Peter, this isn’t the first time in this campaign the media has betrayed its own stated ideals in order to help out Barack Obama. Recall the “piling on” debate, in which Hillary Clinton claimed her opponents and the moderators were ganging up on her. The media (fairly uniformly) rebuffed her, scoffing that she was playing the “gender card.” After all, that was the appropriate tough treatment for a front-runner (which she was at the time).

For Obama, they’ve shown no similar inclination to defend their own role. But it extends to more than debate coverage. When Obama whimpers that eight questions are quite enough on Tony Rezko, or when he snaps at the press and goes days or weeks without making himself available to the press, we do not see a flood of stories complaining that he is “evasive” or “cloistered.”

It isn’t just that reporters are helping their horse in the race. They’re doing so at the expense of their own professed journalistic standards. When ABC decided to do its job, the rest of the horde pounced. Now, that is shameful.