20
Jun
Wuz Tom Hayden Robbed — By Hostile Media Coverage?
I have known Tom Hayden for years from our days together in the civil rights and student movements. He made a decision some years ago to enter electoral politics, running unsucessfully for the U.S. Senate from California, and later winning a place in the State legislature where he was respected as a pioneer of progressive legislation. When he left Sacramento, he made a failed bid for the Mayor’s job in LA. He lost. And just this year, he ran for the LA City Council from the liberal leaning West Side of Los Angeles and was given a good chance of winning. But he lost, and in a Florida-like squeaker by just 369 votes!
According to Walter Lippmann, a local writer, that loss can be blamed on negative media coverage in the Los Angles Times which, he charges, practiced a a form of modern red baiting and labeling. Perhaps other Angelinos can weigh in on this. Lippmann sent me a letter he wrote the Times. I am not sure if it has been published or not.
Editor, Los Angeles Times
(A response to the assessment of Tom Hayden’s campaign, June 16)
Why is the TIMES re-burying the 1960s again?
Tom Hayden was no icon to me. His pandering to the worst fears and prejudices, especially regarding Israel’s wars, were obvious. But the Times objects to the GOOD he did: opposing the Vietnam war and acting for civil rights. Consider:
Given the tiny 369 vote margin out of 53,167 cast (.0069%) the Times was THE deciding factor in Hayden’s loss. Had the Times not campaignedagainst Hayden, he would have been elected.
Your coverage was filled with loaded words such as: “traitor”, “stumbled”, “goateed liberal icon”, “carousel of political baggage”, “aging insurgent”, “burned out”, “jaded”, “skulked” and “old, worn and out of touch”.
The Times’ goal was obvious: to trash the movements of the 1960s and their hopes for a less violent, less greedy, more humane world. That will not succeed.
Sincerely (and for publication),
Walter Lippmann
Over 30 years of reading the LA TimesPaid print subscriber
p.s., I am ready, willing and able to writean op-ed column expanding on this.
Thanks.
