The Washington Post has assigned reporter Jenna Portnoy to follow Republican nominee David Brat's campaign for the U.S. House seat for the 7th District of Virginia. In Portnoy's latest story, published in Friday's paper on page B4, the staff writer slammed Brat for having "largely ducked media exposure since his [primary] win," noting that after a brief press statement on Thursday which lasted eight minutes, he "retreated inside" his campaign headquarters, "ignoring questions shouted by reporters." A few days earlier, Portnoy insisted that an unprepared Brat had "stumbled" during a phone interview with MSNBC's Chuck Todd

Of course, as Politico's Sarah Wheaton has noted, Brat's Democratic opponent, fellow Randolph-Macon College professor Jack Trammell, "offered few policy specifics during his first public appearance as a candidate on Saturday." Last Friday, Wheaton reported that "Trammell has declined multiple interview requests" and that "[l]ike Brat, who virtually no one thought had a shot at toppling Cantor, he’s gone into something of a lockdown." Yet a search for "Jack Trammel" on the Washington Post website reveals no such critical reporting about the Democrat's unwillingness to have free-wheeling interactions with reporters. What's more, Trammel received fawning coverage in, of all places, a June 16 Style blog entry by book reviewer Ron Charles. The topic was Trammel's yet-unfinished vampire novel (excerpt below, emphasis mine):

In a 2008 column for The Hill, Daily Kos boss Markos Moulitsas warned Democrats not to listen to Republican "concern trolls," a term for those on one side of the political fence who seek to undermine the other side by offering it seemingly good (but actually bad) counsel. "Democrats," wrote Moulitsas, "understand that they're not in the business of giving their opponents advice."

Nonetheless, a Daily Kos writer stepped up to the concern-troll plate this past Sunday when Ian Reifowitz called on non-Tea Party GOPers in Virginia’s 7th congressional district to vote for Democratic nominee Jack Trammell in order to “punish Republicans who are too extreme,” including nominee Dave Brat. “If there isn't a civil war within the Republican Party yet, there sure ought to be,” opined Reifowitz, “and the 7th District is where sane Republicans need to make a stand.”

In a brief Thursday post on the Atlantic’s website, "reform conservative" pundit David Frum cited Eric Cantor’s primary loss to Dave Brat as further evidence that “Republican leaders” need to emerge to confront the “the destructive leadership of fanatics (and the cynics who make their living by duping fanatics)."

He cited Tony Blair as a model, someone " who revived his party by standing up to its most extreme elements," and asserted that if such leaders fail to appear, the GOP “might just as well already rename our dysfunctional party the Committee to Elect Hillary Clinton.” Frum’s entire post (emphasis added):

Both of Comedy Central’s favorite comedians took the time on their shows on June 11 to make fun of upstart conservative congressional nominee David Brat for his Christian faith while subtly hinting at a strain of anti-Semitism in either the Virginia Republican himself or the GOP voters of the 7th District which chose him over Majority Leader Eric Cantor.

In fact, both Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert mocked the exact same clip of Dave Brat claiming that his unexpected victory was “a miracle from God” and then made jokes about him beating Eric Cantor, the “only Jewish Republican in Congress.” For good measure, Colbert found a clever way to tag another Republican with a phallic epithet without actually using the term. [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]

Chuck Todd's political correctness button appeared to be in the on position as the NBC political director and chief White House correspondent made four appearances on MSNBC Tuesday night highlighting immigration as the main issue behind House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's Republican primary loss. Not only did Todd conspicuously evade using the word "illegal" while talking about illegal immigration, he even made a crack at one point mocking GOP nominee and Tea Partier Dave Brat for using the words "amnesty" or "illegals" so many times in an interview aired on Todd's Daily Rundown MSNBC show as if there were something wrong with doing so.

Todd, who only once used the word "illegally" amongst all four of his appearances, even though he referred generically to "immigration" 21 times, was dismissive toward Brat's word choice: "I think he used the word 'amnesty' and 'illegals' every fourth word when I was interviewing him this morning." By contrast, Todd was more accepting of loaded terminology preferred by liberals like "Dream Act."