As NewsBusters has previously reported, The Washington Post has double standards when it comes to their coverage of politicians; gladly digging up nasty opposition research on Republicans while not doing such a thorough job when it comes to the Democrats. During Monday’s edition of The Ingraham Angle, host Laura Ingraham brought up another example of the Post’s double standards; this time focusing on the disparity in coverage between sexual assault allegations against Republican Supreme Court nominee (and now Justice) Brett Kavanaugh and Democratic Virginia Lieutenant Governor Justin Fairfax.
According to Ingraham, “If you were looking for yet another stark example of media hypocrisy, look no further than The Washington Post.” Ingraham described the Post as “the paper that first brought us the completely...uncorroborated accusations against now sitting Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.” Ingraham contrasted the paper’s eagerness to publish the allegations against Kavanaugh with their hesitation to publish allegations against Fairfax, who would succeed embattled Governor Ralph Northam if he decided to resign.
Ingraham proceeded to read aloud an excerpt from a Post story titled “Va. Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax denies sex assault allegation from 2004.” According to the story, “The Washington Post, in phone calls to people who knew Fairfax from college, law school, and through political circles, found no similar complaints of sexual misconduct against him...Without that, or the ability to corroborate the woman’s account - in part because she had not told anyone what happened - the Washington Post did not run a story.” Ingraham responded, “I totally agree,” before asking “why wasn’t that standard applied to Kavanaugh?”
Ingraham brought in Jeffrey Lord, columnist for The American Spectator, NewsBusters and former Ronald Reagan advisor, for analysis on the media’s double standards. Ingraham asked Lord, “this is a pretty clear cut double standard, isn’t it?” Lord proceeded to give a history lesson, talking about how “this has been going on for decades,” and pointing out how the media will frequently commit a “sin of commission, in which they will go after somebody like Brett Kavanaugh,” in addition to sins of omission, where they do not go after liberals for similar behavior.
Lord did not mention this but the Post’s enthusiasm for covering a story about a few dozen feminists protesting for “menstrual equity” and their failure to cover a pro-life rally with hundreds of attendees perfectly illustrates his point about “sins of commission” and “sins of omission.”
A transcript of the relevant portion of Monday’s edition of The Ingraham Angle is below. Click “expand” to read more.
The Ingraham Angle
02/04/19
10:16 PM
LAURA INGRAHAM: If you were looking for yet another stark example of media hypocrisy, look no further than The Washington Post. Now, this is the paper that first brought us the completely, as Candace mentioned, uncorroborated accusations against now sitting Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. They did not publish accusations against current Lieutenant Governor, however, and potential Northam successor, Justin Fairfax. They wrote “The Washington Post, in phone calls to people who knew Fairfax from college, law school, and through political circles, found no similar complaints of sexual misconduct against him...Without that, or the ability to corroborate the woman’s account - in part because she had not told anyone what happened - The Washington Post did not run a story.” Well, yeah, I totally agree. So why wasn’t that standard applied to Kavanaugh? We reached out to the Post and asked for, you know, someone from the Post to come on tonight. They simply referred us to a statement about Fairfax while ignoring our questions about Kavanaugh. I’d actually like to have a really good conversation. I think it would be positive and good for them too but no luck there. Now, I want to bring in former Ronald Reagan advisor and American Spectator columnist Jeff Lord, who’s going to bring this conversation to this point of Kavanaugh and the double standard that we’ve been talking about. Jeffrey, this is a pretty clear cut double standard, isn’t it?
JEFFREY LORD: Laura, this has been going on for decades, absolute decades. I hate to admit this but I’m old enough, when I was in college, to remember Spiro Agnew bringing up a speech in which he said there’s just a handful of people in The Washington Post and The New York Times and the liberal media and they’re all…they all hang out together. They all have this double standard and they don’t give the American people the straight story. This has been going on forever and a day, and they will do two things. There’s the sin of commission, in which they will go after somebody like Brett Kavanaugh and then there’s the sin of omission, in which they will not go out the appropriate liberal with the, with the appropriate liberal. They do it all of the time.
