Fallows highlights this video, which is sympathetic to the Steubenville rapists, as an extreme example of false equivalence:
A petition asking CNN to apologize, as of this writing, has over 245,000 signatures. Elias Isquith analyzes:
Basically what I think happened is that the people who run these shows are overworked. They get sloppy. And lazy. If we consider that the victim’s anonymity made it exceedingly difficult to run he-said/she-said coverage, it’s kind of a no-brainer that we’d end up with reports that have much more in common with one of those unbearably maudlin SportsCenter “stories” about athletes triumphing in the face of adversity than they do with actual news.
The weeping rapists were right there. TV gold. And the girl? She didn’t even give us a single little tear! No Casey Anthony, her.
The Onion’s take on the subject here.
The Dish 