By Joe Conason

May 13, 2001 | 8:00 p.m

I always knew that someday, someone in the Washington press

corps would notice the right-wing conspiracy. After all, it has been operating under their upturned noses for these many, many years. On May 6, my faith was finally vindicated with the appearance of a startling article by one of The Washington Post 's most able reporters, John Harris. While Mr. Harris carefully avoids using the C-word, he obviously gets it. By merely acknowledging the existence of what plainly exists, he breaks new ground. Even more forthrightly, he points out that the conspiracy's most important beneficiary, George W. Bush, has so far escaped the barrage of assaults inflicted by the national media on everything and everyone associated with Bill Clinton. If the Clintons (and Al Gore) were constantly spattered with mud and worse, then Mr. Bush has been showered with champagne and rose petals. As Mr. Harris writes, "The truth is, this new president has done things with relative impunity that would have been huge uproars if they had occurred under Clinton. Take it from someone who made a living writing about those uproars." He is quick to add that this difference in coverage has nothing whatsoever to do with "journalists' attitudes toward Bush or their willingness to report aggressively on him." No, of course not. The true culprit is that right-wing thing (which perhaps should be renamed La Cosa Destra, in homage to another infamous group which some have likewise insisted is mythical). Mr. Harris calls it "a corps" of "aggrieved and methodical people" whose "well-coordinated" aim was to "expose and undermine" Mr. Clinton from the moment he took office in 1993. He asserts that the absence of an organized liberal mob is why Mr. Bush gets such an easy media ride every day. Briefly sketching the gang's crews and capos, he notes that there is no liberal equivalent of the Heritage Foundation-or, he might have added, the American Enterprise Institute and about half a dozen smaller but well-funded versions of same, financed by right-wing godfather Richard Mellon Scaife. Nor is there any leftish loudmouth who possesses the influence of Rush Limbaugh-generously described by the Post reporter as "colorful," although "malicious" and "mendacious" would have been equally apt. Perhaps most important, there is no Democratic counterpart to Representative Dan Burton-the Hoosier hooligan whose "investigations" of the Clinton White House were only part of a broader harassment scheme mounted by the Republican Congressional majority. The irony of that contrast between then and now doesn't escape the astute Mr. Harris. Despite serious doubts about whether Mr. Bush won or stole the election, and his clear defeat in the popular vote, he has been granted greater legitimacy by the opposition party than his Democratic predecessor ever was. Mr. Harris observes that "Washington's snarling public tone" during the 90's was produced largely by Mr. Clinton's opponents, a fair judgment rarely offered in The Post or any other major newspaper when it would have mattered. Insofar as he discusses the right's hypnotic influence on the press, Mr. Harris' article is semi-confessional, or at least quasi-confessional. When mainstream journalists write about the shortcomings of their industry, reassurance always outweighs remorse, and Mr. Harris is no exception. Yet his perspective as an insider at a Clinton-bashing national daily ought to be taken seriously. According to him, there are never any conscious decisions by reporters or editors to slant news coverage in deference to conservative dictates. Instead, he explains that "we give more coverage to stories when someone is shouting." The Republican right ranted incessantly, about Whitewater and Travelgate and Filegate and Chinagate, and the Washington press haplessly lent credence to their ravings. The busy journalistic establishment somehow neglected to discover, and thus inform their readers, that much of the scandal mongering was without foundation. Mr. Harris doesn't dwell on that failure, or the ambitions and enmities behind it. As they grew addicted to the Clinton soap opera, he writes, "the Washington press corps collectively may have fallen a bit out of shape at the hard work of examining, exposing, and critiquing public officials as they go about making the decisions that affect national life." So the flabby, scandal-addled minds of those who covered the last administration are in no condition to cope with this one. Still, he strives to conclude with the upbeat tone required inside the Beltway these days: "Good for this White House in avoiding the worst stumbles of the early Clinton administration; good for Washington in giving a new president a break at the start. And those people eager to see this president face scrutiny can rest assured: The opposition is sure to awaken." Should that reawakening ever occur, we will see whether Mr. Harris and his colleagues can hear shouting from the left as well as they heard it from the right. Based on recent experience, I worry that they've become deaf on that side.