Media bias, the red/blue divide, the culture war–call it what you will, it’s everywhere. Have a look at Newsweek’s cover story on “The Myth of the Perfect Mother.” The story conveys the latest feminist line, as told by former Newsweek stringer, Judith Warner, and Newsweek columnist, Anna Quindlen. Warner is hyping her new book, while Quindlen helpfully echoes Warner’s point. It wouldn’t have been difficult for Newsweek to juxtapose Warner’s story with a column by Mary Eberstadt, author of Home Alone America. But instead of presenting the reader with different points of view, Newsweek worked an in-house cheerleading session into a cover story. It says something (entirely unsurprising) that Newsweek’s in-house experts on the family would be like-minded feminists. We see the bias of America’s elite institutions clearly when someone like Lawrence Summers stumbles across it, and all hell breaks loose. But what’s really scary is that we don’t usually hear any fuss at all–precisely because the cultural left has a lock on both MSM and our universities.

So what about the substantive argument of Newsweek’s “Myth of the Perfect Mother” cover story? It’s the usual feminist line, cleverly packaged as empathy for the stressed out working mother. Working mothers are having a terribly tough time blending family and profession. But they shouldn’t blame themselves, says Judith Warner, they should blame society. The only solution to the family/work dilemma, claims Warner, is the European welfare state. Warner and her friends won’t be satisfied till they turn the United States into Sweden. Trouble is, Europe’s welfare state is on the verge of collapse, chiefly because no-one is having babies. And although Warner doesn’t mention it, Europe’s massive welfare state has gravely weakened its families.

Anna Quindlen is nostalgic for the days when our standards of mothering were less exacting–the days when children could roam their neighborhoods freely for hours without that implying maternal neglect. But as Mary Eberstadt shows in Home Alone America, the real reason children can’t run free anymore is that, with both parents at work, it’s no longer safe for kids to go out alone. Of course, we get only one side of that story from Newsweek.