, she was labeled a "law professor." In the October 28 Time, it was "University of Southern California law professor." Only ABC, in appearances on Nightline and Good Morning America, described her partisan credentials as 1988 Campaign Manager for Michael Dukakis.

TEAM TALBOTT. Time Editor-at-Large Strobe Talbott, who in January of 1990 claimed Gorbachev proved "the Soviet threat isn't what it used to be -- and what's more, that it never was," is at it again. In an October 14 essay on Robert Gates' CIA nomination, Talbott charged that in 1976, CIA Director George Bush requested an outside "Team B" report on the Soviets which was "a depiction of Soviet intentions and capabilities that seemed extreme at the time and looks ludicrous in retrospect."

Earlier in the essay, Talbott conclude that "Gates' supporters on the committee -- all Republicans -- tried with more ingenuity than success to discredit the most damaging testimony. Gates then put up a spirited, gutsy defense of his own, earning respect from several Senators -- all Democrats -- who will still probably vote against his confirmation." At the time Senator David Boren (D-OK), the Intelligence Committee chairman, had already announced his support for Gates, who ended winning the committee vote 11-4, with four Democrats voting in favor. Perhaps Time needs a Team B essayist for future predictions.

COMPLIMENTING CLINTON. Is NBC reporter Lisa Myers objective? You make the call. In one of a series of Nightly News reports on Democratic candidates, Myers heralded Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton on October 3: "His prescription -- an ambitious agenda to make government work and help the forgotten middle class...A star since first elected Governor at age thirty-two, Clinton is less driven by ideology than by what works...Name a problem, Clinton probably has a solution."

Earlier, on the September 12 Today, Myers claimed: "Clinton has racked up a fairly strong record in eleven years as Governor. This year fellow Governors voted him the most effective Governor in the nation. His claim to fame, education...Clinton increased school attendance requirements, raised accreditation standards and required teachers to pass competency tests, over the vehement objections of the teacher's union. Then he raised taxes to pay for it all, including higher salaries for teachers. It worked."

SCORCHED TAXPAYERS. One reporter is actually blaming the Oakland fires on low taxes. In an October 27 Philadelphia Inquirer story, Knight-Ridder reporter David Johnston asked: "If $12,000 in overtime pay might have saved Oakland's hills, is it time to rethink the tax revolt?"

"The idea that paying too much in taxes can hurt, but that not paying enough can kill, has begun to seep into the political consciousness here," Johnston observed before charging the future fire "threat is magnified because many fire departments are underfunded and underequipped." Why? "The modern tax revolt began here in 1978, when Proposition 13 slashed property taxes. Since then there have been severe cuts in local government services."

The fact is California localities are hardly strapped for cash. The California Taxpayers Association reported last month that local discretionary levies, such as business license fees and utility and hotel taxes, have soared 298 percent since Prop. 13 and property tax collections have grown faster than inflation every year since 1982. The Los Angeles Times offered a better culprit: incompetence. On November 1 the Times reported "officials were slow in asking for aerial support" and "offers from state firefighters were ignored."

TAKING AIM AT GUNS. The Killeen, Texas mass murder tragedy prompted some opinionated assertions from CBS News. On the October 16 Evening News, Dan Rather asked reporter Richard Threlkeld, "Is Congress going to do anything to limit these assault weapons, and if so, what?" Threlkeld answered, "We hope so. Tomorrow, Congress will vote on the crime bill which includes a feature to limit the sale, or manufacture, or importation of some semi-automatic weapons." On October 23 Dan Rather led off a story on the aftermath of Killeen with this bit of blame transference: "The shootings in Killeen are the latest tragedy highlighting the success of the gun lobby at fighting gun control."

SCAMMING SAM. With sexual harassment the issue of the month, at least one male network reporter was clearly nervous that he might fall out of liberal favor. On This Week with David Brinkley October 13, ABC attack dog Sam Donaldson got this surprise from Barbara Walters: "Sam, if I wanted to, I could have such a list of sexual harassment against you." A sheepish Sam replied: "I can tell you I've never done anything that Judge Thomas is accused of, but have I walked through the news room kind of uh-huh uh-huh? Sure." He later repented: "I think from now on, though, I'm probably going to go uh-huh uh-huh [whispered]."

One who wasn't nervous, ironically, was NBC commentator John Chancellor. On the October 8 Nightly News he warned: "The biggest lesson of all is that these days women take it very seriously when they're not taken seriously." He should know. In her book Fighting For Air, former NBC reporter Liz Trotta wrote that Chancellor once signed a petition to keep women out of his social club because they would "break down the effortless, unconstrained companionship among men." Trotta, who described several run-ins with a chauvinistic Chancellor, was amused. "I still believe that men have a perfect right to their own clubs, but it was a tonic to watch Chancellor's liberal credentials up for grabs."

FACTS ON BLACKS. Despite the polls showing strong black support for Clarence Thomas, NBC News portrayed the opposite. On October 10, the night before the special hearings, NBC reporter Deborah Roberts stated: "There is little sympathy for Clarence Thomas' trouble. After all, many black leaders here never embraced his nomination...Today, at all-black Morehouse College, they debated Thomas' stand against affirmative action. In this classroom, there will be no feeling of loss if he loses the nomination."

Really? What about the rest of the country? On October 14, USA Today's poll reported 63 percent of blacks supported confirmation for Thomas, while only 18 percent were opposed. In the same poll, 47 percent of blacks believed Thomas was telling the truth, compared to 20 percent who believed Anita Hill. Likewise, a Los Angeles Times poll found 61 percent supported Thomas and an ABC News-Washington Post poll found 70 percent wanted Thomas confirmed.

BALANCE IS BORING. Who says journalists should be balanced and fair in their reporting? Not Newsweek media critic Jonathan Alter, who apparently prefers editorializing over news reporting. In an October 28 column on the press coverage of the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill story, Alter wrote: "At The New York Times, Maureen Dowd, framing the story while the competition slept, scored a series of analytical scoops on the unfairness of the Senate to women and to Anita Hill...But inside the Times and out, just-the-facts-ma'am mossbacks grumbled that `editorials' were appearing on the front page. Their bumper sticker should be: KEEP THE TIMES BORING."

STILL WAITING. On Nightline's October 16 two-hour special on the Thomas hearings, MediaWatch Publisher L. Brent Bozell asked Ted Koppel if he would allocate the same zeal to investigating the Senate's leak of a confidential FBI report on Anita Hill as he has to "October Surprise" charges. Koppel responded: "I'll be happy to talk to you by phone tomorrow morning if you'd like to." Despite two phone calls and one faxed letter, Koppel has not responded.

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