 In the final episode of season four, Murphy Brown gave birth to her  child, Avery. Around that time Vice President Dan Quayle (qv),  during a televised debate, criticized the show for introducing the  theme of an unmarried woman having a child and thereby promoting the  idea of single motherhood and the decay of family values, a hot  issue during that years election campaigning. The producers and  writers retaliated in the 60