Before we return to the never-ending saga of Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and his efforts to create a totalitarian theocracy that destroys democracy in America, let’s pause for a Journalism 101 case study.

Don’t worry, this is directly related to this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in).

Now, gentle readers, are any of you old enough to remember Marabel Morgan, the evangelical superstar who wrote “The Total Woman,” which sold something like 10 million copies? Morgan was an anti-feminist crusader clothed in pink (as opposed to something else) who had a knack for infuriating blue-zipcode elites. Here is a quick flashback, via the Faith Profiles website:

An editor at Time magazine once confided in Marabel Morgan that he came away from a cocktail party with high-heel marks all over his chest at the mere mention of her name.

And what heinous crime did Morgan commit that could provoke such a sharp reaction? Morgan wrote a book in the early 1970s that sold more than 5 million copies about how she salvaged her marriage. The widespread belief was that she proposed that women rekindle their marriages by such innovations as greeting their husbands at the door dressed in Saran Wrap or having sex under the dining room table.

Whee!

During my early 1980s religion-beat work at The Charlotte News, I ventured out to a suburban megachurch where Morgan spoke to several thousand fans. I left that meeting absolutely furious, my mind packed with outrageous punchline quotes from her (I had to admit entertaining) speech.

Driving back to the newsroom on deadline, I started figuring out what would be in the crucial first two or three paragraphs of the story. Then I realized that, if I followed my own prejudices, I was going to frontload this story with stuff that would fire up my editors and others who detested Morgan and her tribe.

Thus, I decided to attempt a story that opened with material that included (a) what Morgan said that I knew would appeal to her critics and (b) what she said that drew cheers and applause from her supporters. Yes, one or two quotes in the story fit into both of those categories.

All of this material was accurate and all of it, quite frankly, was newsworthy — if one assumed that her Christian faith and her views on the Bible mattered as much as her quotes about cultural-political issues. The story ended up drawing praise, and criticism, from readers on both sides of this debate.

This brings us to a recent CNN report that ran with this headline: “Mike Johnson’s America: Revisit landmark SCOTUS decisions and use government to ‘restrain evil’.”

If a reader is predisposed to disagree, or even hate, Speaker Johnson — this is a fine story. If a reader is part of the other half of the American population, in this tense land, there is no reason read this report.

Here is the problem, from my point of view — echoing some of what I said in an earlier post with this headline: “Surprise! Speaker of the House is pro religious liberty, which means he's ultra-conservative.”

Readers learn quite a bit about what Johnson has to say when, during his earlier work as a legal activist and then as a campaigning politico, about legal debates on the First Amendment and related hot-button political issues. This is very much an opposition-research file. Readers learn little or nothing, however, about what Johnson actually wrote or advocated in actual court documents and testimony on these kinds of cases, during his years working as a conservative church-state lawyer.

Consider these crucial paragraphs near the top of this long story:

… CNN’s review of more than 100 of Johnson’s interviews, speeches and public commentary spanning his decades-long career as a lawmaker and attorney paints a picture of his governing ideals: Imprisoning doctors who perform abortions after six weeks; the Ten Commandments prominently displayed in public buildings; an elimination of anti-hate-crime laws; Bible study in public schools.

From endorsing hard labor prison sentences for abortion providers to supporting the criminalization of gay sex, his staunchly conservative rhetoric is rooted in an era of “biblical morality,” that he says was washed away with the counterculture in the 1960s.

“One of the primary purposes of the law in civil government is to restrain evil,” Johnson said on one radio show in 2010. “We have to acknowledge collectively that man is inherently evil and needs to be restrained.”

You know, I wonder if the CNN editors realized that the “inherently evil” reference in that radio show appearance (Question: Was this a religious station?) was theological language rooted in Johnson’s Southern Baptist beliefs, almost certainly Calvinist? Man! It’s lucky that he didn’t talk about “total depravity”!

The political issue is not what Johnson believes about original sin, including his own, but how this affects his legal actions on matters of free speech, freedom of religion and freedom of association in cases involving people with beliefs very different than his. Where are the hard facts, in this CNN report, about Alliance Defending Freedom work in cases involving religious believers in a wide variety of religious minorities?

Consider a few items in that laundry list of controversial stands allegedly taken by Johnson.

How about “Bible study in public schools”? What does that mean? Is this a reference to (a) classes approved by many courts that focus on studies of the the Bible and other scriptures as history, literature or culture or (b) a reference to students being able to form Bible study groups (think liberal equal-access concepts) that meet on school property, following the same rules as groups focusing on the environment, gay rights or other topics?

Or here is a really hot topic — the “criminalization of gay sex.”

If you click the “criminalization” link, you will flash back to 2003 debates about the SCOTUS ruling in Lawrence v. Texas. Now, lots of people argued about that case for lots of reasons. In church-state history, this is also the case in which Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion restated (quoting his earlier Casey gay-rights decision) what some have called the “Star Trek” doctrine: “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” It’s still hard to define, in legal terms, what that those words meat, which may have been the point.

There were, of course, conservatives who supported the content of the old Texas laws — period.

Many other cultural conservatives simply argued that the court had not made a truly convincing case that state governments could not pass laws on issues related to private sexual activity, which could legally open the doors to rejecting laws on other topics such as, yes, incest, polygamy, pedophilia, etc.

Others opposed the Texas laws, but worried that the court decision automatically created a fast-track route to same-sex marriage.

In other words, there were quite a few “conservative” takes on that decision. None would, of course, please LGBTQ+ activists — but the various “conservative” stands were not identical.

Thus, what did Johnson argue — in legal terms — on these issues? The Johnson brief on this case (.pdf here) seems to say that arguments made by the activists behind the case were weak for various reasons based on law and public health.

Johnson’s 2003 views are certainly offensive in 2023. The question is what has he done — legally and politically — on those matters since then?

This is where the CNN opposition-research file has a major journalism problem: It is built TOTALLY on the views of church-state progressives who want to find ammunition with which to attack Johnson. There is zero content from church-state conservatives who either (a) back Johnson’s views or (b) disagree with him on some issues, but for legal reasons different than those found among today’s progressives. That’s bad journalism.

In conclusion, let me note that the CNN report is a perfect example of the “Christian nationalism” growth industry in many newsrooms (including news reporting and coverage funded by activist groups on that topic).

Is Johnson a “Christian nationalist”? I am sure that he is, under the definitions used by some players in these debates. A Pew Research report on the wide spectrum of definitions for this term quoted this definition:

White dudes who are scared to lose power to women and minorities hiding behind a Bible they don’t even believe in to retain power.

I am sure that some would apply those words to Johnson. The question is whether the speaker’s actual views are different from those in pews in many Black or Latino Pentecostal congregations (as well as others). Are his views radically different than, oh, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt?

So, how helpful is the “Christian nationalism” term — when undefined — in hard-news journalism? Pew Research noted, in a 2022 report (I added some bold type):

Most Americans think the founders of America intended for the U.S. to be a “Christian nation,” more than four-in-ten think the United States should be a Christian nation, and a third say the country is a Christian nation today. However, Americans’ views of what it means to be a Christian nation are wide-ranging and often ambiguous. To some, being a Christian nation implies Christian-based laws and governance. For others it means the subtle guidance of Christian beliefs and values in everyday life, or even simply a population with faith in something bigger.

Many Americans are unfamiliar with the concept of “Christian nationalism,” and among those who have heard of it, more people express an unfavorable view of Christian nationalism than say they have a favorable impression of it. Nevertheless, like the descriptions of Christian nation, Americans’ views of Christian nationalism envision varying levels of Christian influence on the nation, ranging from strict theocratic rule to merely embracing moral values such as helping others.

Also note this passage:

Some U.S. adults — again, particularly those with unfavorable views of Christian nationalism — also describe Christian nationalism using other negative attributes. These include: “radical” or “extremist,” “hypocritical,” “cult”-like or “fanatical,” “fascist” or “authoritarian,” “misogynistic,” “hateful” or “angry,” “ignorant,” “anti-democratic,” and “[falsely] believing they are under attack.” This group makes up 30% of those with unfavorable attitudes toward Christian nationalism.

This also includes 3% of all Americans (13% of those with negative attitudes toward Christian nationalism) who describe Christian nationalism as White supremacist and racist.

Yes, one has to wonder if many CNN producers can be found in that “3% of all Americans.”

If podcast listeners want to dig a bit deeper on that topic — which is clearly part of the Speaker Johnson trials via news reports — I would suggest reading this post by GetReligion patriarch Richard Ostling: “One of the central religion-beat issues of our day: What is 'Christian nationalism'?”

Journalists! Be careful out there and, maybe, consider talking to some sources who disagree with your pre-existing views on some of these topics. There are many old-school liberals on First Amendment issues and, in my experience, the views found in that camp are quite diverse. I am sure reporters would find interesting commentary on the LEGAL DOCUMENTS (as opposed to talk-show chatter) produced by the Southern Baptist who now leads the House of Representatives.

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FIRST IMAGE: From the X feed of Speaker Mike Johnson — a photo from a recent pro-Israel rally.