THIN GRUEL: I got an email yesterday with this heading: CBSNEWS.COM EXCLUSIVE: CBS NEWS INVESTIGATIVE UNIT OBTAINS AN EXCLUSIVE EMAIL PALIN WROTE JUSTIFYING THE INCREASE IN TAXES TO FUND THE SPORTS COMPLEX.

Oh, the scandal! Good work, CBS Investigative Unit! Only here’s the story, and it’s about . . . a mayor funding a sports complex. I’m against cities funding sports complexes — though this one is actually for people to use, rather than for overpaid professional athletes to make money in, so maybe not — but if this is what the crack CBS Investigative Unit has “obtained,” then, well, they don’t have anything: A document so innocuous that, even though it comes from CBS, I doubt it was faked . . . .

UPDATE: Meanwhile, the folks at the New York Times have forgotten about YouTube: “But the thing is I know that the crowd laughed — and Obama paused to encourage the crowd to laugh — after he said “You can put lipstick on a pig,” and before he said, “but it’s still a pig.” So it’s obvious to me that the NYT is not playing it straight. Does it make a whole lot of difference? Obama’s position is still defensible, but I hate to see the NYT helping him defend himself. Play it straight. Tell the truth. We have the video. We don’t have to trust you anymore.”

And they’re not exactly bending over backwards to earn that trust, either.