Separation of church and state isn't quite good enough for CBS Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer. It should go a step further and be separation of church and campaign.
Schieffer, who is scheduled to moderate the last presidential debate between Obama and McCain on October 15, appeared at Politics & Prose, a bookstore in
“I thought that was a pretty good discussion,” Schieffer said. “I kind of was a little uneasy that it took place in a church because I do really believe that there's a separation there.”
Despite Schieffer's disapproval of the setting, he still praised
“But, I thought he asked very good questions and I thought we saw a side of the candidates that we haven't seen before,” Schieffer added.
However, even former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has detected an anti-religion sentiment [3] from the media. He pointed out this religion phobia on September 12 at the Family Research Council's Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C. [4] and cited ABC News Charles Gibson's interview [5] with GOP vice presidential nominee Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as an example.
“And I want to take a minute or two because I want to put in context how bad things have gotten in the elite media and how utterly alien from historic traditional American culture some elements of the elite media are and I'll let you decide for yourself as you watch them which people accurately fit this,” Gingrich said. “But there's a secular, at a minimum skeptical to religion, at a maximum overtly hostile to religion bias in the mainstream media”
Schieffer also attacked the press strategy of the McCain campaign, calling the it “demeaning to women” [6] at his book event, because the campaign has not yet held a press conference featuring Palin.
Jeff Poor is staff writer for the Business and Media Institute, a division of the