[somewhere deep within the bowels of a Breitbart/Drudge/Daily Caller like dungeon of journalistic integrity]

Cub Hack: Ooh, ooh, Boss! I've got a scoop! Look at all these pictures of this lib "journalist" gettin' all cozy with this ultra-lib Senator!

Managing Editor Hack: Hmm. Ok. Let's go all O'Keefe on her, but this time, we'll do it double agent style. She's a leftist elite "journalist" so you'll need to pretend you're one too.... you know, balanced and open minded. Make sure to keep it polite. No theatrics. Just professional. Once we get her confession, we'll make a Youtube video and send it around to all of our co-horts. And Fox Nation of course. She'll be Van Jones or Shirley Sherrod before lunch.

Cub Hack: I'll get right on it Boss!

Yeah. No, really, that's all too probable, but we'll never really know as you'll soon see. Here's how it went down in action:

Dear Ms. Shultz,

We are doing an expose on journalists in the elite media who socialize with elected officials they are assigned to cover. We have found numerous photos of you with Sen. Sherrod Brown. In one of them, you appear to be hugging him.

Care to comment?

That should read "Dear Ms. Schultz"; so much for professionalism. Yes, this email was addressed to  Connie Schultz, Pulitzer Prize winning columnist of the Cleveland Plain-Dealer. [Note to Cub Hack: that's Cleveland, Ohio]

In any event,  Ms. Schultz responded with:

Dear Mr. [Cub Hack]:

I am surprised you did not find a photo of me kissing U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown so hard he passes out from lack of oxygen. He’s really cute.

He’s also my husband.

You know that, right?

Connie Schultz.

 

Queried by Talking Points Memo:

Schultz preferred not to name the reporter or publication.

“I figure he’s an intern, as his name didn’t show up on the web site he represented,” she wrote in an email. “You know us liberal moms: I want to give him a chance to learn the right lessons from this, which isn’t going to happen if I out him.”

[Note to Cub Hack: you hack for the Internet, douche bag. Use it.]

I shudder to think how this situation would have evolved had the political poles been reversed.