Newsbusters' Scott Whitlock has outdone himself, criticizing MSNBC's David Shuster for a “softball” interview with an 11 year old who is lobbying for health care reform after losing his mother to pulmonary hypertension.

Whitlock is miffed that Shuster “failed to mention that Owens' entire family have been members of the liberal Washington Community Action Network.” And he thinks he has caught MSNBC in a double-standard:

In contrast, on November 19, 2009, O'Donnell interrogated Jackie Seal, a conservative, Michigan teen who was waiting in line to see Sarah Palin at a book signing. The MSNBC host challenged this particular young person on her political beliefs: “Did you know that Sarah Palin supported the bailout?” O'Donnell berated, “Does that change your view?”

Now, certainly, Owens has lost his mother and no one would grill an 11-year-old who suffered such a tragedy. But, the network's reporters clearly have different standards for different young people.

Whitlock didn't mention that Seals was 17 years old, not 11 -- probably because he knows even Newsbusters readers would laugh at him if he wrote that 11 year olds and 17 year olds should be treated exactly the same. Just take a look at how absurd that last complaint would look if Whitlock was transparent about the age difference: “But, the network's reporters clearly have different standards for 11 year olds and 17 year olds.” Yeah, that would be a devastating critique. There's a simple word for Whitlock's failure to reveal Seal's actual age: Dishonest.

Whitlock also didn't mention that the reason why O'Donnell asked Seal whether she knew Palin supported the bailout is that Seal was wearing a T-shirt critical of the bailout, while standing in line to see Sarah Palin. The question didn't come out of the blue, and it wasn't hostile -- it was straightforward and perfectly legitimate. Asking someone if additional information causes them to change their view isn't “berating,” it's a simple question. In an accompanying video, Newsbusters claims O'Donnell “sounds angry.” That's a subjective assessment, but one that seems ludicrous to me; I would invite you to watch the video of O'Donnell and decide for yourself.

So, basically, Whitlock is angry that an MSNBC reporter asked a 17 year old a straightforward question, and miffed that a different MSNBC reporter “tosses softballs” to an 11 year old. But give him some credit: he's realistic enough to know that if he spells that out, he'll get laughed at, so he pretends the 17 year old and the 11 year old are of similar ages.