Deal Hudson Getting Free Pass from Press

I wrote recently about Deal Hudson, Bush's Catholic advisor who had to quit because it came out he had sexually abused (some might call it rape, or at least date rape) an intoxicated student at Fordham while he taught there. For some reason, though, the press has largely ignored this. Why?

Kathryn Joyce writes for The Revealer:

All the vitriol, all the putting-into-perspective, the calls for purges and calls to move on came from a handful of blogs and websites, most religiously-concerned. The mainstream follow-up on Joe Feuerherd’s excellent profile in The National Catholic Reporter amounted to an AP bulletin and two short, general reports from The New York Times and The Washington Post. All three announced Hudson’s resignation as a final story, accepted the White House’s refusal to comment and didn’t mention the affair again.

In some ways, this seems an extension of the "chilling effect" the administration’s press policies have had -- discouraging reporters from asking tough questions with the unspoken warning that doing so will mean that they don’t get to ask any questions at all. It's one thing to call the bishops to task and, it seems, quite another to question the religious sincerity of any of the president's men. Has the press become so fearful of criticism like Olasky’s, of alienating the "persecuted" majority, of appearing to engage in a Christian “witch hunt,” that they won’t press for details when a political scandal seems, in some vague way, "religious"?

The so-called “liberal media” has been airing the accusations of the Swift Boat veterans 24-hours a day, giving them about the same amount of time and deference that they have to Kerry’s defenders. One would almost think that there is something to their story, despite the fact that real journalists who have investigated the matter have found no truth whatsoever to it. In this case, however, the media is basically ignoring it and giving the administration a free pass.

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