Media slanted in reporting high-profile shootings (OneNewsNow.com)

Media slanted in reporting high-profile shootings (OneNewsNow.com)

A conservative media watchdog organization says mainstream outlets demonstrated once again what their priorities are with the striking difference in the way two shootings were covered in the past week..

Muslim convert Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad has been accused of shooting two uniformed soldiers on Monday outside a military recruiting center in west Little Rock, Arkansas, killing one and wounding the other. Authorities said he acted "with political and religious motives" -- and numerous media outlets described him as a "lone shooter."

But one day earlier, when abortionist George Tiller was gunned down at his Wichita, Kansas, church, the media not only gave the murder substantial coverage, it took every opportunity to use the incident as a way to slam the entire pro-life movement. That's the report from Colleen Raezler, a research assistant at the Culture and Media Institute of the Media Research Center.

"They were saying that [Tiller's killer] was a person who was linked to pro-life organizations and things like that -- and there's no such consideration for the person who did those shootings in Arkansas," Raezler notes.

The Muslim suspect in the Arkansas attack has been charged with multiple counts of terrorism as well as murder. Raezler says she has noticed a striking difference in the reaction to the two killings.

"Many of the pro-life organizations -- ...Concerned Women for America, Family Research Council, the big names in the pro-life movement -- issued statements condemning the killer and any actions that Tiller's killer took on Sunday," she points out. "And yet from anti-war groups such as CodePink, who had called our soldiers killers and things like that, there is nothing, nothing coming from any of them."

Raezler says the broadcast networks went out of their way to portray Tiller as an abortion rights martyr, willing to die in defense of women's rights -- but had little to say about the lives he helped end.

Columnist Michelle Malkin, writing of the media's handling of the two shootings, says it is apparent that politically and religiously motivated violence "is only worth lamenting when it demonizes opponents."