Washington Post reporter Howard Kurtz begins today's “Media Notes” column with a section on reaction to Roman Polanski's arrest. Kurtz quotes right-wing bloggers Patterico, Ann Althouse, and Ed Morrissey -- but no progressives.

He doesn't quote, for example, my criticism of two Washington Post columnists who argued for lenience towards Polanski. He doesn't quote Scott Lemieux at The American Prospect. Or Jill Filipovic at Feministe. Or Kieran Healy at Crooked Timber. Or Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon. Or any of countless others who have been critical of Polanski and his defenders.

Kurtz' decision to quote three conservative bloggers and no progressives is bad enough. What's worse is that Kurtz quotes Morrissey claiming that defending Polanski is, as Kurtz puts it, a “liberal cause”:

At Hot Air, Ed Morrissey sees Polanski as the latest liberal cause:

“Hollywood has tried to sell the statutory rape as some sort of misunderstood love story. They tried again last year in the documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired. The reality is that Polanski drugged, raped, and sodomized a 13-year-old girl . . .

”The victim would now prefer to see the charges dropped, but that doesn't account for 32 years of fleeing justice. Polanski still needs to be held accountable for his crimes, at the very least by getting hauled back to an American court to face the process of justice. He's no hero; he's a rapist, and it's about time that someone make it clear that being a fabulous Hollywood director does not give one a license to commit violent crimes."

Kurtz offered not so much as a hint that any liberals have been critical of Polanski and his defenders; he simply quoted and paraphrased a conservative blogger claiming liberals support Polanski. And then he left out any of the progressive criticism of Polanski that would have disproved the conservative blogger's bogus claim.

And yet Washington Post executives tell us the paper needs to be more responsive to conservatives. Right.