what have we been telling you?

Campaign coverage needs to read between the lines: "The media are awash in 'he said/she said/we're mum' journalism, 'the practice of reporters parroting competing rhetoric instead of measuring it for veracity against known facts....'

'Reporters seem to think they've done an adequate job just because they give both sides a chance to state their case,' Lovelady says. 'But if that's all you do, you may have satisfied the imagined constraints of objectivity, but often you haven't told the reader anything.

'It's the most common and infuriating flaw in the press today. Reporters just don't measure what each side said against the known facts. It shouldn't just be he said/she said. It should be he said/she said/we say — and here's why we say it....'

But the steady stream of charges that the media have a liberal bias has made many journalists gun-shy when it comes to evaluating controversial, partisan charges.

'The press is so sensitive now to charges of liberal bias that it bends over backward to give the appearance of being evenhanded,' Lovelady says. 'Reporters can and do argue that it's not their job to ascertain veracity. But that is their job, especially when the facts are so available....'"

For more straight talk check out this site: CJR campaign desk