THE SLEAZY TACTIC OF ASKING US ABOUT WHAT WE REALLY BELIEVE

Respectable political journalist turned right-wing attack hack Michael Barone has a debate wrap-up at the Washington Examiner. Here's how it begins:

This was a debate full of surprises, at least for me. The first: CNN's John King showed some forebearance in not leading off with a question to Rick Santorum on his statements on contraception and other cultural issues. Instead, we had an audience question on how to bring down the national debt. The second surprise was that when King did pose such a question, after the first break, Santorum gave a first-rate reply, declining to speak about his personal feelings about contraception, but instead focusing on the fact that 40% of children are now born out of wedlock, and citing the concern expressed about this fact by Charles Murray in his new book Coming Apart and by a New York Times reporter in a front page story -- both of which matter of factly note the undeniable fact that children born out of wedlock and raised with a single parent tend to have huge disadvantages in life. Interestingly, Mitt Romney, who had responded before Santorum with a strong attack on Barack Obama for what he said was his attack on religious tolerance and conscience, was called on again and made a point of agreeing with Santorum.

Translation: Good thing that reprehensible liberal thug John King held off before trying to inject sex into this debate, as if it's in any way relevant to politics ... even though I actually believe, as do the two leading candidates at the debate, that it is relevant to politics. It's extremely relevant -- in fact, we all think sexual depravity is a key reason this country is going to hell in a handbasket. But if the liberal media asks us to talk about this in public, it's partisan bias.

Have I got that about right?