Or to be exact, when Fox News doesn't make news.

We know that the husband of the Nevada woman who was having an affair with Republican senator John Ensign wrote and emailed a Fox News anchor on June 11, asking her help in breaking open the story.

We know that Ensign copped to the affair, knowing that the husband had contacted Fox News.

And we now know that Fox News did nothing with the original, exclusive news tip about an adulterous Republican

The WashPost reports that Fox News producer Tom Lowell is taking the fall:

“As the day went on, it fell off my radar,” Lowell said. When he heard the next day that Ensign had scheduled a news conference, “at that point I realized there might be credibility to these claims. . . . Should I have paid a little more attention to this e-mail? Sure.”

Y'know, just one of those crazy news days where you forget to follow-up, or to tell your superiors, about a first-hand, on-the-record communication revealing an affair by a presidential Republican hopeful. Oops.

Raise your hand if you think the Fox News producer would have dropped the ball if a juicy, inside scoop about, say, Democrat Chuck Schumer having an affair had fallen into Fox News' lap.

Yeah, me neither.

And please, please, please note the crushing irony in that one of the GOP talking points Fox News hammered this week was that the press is too soft on Obama; that the press won't report bad news about the Democrat. This, from a news org that sat on a gigantic, embarrassing scoop featuring a conservative Republican senator.

Just coincidence, right?

P.S. Surprise! According to TVeyes.com, “Ensign” has not been mentioned once on Fox News today.