The Associated Press and the Los Angeles Times trumpeted the legacy of Ted Kennedy on Wednesday by running headlines which used quotes from notables about the deceased senator without quotation marks. The AP’s report by Glen Johnson and Philip Elliott heralded the President’s superlative about Kennedy without stating it was Mr. Obama’s words: “Obama mourns Kennedy, greatest senator of our time.”

Ari B. Bloomekatz’s entry on the blog of the LA Times highlighted the statement from the Catholic archbishop of the City of Angels: “Cardinal Mahony calls Kennedy a champion of the powerless” (an odd statement from the Cardinal, as Kennedy was a staunch defender of “abortion rights,” and who is more “powerless” than a baby in the womb?)

Reporters and editors at the Washington Post are defensive about new health-care ads mocking President Obama's vacation. In Monday's Washington Post, after disposing with the official line that no news will be made during the time off, reporter Michael D. Shear insisted Obama's vacation was brief, next to those lazy Bushes:

Past presidents have been queasy about time away from the White House, fearing the image of a checked-out president. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs expressed none of that concern last week, saying, "I don't think the American people begrudge a president taking some time with his family that's well earned and well deserved, for a few days to see and spend time with them."

Obama is taking a week off from his day job, far less than some of his predecessors. Former president George H.W. Bush spent weeks at Kennebunkport, Maine. Son George W. Bush did the same at his ranch in Crawford, Tex.

Associated Press reporter Philip Elliott has a new honorific title for President Obama: "Fact-Checker-in-Chief." In a Thursday filing, Elliott suggested Obama apparently has all the facts, and his conservative opponents are the constant myth-spreaders.

On the defensive, Obama is embracing a new role of fact checker-in-chief, trying to correct untrue claims such as that the proposals would provide health care for illegal immigrants, create "death panels" or pay for abortions with taxpayer dollars. Aides say the situation has left Obama exasperated.

This isn’t the first time Elliott has used that flattering lingo. On August 12, he also insisted the president favored facts and his opponents were falsifiers:

Obama assailed "wild misrepresentations" of his health care plan Tuesday during a town hall-style meeting in Portsmouth, N.H., taking on the role of fact-checker-in-chief for his top domestic priority.

In his October 20 feature "Obama ropelines: bouncing babies, controlled chaos," Associated Press writer Charles Babington found room to write about enthusiastic crowds reveling in the Obamessiah.

The hosannas have already been sung in numerous stories of this variety from earlier in the campaign, but for some reason Babington thought fit to chronicle the cries of adulation from the Illinois senator's faithful followers (emphases mine; h/t e-mail tipster Joe Loiacono):

Only a fraction of the thousands of people who attend Obama's larger rallies manage to touch him. They arrive hours early, stand and cheer during his speech, and then scream, jump and sometimes cry out in joy when he uses both hands to briefly press their arms, hands, fingers.

The noise rivals a rock concert.