On October 30, 2008, Fox News' Bill O'Reilly went off on one of his trademark tirades about the media, complaining that they're all irredeemably liberal and biased, and the only hope for the free press in America was “Fair and Balanced” Fox News. Of particularly note was O'Reilly's scathing attack on General Electric, the parent company of NBC and one of O'Reilly's favorite punching bags, for “using its money and power to benefit a presidential candidate. That is a gross violation of the spirit of the constitutional powers given to a free press.”

As O'Reilly put it, General Electric allegedly sided with Barack Obama so “they could lure millions of Obama supporters and make money.”

Fast forward to today, and we find out that News Corp., the parent company of Bill O'Reilly's Fox News, has donated $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, an openly partisan outfit that helps to elect Republican gubernatorial candidates through campaign coordination and independent advertising. According to Politico's Ben Smith, a News Corp. spokesman said that the company “believes in the power of free markets, and the RGA's pro-business agenda supports our priorities at this most critical time for our economy.”

Here we have News Corp., to borrow O'Reilly's words, “using its money and power to benefit” several Republican candidates for statewide office. And unlike General Electric, whose alleged support, according to O'Reilly, came in the form of biased news coverage, News Corp. has made a direct cash contribution to this Republican outfit.

So when can we expect O'Reilly's denunciation of News Corp.'s “gross violation of the spirit of the constitutional powers given to a free press”?