I get that the media has gotten the memo that Donald Trump is the greatest threat to civilization since NBC’s “The Slap,” but the controversy surrounding the Trump v Ted Cruz wife-dissing battle has revealed a stunning bit of tunnel vision, particularly among liberals. While everyone piles on Trump for retweeting an unflattering photo comparison of Heidi Cruz and Melania Trump, they’re giving Cruz and his SuperPAC a complete pass for what amounts to a political sexual assault on Melania Trump. Both attacks were ugly; I would submit that the explicitly sexual nature of the attack on Mrs. Trump is worse, but for the sake of argument, let’s call them even.

Consider this introduction to the flap by Chris Hayes on Thursday night’s All In, in which he takes great pains to note that the PAC that attacked Melania Trump has “no direct connection” to Ted Cruz, then delights in Cruz’s (admittedly awesome) refusal to say he won’t support Trump if he’s the nominee:

God bless Hallie Jackson for asking that followup, but another great question would have been why didn’t Ted Cruz immediately denounce the anti-Melania ad and demand that it be taken down? As for Hayes, he and the rest of the media are giving Cruz a benefit of the doubt that he has not earned. Sure, he’s not supposed to coordinate with SuperPACs, but this is the same guy who swore his campaign had nothing to do with spreading the rumor that Ben Carson had dropped out in Iowa, only to have voicemails to the contrary surface almost immediately. At a bare minimum, Cruz bears responsibility for not immediately coming out against the ad.

Yet in a total of four segments blasting Trump, Hayes never mentions Cruz again, not even after he brought up this December tweet:

The Establishment’s only hope: Trump & me in a cage match. Sorry to disappoint — @realDonaldTrump is terrific. #DealWithIt — Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 11, 2015

You would think that a liberal host might have thought abot that for a second, and remembered this other thing that Cruz said Thursday while he was milking this thing like a coked-up dairy farmer:

Yeah, I don’t know what “off-bounds” means, either. It’s probably some kind of Canadian Football League slang. But the general idea Cruz is espousing is pretty tough to argue with. Here’s the thing that no one, not Chris Hayes or anyone else, is calling Cruz out for, though: when Cruz sent that tweet saying Donald Trump is “terrific,” Trump had already attacked another candidate’s wife. In fact, Cruz still thought Trump was terrific after he attacked Carly Fiorina‘s face, Megyn Kelly‘s “wherever,” and every other horrible thing Trump has done since he introduced the world to Mexican rapists.

It’s bad enough that Cruz is being given a total pass for this, but liberal outrage at Trump is so great that they won’t even go after the SuperPAC that actually attacked Mrs. Trump. It’s even worse than that, though. On Thursday night’s The Last Word, you’ll never guess who Lawrence O’Donnell brought on to the show to rant about Donald Trump’s misogyny:

That’s right, folks, liberal Lawrence O’Donnell had on Rick Wilson, the guy whose SuperPAC put up the Melania Trump ad, to rant about Trump’s misogyny. That’s like having Hannibal Lecter on your show to critique Guy Fieri (save the hate mail; Lecter is too as bad as Fieri). Not only that, O’Donnell showed the ad during the segment, and when panelist Nancy Giles later tried to call Wilson out, O’Donnell just changed the subject.

Liberals are supposed to care about women, but it seems like their distaste for Donald Trump is so great that they’re willing to ignore a truly despicable attack on Melanie Trump just because she’s married to him, and that is a damn shame.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.