The War on Christians and the Values Voter in 2006
Vision America continues to receive commitments from prominent speakers for its March 27-28 “The War on Christians And The Values Voter 2006” conference. Those committed to date include: Senator Sam Brownback, Senator John Cornyn, Congressman Tom DeLay, Congressman Todd Akin, Congressman Louis Gohmert, Rod Parsley, Ron Luce, Gary Bauer, Alan Keyes, Phyllis Schlafly, Laurence White, and Janet Folger.
There’s a drama being played out in the Senate Judiciary Committee that merits your serious attention. Part spectacle, part three-ring circus -- the hearings on the nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito to serve on the United States Supreme Court reveal the desperation of the left.
Liberals have lost 7 of the past 10 presidential elections. Conservatives have controlled both houses of Congress for the last decade. The federal courts are all the left has left. The cultural elite will use any means, fair or foul, to maintain its iron grip on the federal judiciary.
In years past, it was considered the natural prerogative of a president to nominate federal judges who shared his judicial philosophy. (Democrats from FDR to Bill Clinton put far-out liberals on the bench.) That ended when George W. Bush was elected to the presidency in 2000.
Suddenly, Congressional liberals (and their media/activist allies) decided that: 1) Only “consensus” candidates for the high court were acceptable and 2) The Supreme Court’s current ideological balance (overwhelmingly activist) must be maintained now and forevermore (an idea no one on the left felt compelled to advance during the confirmation hearings of ACLU lawyer Ruth Bader Ginsburg).
Alito could hardly be rejected on the grounds of experience or competence. He’s been a federal appeals court judge for fifteen years, writing literally thousands of opinions. Just last week, he received the American Bar Association’s highest (“well-qualified”) rating.
That hasn’t kept Congressional liberals from trying every trick in the book to paint Alito as an extremist who’s anti-minority and a foe of civil liberties.
But I’m happy to report that it isn’t working. An article in today’s New York Times, not exactly a conservative newspaper, discloses: “If Senate Democrats had set out to portray Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. as extreme … they ran up against an elusive target: Samuel A. Alito Jr. For nearly eight hours, Judge Alito was placid, monochromatic and, it seemed, mostly untouchable.”
Having made the federal judiciary the most powerful branch of government (in effect, a super-legislature), the left will do anything to keep control of an institution it fashioned. Abortion-on-demand cannot be maintained nor homosexual marriage be established, absent liberal control of the courts.
Even if Alito is confirmed, conservatives will still be in the minority on the Supreme Court. But it will be a move in the right direction. For the sake of our Constitution and representative government, the president’s power to put his candidates on the federal bench must not be impeded. If you haven’t already let your Senators know how you feel about the Alito nomination...
Our "Boycott the Liberal Media" campaign is getting a response from the liberal media. And it’s about what you’d expect.
On January 5th, The Dallas Morning News published a column by religion writer Jeffrey Weiss that takes me to task for Vision America’s effort to counter media bias. Mr. Weiss informs us that the media “tend to believe that more information is better than less information. That we should cast a broad net for sources.” Noble sentiments, be sure. If only they were true.
In reality, liberal media tend to use sources that confirm/endorse/promote their point of view. For instance, if a conservative group takes a controversial position, in reporting it, the mainstream media always go to a liberal group (sometimes several) for an opposing view. But when the ACLU or People for the American Way say something, it goes unchallenged in the pages of your local paper. Or, they quote two or three liberal sources for every conservative opinion.
The ways liberal media distort the news are manifold and varied. To cite but one example, on NBC’s Today Show yesterday, co-host Matt Lauer described Judge Alito as an “ultra-conservative.” Would he call Ruth Bader Ginsburg an “ultra-liberal”? Would he tag David Souter or Anthony Kennedy as a “judicial activist.” Of course not -- because he agrees with their rulings. The media reserves the prefix “ultra” (which implies fanaticism) for conservatives.
The more objective people in the media readily acknowledge this bias. Consider the following from Marie Arana, Washington Post “Book World” editor: “The elephant in the newsroom is our narrowness (What happened to Weiss’ broad net?) Too often, we wear our liberalism on our sleeve and are intolerant of other lifestyles and opinions.”
Here’s Former CBS News President Van Gordon Sauter, explaining in an op-ed piece in the Los Angeles Times (January 13, 2005) why he rarely watches CBS News anymore: “The unremitting liberal orientation finally became too much for me. I still check in, but less and less frequently.” But didn’t Weiss tell us the media have no political orientation?
I’m not alone in seeing much of the media as a propaganda transmission belt. Every national survey confirms this. In a 2000 poll conducted for the Pew Research Center, 57% of respondents said the media “often” allow their own political preferences to influence reporting. Another 32% said it happens “sometimes.”
We too believe Christians should get views from a wide variety of sources. However, we also believe that opinions should be confined to a newspaper’s editorial pages, instead of saturating its news pages in the guise of reporting. To join Vision America’s campaign against media bias, click here.
ANTIDOTE TO THE ABOVE “THE WAR ON CHRISTIANS AND THE VALUES VOTER IN 2006” CONFERENCE
If you’re concerned about the bashing of conservative judges (like Judge Alito) and anti-Christian bias in the media, I urge you to attend Vision America’s March 27-28 conference, “The War On Christians And The Values Voter In 2006.”
Speakers include Alan Keyes, Sen. Sam Brownback, Gary Bauer, Janet Parshall, Sen. John Cornyn, Rod Parsley, Rep. Tom DeLay, Rep. Loius Gohmert, Rep. Todd Akin, Dr. Laurence White, and Phyllis Schlafly.
Panel discussions cover every battlefront of the war on Christians. They include “The Judiciary: Overruling God” and “The News Media: Megaphone for Anti-Faith Values,” timely topics covered in this issue of The Rick Scarborough Report.
It’s time for Christians to do more than complain about activist judges (and the bashing of conservative judges) and anti-Christian bias in the media. We must become informed. We must get involved. We must educate, activate and mobilize.
The place to begin is at Vision America’s “The War on Faith And The Values Voter In 2006” conference. Click here to register online
