Abortion is another issue that many leading journalists believe would already be settled in a "progressive" manner if pro-life pyromaniacs were not in the way. This week's coverage of Senate success for the bill banning partial birth abortion included an NPR slam on the pro-life movement for pushing a measure seen by most Americans as moderate. (That makes it harder to depict pro-lifers as fanatical fire-starters.)

Or look at the coverage this week and last of the purportedly fiery remarks of Lt. Gen. Jerry Boykin. NBC played a clip of Boykin presenting a slide slow in June at the Good Shepherd Community Church in Sandy, Ore., and Boykin saying: "Well, is he (bin Laden) the enemy? Next slide. Or is this man (Saddam) the enemy? The enemy is none of these people I have showed you here. The enemy is a spiritual enemy. He's called the principality of darkness. The enemy is a guy called Satan."

This is standard biblical understanding: The real enemies are not flesh and blood, they are spiritual. But NBC and an unheavenly host of politicians were aghast, as they also were about Boykin's statement at a church in Florida that Christianity is true and Islam is not. The general soon came under enormous pressure to bow to the standard non-biblical understanding that all religions are essentially the same.

Intelligent Design advocates, pro-life leaders, Christian generals: Networks and liberal pundits scream Fire! Fire! Good thing we have hundreds of high-pressure fire hoses and journalists willing to use them.