Victor Davis Hanson, a historian at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, examines the double standard involving Democratic politicians who say or do stupid things but are quickly forgiven by the sympathetic liberal media.

From his recent op-ed column:

The answer is not just the usual explanation that most in the media are sympathetic Democrats.

Instead, the public is conditioned by the media and an elite establishment to assume that Obama, Reid and Biden are superior moralists -- more interested in "issues of social justice."

So when such supposedly more intelligent humanitarians lapse, their offensive or dumb remarks are written off as atypical. Or maybe they are due to extenuating circumstances or honest mistakes.

In contrast, any inanity of a Bush, Lott or Palin is seen as yet more logical proof of their shallow, unsophisticated emphasis on self rather than society.

So, why damage the career of a smart, well-meaning progressive for a moment's gaffe when his aims are so much more exalted, so much more moral than his conservative counterparts?

Yet if all that were true, why, then, as we have seen, do liberals prove as insensitive or unaware as their conservative counterparts?

Read the full column at the link below:

Right's felonies, left's misdemeanors - Victor Davis Hanson - Fresnobee.com