Guest-hosting Monday's edition of America Live, Martha MacCallum appropriately led off with the big news of the day -- allegations that Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain sexually harassed two former employees while he headed the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s. She even brought on Fox digital politics editor Chris Stirewalt to discuss the controversy. MacCallum ended the segment by noting that Cain was then speaking at the National Press Club and teased an appearance from the Washington Examiner's Byron York in the next hour “with news from those remarks today.”

So far, so good. The Cain story is obviously big, and it would be expected that MacCallum would start the next hour of her two-hour show by highlight the latest words from Cain on the burgeoning controversy.

Except that's not quite what happened.

MacCallum did lead with Cain's remarks at the National Press Club -- but not what he said about the harassment controversy. MacCallum introduced the segment by stating that Cain used his National Press Club remarks for “defending his position on abortion, offering some new details on the 9-9-9 plan, and slamming Congress for its role in the economic crisis.” MacCallum then played a clip of Cain blaming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and attacking Chris Dodd and Barney Frank for their alleged roles in the financial crisis.

After citing Iowa polling numbers which show Cain in the lead, MacCallum brought on York, saying, “Byron, gee, there's a lot to talk about with regard to Herman Cain today.” MacCallum then proceeded to ignore the big story: “Let's start with what he just said. You know, we haven't heard a lot of this in terms of GOP candidates really putting the focus back on government. You hear so much about Wall Street, but perhaps some of the blame needs to also be shared by what happened in government with this economic crisis.”

After York made a passing mention about “the whole sex harassment case,” MacCallum finally got around to asking York about the allegations. York repeated what Cain had said on the subject at the National Press Club, but no clip of Cain discussing it was aired.

And that was the last we heard of the harassment charge. MacCallum played another clip of Cain attacking the Obama administration for playing “the race card” and discussed that with York. She concluded the segment by noting that Cain ended his Press Club appearance “by singing for the audience, and we wanted to share that with you as well.” After playing the singing clip, MacCallum said, “Wow. How about that? You don't see that every day, right?”

MacCallum regularly advocates Republican positions while serving as a host of what are ostensibly “straight news” shows. By trying to divert attention away from a story that's embarrassing for a Republican candidate, she appears to be trying her hand at Hannitization as well.