Here’s the opening of CNN’s NewsNight from last week :

AARON BROWN : Good evening again.
Here’s a question to start the night. If someone makes an allegation in a political campaign, a serious allegation, should we report it simply because it’s made? Is the allegation itself news?

Let’s say, for example, that someone alleges that a candidate had a drug problem at some point in his life. Should that allegation be reported if we don’t know the truth of it or can’t confirm any of it just because someone makes the charge?

We actually dealt with this four years ago with one of the candidates for president and we didn’t report it because, though we tried to find the evidence, we could not.

Was that the right call? Were we taking sides by not reporting the allegation? Should we just allow anyone to say anything, let the other side deny it and go home, call it a night?

This is the political season and some pretty nasty things are being said and will be said. Do you think we should report them all, throw in the denials and say we’ve done our job? That’s a question for you to consider tonight.

And here’s a transcript from eight and a half hours earlier on Inside Politics :

ANNOUNCER: John Kerry’s war record comes under attack.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: John Kerry has not been honest about what happened in Vietnam.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is lying about his record.

ANNOUNCER: Are these charges true? And who’s paying for this commercial?

So are these charges trash that shouldn’t be reported or not? Obviously somebody at CNN can see through the bullshit here. To be fair, Inside Politics had people on both sides debating the issue, but do dirty tricks like these even deserve the free exposure that the news is providing?