On Saturday, NewsBusters reported an Associated Press story about the campaign by MoveOn.org and Daily Kos to get sponsors to pull their ads from Fox News.

According to Advertising Age magazine, "MoveOn has been pitching this story for weeks now," and has "been trying, with absolutely no success, to target Home Depot."

As a result, in AdAge's view, the AP bit on a story that nobody else was interested in covering until maybe this effort had some success.

As Ken Wheaton wrote Friday in an article entitled "MoveOn Gets Someone to Bite on Faux Fox Protest" (emphasis added throughout, h/t Glenn Reynolds):

What's left unsaid in the AP piece is that MoveOn has been pitching this story for weeks now. According to the AP piece, "the groups want to first concentrate on businesses running local ads, as opposed to national commercials." That seems to contradict the AP's own story which points out that the groups have been trying, with absolutely no success, to target Home Depot.

By its own admission in press materials, this is the "fourth stage" of MoveOn's attempt to take down the "Republican spin machine."

Might have been nice for the AP to point this out, wouldn't you agree?

But it isn't news. And if I had my way, the media wouldn't waste any time with any of these efforts until it was actually shown that someone somewhere lost a sale.

I quite agree. Yet, what's also interesting is how the AP bit on a story that, up until this point, only liberal bloggers cared about:

Funnier still is that MoveOn, until now, has been unable to get much media coverage -- unless one counts The Huffington Post and DailyKos as the sort of media that's going to move the masses. Both of those, by the way, are part of this little coalition of speech police, so that's kind of like getting recognized by your parents for a job well done.

As such, not only has the AP shilled for MoveOn.org, but has similarly so for HuffPo and Daily Kos.

Isn't that special?

Yet, maybe even more delicious was how Daily Kos proprietor Markos Moulitsas congratulated his troops Friday for getting the home improvement retailer Lowe's to cancel its ads from Fox News:

Lowe's pulls advertising from O'Reilly show by kos Fri Jul 27, 2007 at 05:59:06 PM PDT

A reader emailed Lowe's about their ads on O'Reilly's show. They got this response:

Replied On 07/27/07 15:41:09

Dear Lowe's Customer,

Thank you for your comments regarding the program, The O'Reilly Factor.

Lowe's has strict guidelines that govern the placement of our advertising. Our company advertises primarily in national, network prime-time television programs and on a variety of cable outlets.

Lowe's constantly reviews advertising buys to make certain they are consistent with its policy guidelines. The O'Reilly Factor does not meet Lowe's advertising guidelines, and the company's advertising will no longer appear during the program.

We are dedicated to providing the best service, products, and shopping environment in the home improvement industry. All three of these are very important to our business, and our customers will always be our number one priority.

We appreciate your contacting us, and hope this information addresses your concerns.

Thank you,

Lowe's Customer Care

Emphasis was mine.

Two can play at this game.

There's only one problem, Markos: Lowe's pulled its sponsorship of "The Factor" back in - wait for it! - January, and it had nothing to do with the efforts of MoveOn or Daily Kos. As reported by Radar Online February 2 (h/t Charles Johnson, emphasis added):

Home-improvement chain Lowe's has pulled its advertising from The O'Reilly Factor following comments host Bill O'Reilly made about Shawn Hornbeck, the 15-year-old Missouri boy who recently returned to his parents after four years in captivity.

[...]

According to News Hounds, a watchdog website that monitors Fox News Channel, viewers who complained to the retailer about its financial support of The O'Reilly Factor got e-mails back notifying them that Lowe's had pulled its ads as of Jan. 25.

A search of the tag "Lowe's" identified absolutely no stories posted about this company by Markos or anyone else at Daily Kos between September 8, 2006, and April 26 of this year.

As such, Kos reported Friday - and appeared to take credit for - something that actually occurred six months ago totally without his involvement.

Now that's quality journalism.

—Noel Sheppard is the Associate Editor of NewsBusters.