When conservative Sen. Jesse Helms died in 2008, Brent Bozell wrote about how NBC substitute anchor Lester Holt could only talk about what he opposed: "He staked out firm positions against everything from communism and foreign aid to civil rights and modern art." NBC reporter Martin Savidge called Helms an "ultra-rightist."
But when Sen. Jim Jeffords died – a man best known for leaving the GOP and throwing the Senate majority to the Democrats in the summer of 2001 – NBC anchor Brian Willliams described him on Monday as a “giant of Vermont and national politics for decades.” He was a “moderate,” not a liberal:
Jim Jeffords
By Tim Graham | August 23, 2014 | 10:31 PM EDT
By Clay Waters | August 19, 2014 | 8:59 AM EDT
An obituary by the New York Times' Bruce Weber for Vermont Sen. Jim Jeffords, a soft Republican who swung Senate control to the Democrats when he disavowed his party and went independent ("Jim Jeffords, Who Altered Power in Senate, Dies at 80") appeared in Tuesday's edition.
The most ideological label Weber could find for Jeffords, who made headlines in 2001 when he defected from the GOP to vote with the Democrats in a split U.S. Senate, was "left-leaning." Weber used much of the obituary to criticize the GOP's "conservative orthodoxy." The same politicized tone showed in a previous Weber obit for influential conservative Paul Weyrich.