I'm Not Biased. I Just Love Him.

Complaints about bias in the media --- particularly complaints coming from the right about favorable coverage of the left --- aren't new. In fact, they're old and a lot of times sound like whining.

But, just as he has for our nation's love of apple pie, baseball and the 4th of July, Barack Obama has brought new energy and enthusiasm to the media's bias as well, and this time those complaining have a legitimate beef.

We had this editorial today from the Manchester Union Leader in New Hampshire which said:

The blatant bias of the major national news media toward Barack Obama is now so overwhelming that it would not be worth noting, except that the election of a President of the United States is involved.

And added...

A recent report found that since June the nightly newscasts of NBC, CBS, and ABC combined have spent 114 minutes covering Obama. McCain got 48 minutes.

But that was before this week.

The three major television networks are all scheduled to send their nightly news star "anchors'' to follow Obama on his trip to Iraq and the Middle East.

What might make the Union Leader blast away like this? Maybe it was this love note scribbled on the nation's newspapers by the Associated Press:

In this city where John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton all made famous speeches, Obama will find himself stepping into perhaps another iconic moment Thursday as his superstar charisma meets German adoration live in shadows of the Reichstag and the Brandenburg Gate. He then travels to Paris and London where he can expect to be greeted with similar adulation.

It's not only Obama's youth, eloquence and energy that have stolen hearts across the Atlantic. For Europeans, there have always been two Americas: one of cynicism, big business and bullying aggression, another of freedom, fairness and nothing-is-impossible dynamism.

If President Bush has been seen as the embodiment of that first America, Obama has raised expectations of a chance for the nation to redeem itself in the role that--at various times through history--Europe has loved, respected and relied upon.

With that, it's pretty amazing that the McCain camp is keeping in this race and keeping a sense of humor about all of it too. It appears they are and they can.

Vote early and often.