MRC's Bozell Hits WaPo Double Standard in Pulling 'Opus' Cartoon

August 29th, 2007 10:46 AM

MRC president and NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell appeared on the August 29 "Fox & Friends" to discuss the Washington Post's double standards on religious sensitivity.

As NewsBusters associate editor Noel Sheppard reported on Sunday, the Post refused to run Berkeley Breathed's August 26 "Opus" cartoon in which flighty recurring character Lola Granola has declared herself a "radical Islamist" and adopted its strict adherence to Muslim law, including covering herself head-to-toe, much to the chagrin of her long-suffering boyfriend.

Video (1:50): Real (3.00 MB) and Windows (3.44 MB), plus MP3 audio (534 kB).

Bozell noted that the Post's religious sensitivities do not extend to avoid offending Christians, particularly Catholics:

Here you have a cartoon that takes a swipe not at Muslims but at radical Islamists, and they deem that to be inappropriate, and yet the very same paper runs this not only a cartoon attacking Jerry Falwell and his followers, but on a regular basis attacks Christians, it attacks Catholics, it attacks priests, it attacks bishops. It's run cartoons I've seen-- this is a shout-out to the Catholic League which has done a report on this-- it's even run cartoons desecrating images of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. That's okay. That's free speech. They wrap themselves around free speech when it comes to attacking Christians. But when it comes to attacking radical Islamists, suddenly they have standards. It's not a standard, it's a double standard.