[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 14 (Tuesday, February 24, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H538-H539]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1800
                 IS THERE A MEDIA BIAS? ASK BOB ZELNICK

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Shaw). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Speaker, is there a liberal bias in the nation's 
media? Just ask a prominent member of that media.
  Bob Zelnick had been a respected member of ABC's news division for 21 
years. He was fired because he wanted to write a book on Vice President 
Al Gore. The head of ABC news had first granted him permission to write 
such a book, but then changed his mind when it became clear that 
Zelnick was not going to write a puff piece about Mr. Gore.
  In my own experience, ABC News has a liberal bias. I recently 
traveled to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, to 
investigate whether the accusations of sweatshops and other labor 
abuses were true. At a reception hosted by the Governor of the CNMI, a 
member of my staff noticed that a film crew was spying on us from a 
clump of bushes. When the staff asked this film crew whom they 
represented, they would not identify themselves. Later, they admitted 
that they were from ABC News.
  When someone is spying on you from a nearby bush, it's hard to 
believe that they will do a fair story. I tried to accommodate them in 
their story later on. For example, I made certain that they had a 
chance to follow me as I inspected various garment factories and 
workers housing units on the island of Saipan. But I have every 
expectation that the story will be unfair and unbalanced when it 
ultimately comes out next month.
  Bob Zelnick's experience with ABC News just further goes to show the 
true bias at that news division. I urge my colleagues to read this 
illuminating piece that appeared in the Wall Street Journal today, 
entitled ``ABC: Anyone but Conservatives.''

                     ABC: Anyone But Conservatives

                             By Bob Zelnick

       Last week I was forced to leave my position as a 
     correspondent for ABC News. What happened to me illustrates 
     something of what is wrong with TV news today.
       In December 1996, following a dinner conversation with my 
     publisher, Alfred Regnery, I agreed to undertake a biography 
     of Vice President Al Gore. Early the following month I phoned 
     Richard C. Wald, the ABC News executive who tends to the 
     business of editorial standards, to describe the project and 
     secure his permission to proceed.
       Mr. Wald asked if I intended to write a ``straightforward'' 
     biography or one with a distinct point of view. I replied 
     that except for opinions I might develop during my research, 
     the book would be reasonably straightforward. Mr. Wald then 
     inquired what I thought of Mr. Gore. I replied that I knew 
     the vice president only slightly, but had a generally 
     favorable impression of him, shaped by his pro-defense views 
     in the Senate and his critical support for the 1991 Gulf War 
     resolution. I added that my sense was that his environmental 
     views might be a bit extreme.


                        `you have my permission'

       Late in the conversation, Mr. Wald remarked: ``If you write 
     a book about him, you probably can't cover him for us.'' I 
     told him I thought that writing a book on the vice president 
     would enhance my credentials to cover him. ``Now that I think 
     of it, you may be right,'' said Mr. Wald. ``We'll have to 
     see. In any event, you have my permission.''
       I conducted scores of interviews. I hired a researcher who 
     performed more than four months of full-time work. I traveled 
     to Harvard, where Mr. Gore went to school, and to Tennessee. 
     I came up with fascinating, previously unpublished material 
     on both Mr. Gore and his father, also a former Tennessee 
     senator, and mined a rich lode of background material on 
     Tennessee politics. My sense was that the project would prove 
     helpful not only to my own career as a television 
     correspondent but also to ABC's coverage of the 2000 
     presidential campaign.

[[Page H539]]

       But last September, just days before my contract with ABC 
     was to expire, the network informed me that if I wished to 
     sign a new one, I would have to break my contract with 
     Regnery, return the advance and discontinue all work on the 
     Gore book. ABC's new position was that there was an inherent 
     conflict between writing a book on a subject and covering 
     that subject.
       In a written appeal to Roone Arledge and David Westin, 
     respectively chairman and president of the news division, I 
     objected to the ruling as unjust, contrary to ABC's own 
     standards and procedures, and repugnant to the First 
     Amendment values we all endorse. I pointed out that the 
     decision was wildly excessive as regards any valid interest 
     of ABC News, in that I was willing to submit the manuscript 
     months before publication in order to address any editorial 
     problems the company perceived. I noted that most news 
     organizations encourage their correspondents to write books 
     on subjects they cover, then point to them with pride as 
     indicating staff depth, scholarship and authority. Examples 
     from the print press are legion, but even in television, 
     where a career spent writing 90-second spots can erode the 
     ability to think and write in depth, correspondents such as 
     Marvin Kalb, Bernard Kalb, Dan Rather, Sam Donaldson and I 
     have published books on subjects close to our beats.
       Nonetheless, Mr. Westin's written reply explained that ``we 
     cannot have a Washington correspondent writing a book about 
     one of our national leaders whom that correspondent will 
     undoubtedly have to cover.'' Otherwise, we could be ``held up 
     to ridicule that our reporting is influenced by views you/we 
     have formed about the individual involved.''
       I eventually decided to complete the book and to leave ABC 
     News after 21 years. Mr. Wald, asked by a newspaper reporter 
     why he had granted permission in the first place, concocted a 
     tale that I was about to be fired when I approached him, and 
     he didn't want to impede my earning a living by writing 
     books. Thanks, Dick.
       Would I have faced the same problem if I were an avowedly 
     liberal journalist undertaking a book that made conservatives 
     mildly uncomfortable rather than a moderately conservative 
     one writing about a liberal icon? Had the proposed title been 
     ``Gingrich: A Critical Look at the Man and His Climb to 
     Power,'' would I have been forced to choose between my book 
     and my career? I rather doubt it.
       Nor does the double standard stop with books. My friend and 
     former colleague Sam Donaldson is again covering the White 
     House six days a week. On the seventh day he does not rest, 
     but rather appears on ``This Week With Sam and Cokie,'' where 
     he is free with his concededly liberal opinions. Sam is a 
     gifted reporter, and in 21 years I have never seen evidence 
     of deliberate bias in his work. I think ABC is wisely using 
     his talents. But where is his conservative counterpart, 
     licensed both to report and to ruminate?
       My original sin may have been my earlier book, ``Backfire: 
     A Reporter's Look at Affirmative Action,'' also published by 
     Regnery. In 1996, when ``This Week'' decided to interview 
     Gary Aldrich--author of yet another Regnery book, ``Unlimited 
     Access: An FBI Agent Inside the Clinton White House''--and I 
     was asked to prepare the set-up piece, George Stephanopoulos, 
     then a White House spinmeister (now an ABC commentator), 
     blasted ABC News for anti-Clinton bias, specifically citing 
     my limited involvement with the program. Months later, Jane 
     Mayer, a New Yorker reporter, did the same. Is this what Mr. 
     Westin had in mind when he said he feared ``ridicule''?
       Like others at ABC News, I committed my life, my fortune 
     and my sacred honor to the furtherance of the First Amendment 
     and the pursuit of truth. Along with a brave and resourceful 
     crew, I was thrown into a Moscow prison for refusing to stop 
     interviewing a dissident on her way to court. I accompanied 
     soldiers who came under fire in South Lebanon and Somalia. In 
     these times I was conscious of the far greater physical 
     dangers that other correspondents had faced in times and 
     places as different as Gettysburg, Normandy, Khe Sanh and 
     Srebrenica.
       But the principal dangers that threaten television 
     journalists today are not those of an errant bullet, or even 
     a well-aimed one. Rather, they spring on the one hand from 
     the merciless demands of the news cycle, the dumbing down of 
     public affairs programming and the belief in viewers' 
     shrinking attention span. The end results of these dangers 
     are poorly sourced, factually insubstantial, overly 
     sensational stories that, in the end, harm our credibility 
     and make us easy targets for political demagogues.


                         ideological orthodoxy

       The other danger--the one that led to my departure from the 
     industry--involves ideological orthodoxy, political 
     correctness and complete lack of self-confidence regarding 
     the management of a news organization, partly because so many 
     of those at the top have little or no background as working 
     journalists.
       For most of my career I felt honored to serve as a 
     correspondent for ABC News. But the ABC News I served did not 
     practice prior restraint.
       The ABC News I served did not demand that its reporters 
     shatter their integrity by breaching contracts.
       The ABC News I served did not look for a rock to crawl 
     under when the Jane Mayers of the world attacked.
       The ABC News I served did not seek to destroy 
     correspondents who had performed for the company over two 
     decades with dignity, integrity and excellence.
       The ABC News I served did not break its word, ignore its 
     standards or brazenly lie to explain its actions.
       Sad to say, the ABC News I served is not the ABC News I 
     left.

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