The newest right wing, Fox abetted whine focuses on how the evil, librul media is ignoring the Catholic lawsuits filed against the evil, librul, Obama administration. But these folks shouldn't fret too much because Fox News has their back. Along with Fox "opinion," the alleged "fair & balanced" Fox "news" has taken up the cause of conservative Catholics, chief among them Fox superstar, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, who believes that the HHS contraception mandate is a violation of religious freedom. (Women's rights, meh!)  At the beginning of a week that witnessed Fox News' Bill Hemmer's three day Cardinal Dolan lovefest, Fox News' Bret Baier presented a report that paid homage to the talking points of the Catholic bishops. And on Friday, Baier  finished up his Catholic suck-up-palooza with the second "news" piece that was straight out of Fox propaganda central casting. While the Friday report was similar to Monday's, it included the aforementioned meme about the unwillingness of the mainstream media to cover this Catholic "outrage" which, for Fox and it's right wing anti-Obama Catholic political (but strictly chaste) bed fellows, makes the Christians and lions thing look benign by comparison.

After reporting that it just isn't Catholics who are "up in arms" about the HHS mandate, Baier went over to Jim Angle's in-depth report about "various groups fight for" - ready for it - "religious freedom." Angle reported that Catholics are pissed about paying for contraceptives that "include abortion inducing drugs." (Angle, again, failed to point out that it's only the Catholic Church that considers emergency contraception an abortion inducing drug. He failed to note that abortion inducing drugs are not part of the mandate). He showed video of Bishop William Lori who was part of GOP Rep. Issa's lady parts free congressional panel. Lori spoke about - one guess - "religious liberty." Cardinal Dolan's rotund visage got some face time. He played video of Congressman Roy Blunt talking about - ready for it - "religious liberty" and claiming that the mandate is unconstitutional. (Blunt is the dude who want all Catholic employees to be able to deny contraception coverage to their workers. His "Blunt Amendment" was supported by the Catholic bishops.) Without noting that the Catholic Church has lost cases involving state mandates, Angle reported on laws passed to prevent government from violating religious beliefs.

Rather than interviewing those, like the ACLU's Sarah Lipton Lubet who says there is no case here, the "fair & balanced" Angle played commentary from the president of the uber medieval Catholic traditionalist Ave Maria University. He played a snippet of the Fox promoted video, from an extremist Catholic group, and claimed it "captured the depth of feeling among Catholics." He showed data supporting "religious liberty." After playing video of White House Press Secretary Jay Carney explanation of the "compromise" language, he showed video of Catholic priest Fr. Robert Sirico explaining why this is still unacceptable. Again, Angle avoided mentioning that the Catholic Health Association supports it. After describing the issue as a "monumental struggle" between the church and Obama, he said that "some analysts" (LOL - the right wing Brent Bozell) "wonder why the broadcast networks have given this battle so little coverage." He cited Bozell's famous "19 seconds."

So despite reporting, at the beginning of the piece, that it's just not Catholics who are upset, Angle played commentary from only Catholics. But what was even more interesting is that some of this commentary was from Fr. Sirico who went from performing gay marriages as a Pentecostal minister to being a founder and president of the uber Ayn Rand worshipping, uber laissez-faire Acton Institute which is connected to some serious right wing individuals.

 And Fox says that "Special Report" is "fair & balanced." Ya think!