Just In from Mars
"I don't think the national
press is hostile to Dan Quayle any more than it is to Bill
Clinton or any other politician."
- Newsweek's
Eleanor Clift on CNN's Crossfire, September 8.
White House Plane Crash: Blame Reagan, Tom Clancy
"And if you want to talk
about who messed up the air traffic controllers, we could go
back a couple of administrations."
- Time
Washington reporter Elaine Shannon on the Fox Morning News,
September 12.
"Some people are saying
that this incident is eerily reminiscent of a novel by Tom
Clancy called Debt of Honor. Do you see any
similarities and do you think this book might have played a role
in the whole affair?"
- Today co-host Katie
Couric to terrorism expert Neil Livingstone, September 13.
USAir Plane Crash: Deregulation's Fault
"The crash has raised
deeper questions, whether flying anything is safe on today's
deregulated airlines, especially one as financially strapped as
USAir...Many continue to think that safety and much else was
compromised by deregulation, and by the savage cost-cutting
that's gone on in the airline industry in the 16 years
since."
- ABC reporter Jack Smith on This Week with
David Brinkley, September 11.
Jack Smith: Fudging Facts to Fit the Story
"Stocks had their best
performance in months this week, on news of sustained growth
with negligible inflation, and the job picture is good as well.
But does the President get credit? No."
- ABC reporter
Jack Smith, August 28 This Week with David Brinkley.
vs.
"The recovery of the 1990s
does not seem to be translating into better living standards.
Wages are generally flat, job creation last month slowed, and
the new jobs are often low-pay, dead-end service jobs, roughly
one-fifth of them with temporary agencies."
- Jack Smith,
same show, one week later.
Summer Vacations, But You Couldn't Leave the Country
"Summer vacations, once as
customary for workers in Eastern Europe as the annual May Day
parade, have become an anachronism for people of everyday means
under the new - and abruptly less obliging - rules of the free
market."
- Los Angeles Times staff writer Dean E.
Murphy, August 26.
Moderate Mitchell
"Sen. Mitchell and other
moderates said they have narrowed their differences on health
care legislation and vowed to press ahead with efforts to pass a
bill this year."
- September 15 Wall Street Journal
front page news summary on Mitchell (1992 American Conservative
Union rating: 0; American for Democratic Action: 95 percent).
Russert's World: Socialists or Neanderthals
"Bryant, a Democrat can get insurance reform. It will take a Republican President to get universal coverage to prove that it's not a Neanderthal party ten years from now." - NBC News Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert on Today, September 7.
Cairo's Aftermath: A New Morality?
"The motto of the
conference might have been `Our Bodies, Ourselves,' the title of
a book and a rallying cry for American feminism a quarter of a
century ago. It's a simple notion: what happens to a woman
should be her decision and entirely within her control. And it's
a good American ideal - that all individuals have rights...In
the last 30 years, the world has come a long way both in trying
to stabilize its population and in easing the position of women.
It would be a tragedy if Cairo were to hand the initiative to
those who were interested in neither."
- Newsweek's
Michael Elliott and Christopher Dickey, September 12.
"If, after all, the essence
of morality is respect for each life, and if, furthermore, all
future life is threatened by rampant reproduction, then what
could be more moral that teaching teenagers that homosexuality
is a viable lifestyle? Or that masturbation is harmless and
normal? Or that petting, under most circumstances, makes far
more sense than begetting? The only ethic that can work in an
overcrowded world is one that insists that women are free,
children are loved, and sex - preferably among affectionate and
consenting adults - belongs squarely in the realm of
play."
- Time essayist Barbara Ehrenreich,
September 26.
Joycelyn and the Pope: Perfect Together
"[Rep. Vic] Fazio and
[Surgeon General Joycelyn] Elders have, in fact, been very
critical of [Ralph] Reed's organization in recent months, but
not of Catholics, a traditional and pivotal constituency of the
Democratic Party."
- Cox News Service reporter Scott
Shepard on the Christian Coalition conference, September 16.
Reality Check:
"The comment came during a
clip in a televised interview with Elders that appeared July 13.
In that news clip, she is shown saying 'Look who's fighting the
pro-choice movement, a celibate, male-dominated church.'"
- Religious News Service dispatch published in The Phoenix
Gazette, September 4.
Hillary vs. Sexist America
"She and her staff would be
the first to admit that her role in health care wasn't perfect,
that she made mistakes. I think the amount of hatred and
criticism of her should make everyone in this country question
our attitudes toward women and whether they've changed very
much."
- ABC News White House producer Mark Halperin on C-SPAN's
Sunday Journal, September 11.
Truth in Public Broadcasting
NPR anchor Linda Wertheimer:
"Your tax dollars are not going to fund it. National Public
Radio is funded by dues from member stations."
Caller: "It's not entirely
funded by private donations. The Corporation for Public
Broadcasting funds National Public Radio."
Wertheimer: "...No it
doesn't. Which of us works there? I do. No it doesn't."
-
Exchange from C-SPAN's Journalists Roundtable,
September 9.
vs.
"About those 'dues from
member stations,' to which Ms. Wertheimer referred: According to
the 1993 audit, NPR received $28,147,648 in such dues - the
money local public radio stations pay for NPR services. But
where do the stations get the money for dues? Well, some of it,
16 percent on average comes from none other than CPB. A portion
of that money is actually earmarked for national programming
like NPR's."
- Washington Times editorial,
September 21.
Appreciating Other Cultures
"Haiti, to those who didn't
grow up here, is frequently a place where a sort of spooky
feeling seeps in, land of voodoo drums and mangoes, so it's a
little easier to perform a kind of psychological warfare, which
apparently is what's been happening tonight."
- Dan Rather
live from Haiti, September 15 Eye to Eye with Connie
Chung.
Publisher: L.
Brent Bozell III
Editors: Brent H. Baker, Tim Graham
Media Analysts: James Forbes, Andrew Gabron,
Mark Honig, Steve Kaminski, Gesele Rey, Clay Waters
Circulation Manager: Kathleen Ruff