MediaWatch: September 1993
Table of Contents:
- MediaWatch: September 1993
- Networks Promote Government-Directed Systems, Obscure Cost, Quality
- NewsBites: Execution Exaggerations
- Revolving Door: Democrat to Democrat to...
- Newsweek Says Black Families Have Only One Savior
- Post Finds "Extremists" on Right
- Glassman Breaks Myth
- Newsroom Ideology Stays Liberal
- Janet Cooke Award: CBS Sunday Morning's Jerry Bowen Portrays Church, Pope as Out of Touch
Post Finds "Extremists" on Right
Farris Fear, Rush Gush
The Washington Post characterized conservative Christians as "poor, uneducated, and easy to command" in a February news story. A recent "Style" section profile of Republican candidate Michael Farris showed the Post still holds conservative Christians in contempt.
Under the August 5 headline, "Does He Have a Prayer of Becoming Virginia's Lieutenant Governor? Yes -- and Some Say That's the Problem," the Post examined Farris, head of the Home School Legal Defense Association and a Baptist minister. Reporter Jason Vest explained: "Given the way Farris has spent most of his public life, it's not hard to understand why some view him as an extremist...There's rhetoric from his past that might send shivers up some voters' spines. He's a candidate who looks like Bobby Kennedy but sounds more like Bob Roberts."
Vest emphasized the ideological definitions of Farris' critics. "I haven't ever experienced such radical beliefs as I have from Farris," one said. Others worried about "an extreme religious view" and described Farris as "somewhere beyond Pluto."
Compare that to the May 3 profile of Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.). Staff writer Mary Ann French fawned over the Black Panthers' former Minister of Defense turned Congressman. In the '60s and '70s, the Panthers murdered people, robbed banks and sold drugs to finance themselves. Rush went to prison on weapons charges. But the critics quoted by French mostly charged him with not being radical enough, for selling out or being absent when Panther leader Fred Hampton was killed in a shootout.
French gushed that Rush represented "just a clumsy siren call for social conscience. And a steady paddling toward his vision of justice. A gentle spirit shining through sad eyes...An unlikely folk hero."
She also lauded Rush as a "man who usually is careful to be cosmopolitan in his causes, multiracial in his motivations, and modulated in his tone." French didn't delve into Rush's past criminality, only briefly noting that during his 1992 campaign, "The race turned nasty when, as often happens, someone reached back into Rush's past." The Post saved its nasty look into the past for Farris.
