Two weeks ago I posed the question: Does the New York Times have anyone assigned to cover Linda McMahon, the Republican candidate for Senate in Connecticut?

I asked that question because the Times had published at least nine articles on Democratic candidate Richard Blumenthal since mid-April -- all of which focused on Blumenthal's comments about his military service -- compared to one process-oriented piece on McMahon. I also noted that prior to April, McMahon had been the subject of two soft Times profiles. But in stark contrast to their Blumenthal coverage, the Times has done absolutely no scrutiny of McMahon's record or statements.

It turns out that the Times may actually have someone covering McMahon -- Raymond Hernandez, who has been responsible for churning out the Times' Blumenthal hit pieces, recently sat down for an interview with McMahon.

Alas, the article he wrote based on that interview provides no information about what McMahon thinks about anything except... wait for it... Blumenthal's comments about his military service. Yes, it seems that during an interview with Hernandez “on another topic,” McMahon lashed out at Blumenthal for his supposed “pattern of deception.” And -- go figure! -- Hernandez abandoned whatever angle he was planning to take when he sat down for the interview and instead did a nice job of stenography, typing up McMahon's 53-word, two-sentence attack and framing an entire news article around it.

You'd think that Hernandez would already have been aware that McMahon wanted to push this line of attack before the interview -- after all, her campaign provided Hernandez with some of the material he used in his initial Blumenthal hit piece. That is, by the way, a fact that Hernandez neglects to mention in an article entirely based on McMahon's response to that hit piece.

Is the Times ever planning to actually examine McMahon's positions, comments, and background? Or are they just planning to rewrite their Blumenthal hit piece for the next four months?