Being a science writer, I can't help but gravitate toward scientific metaphors. So imagine for a second if two famous primate experts were interviewed for a nature program while an 800 pound gorilla tore the studio apart in the background. And in the midst of that chaos, the scientists avoided any mention of gorillas, while Calmly and Seriously discussing the theoretical danger posed by bunny rabbits.
Something like that happened last weekend: NBC News "chief" Tim Russert interviewed two leading 'conservative intellectuals,' Andrew Sullivan author of The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back, and Christopher Hitchens who wrote God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Both guests have been incessantly congratulated for, as the title of their books indicate, their admirable courage in transcending previously defined conservative boundaries and confronting the pernicious influence fringe ideologues and religious fundamentalists exert on the conservative movement.
Amazingly, during an hour long show, I can't recall either ‘critic’ or host raising a single question or making one comment concerning the stranglehold the religious right has on the modern Republican Party. Just for example, there was not one word spoken about conservative foreign cult figure Sun-myung Moon, his ownership of the Washington Times, its sister publication Insight which published the false story that Obama attended a hard-line militant Madrassa as a child, or any of the dozens of other scandalous connections joining ultra right wing religious icons -- some of whom who routinely concoct wild and ugly religious fabrications -- irrevocably to the Republican Party. The fact that McCain political adviser Charlie Black organized a coronation where Moon was literally crowned the Messiah in a US Senate building, and duped two US lawmakers into not just attending, but physically placing a crown on Mister and Mrs. Messiah's head did not rise to the attention of Russert or his guests. Not like there's any shortage of material.
Instead, two or three full segments of the program were exclusively dedicated to Pastor Jeremiah Wright's comments on the electoral prospects for democratic front runner Barack Obama. (To be fair, Sullivan, an outspoken Obama supporter, took time to at least try and put the issue in context.)
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If reports of right-wing religious influence on senior members of the Whitehouse and the Republican leadership were common place, the events last Saturday on Russert's show would be no big deal. Two 'great conservative thinkers,' both with books out on the subject of the Republican-religious connection just 'happened' to avoid any mention of those issues they're ostensibly best qualified to discuss. But that's the whole point: this wasn't isolated. It was a virtual carbon copy of innumerable discussions that came before and no doubt the many that will follow. Each and everyone merely one more symptom of the feverish hypocrisy and systemic mediocrity running unchecked throughout our national media.
Joe Scarborough is yet another familiar face with the rep of a conservative nobly conflicted by his staunch, admirable convictions juxtaposed against the unseemly religious and political abyss the GOP has stumbled into. But has one day gone by in the past month when Scar or one of his guests did not criticize Obama for failing to preemptively leave Wright's church years ago, or more forcefully condemning Wright in the aftermath? Can you recall the last time, if ever, you saw someone on Morning Joe point out, even in passing, that the father and brother of a sitting US President even now tour the world enthusiastically promoting Sun-myung Moon, or demand that leading Republican Party members publicly repudiate the controversial cult leader?
I use Sun-myung Moon above only because I'm more familiar with his specific brand of lunacy, thanks to author John Gorenfeld. But I could have used any creepy right-wing religious opportunist and focused on any number of news shows featuring guests who fancy themselves Serious and Responsible Journalists right down to their shallow souls. The only thing notable about Tim Russert's and his guests' fascination with Wright last Saturday evening and their collective apathy over Moon, Pat Hagee, Robertson, Falwell, Eric Rudolph, Hal Turner, etc., is that it's not notable at all. It's the same rancid, slanted drivel giving right-wing religious fanatics a pass, cut from the same corrupt mold beamed into US homes every day, all day long, starting with MSNBC's Joe Scarborough at daybreak and finishing up with Hannity and Colmes in the evening.
It is extraordinarily difficult to see our national media as anything other than an embarrassing joke manned by a collection of painted circus clowns when they repeatedly elevate stories about orange juice or bowling over the legalization of torture and secret prisons by a factor of a hundred to one. But when two conservative 'critics' with stated concerns over right-wing religious leaders dragging the entire GOP down the drain appear in a premier program like Russert's show, in the midst of a contentious political season on the heels of the least popular President in recent memory, studiously avoid any mention of the many fat, juicy religious nutcases infecting our political discourse, it's it even more difficult to see our Serious and Responsible traditional media superstars as anything other than willing collaborators with some of the ugliest, most controversial, religious leaders this side of the West Bank.
But then what do I know? I'm just the shrill blogger pointing out the 800 lb. Republican Gorilla in the room.
Update 8:05 EST DS: Some readers have correctly pointed out that Hitchens is not easily labeled as a conservative. Agreed, hence the use of the scare quotes above describing both Sullivan and Hitchens as 'conservative thinkers.' However, if we stipulate he is indeed not a conservative and in no way beholden to conservatives -- all of which is a bit of a stretch imo considering his many apologetics offered on behalf of conservative ideology -- then the whole question of why he would helpfully join in bashing Obama over Wright's remarks, while avoiding any of the endless, revolting counter examples provided by icons of the religious right, is even more perplexing and advances the argument for religious media bias and outright hypocrisy even further than I indicated above.
Something like that happened last weekend: NBC News "chief" Tim Russert interviewed two leading 'conservative intellectuals,' Andrew Sullivan author of The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back, and Christopher Hitchens who wrote God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Both guests have been incessantly congratulated for, as the title of their books indicate, their admirable courage in transcending previously defined conservative boundaries and confronting the pernicious influence fringe ideologues and religious fundamentalists exert on the conservative movement.