ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Just when you thought the media could not get any more dishonest and unserious, along comes Lester Holt.

Yeah, the guy blundered through Monday night’s debate getting his “fact checks” wrong with Donald Trump and letting Hillary Clinton skate along on her river of lies. And, yeah, the guy interrupted Mr. Trump seven times as much as he interrupted Mrs. Clinton. And, yeah, he asked far more probing follow-up questions of Mr. Trump and seemed to only shut down any lines of inquiry into Mrs. Clinton that opened up.

But all that is just typical partisan noise we have come to expect from the leftwing media.

None of these transgressions reveal just how cravenly dishonest and lazy and willfully ill-informed Lester the Media Molester and his compatriots have become in reporting on this election.

The cabal of shameless hacks skidded to a whole new low with this canard about Mr. Trump’s initial support for the war in Iraq.

During a hot moment in this week’s debate, Donald Trump was forcefully prosecuting the case that President Obama and Mrs. Clinton created the vacuum in the aftermath of the 2003 Iraq invasion in which ISIS formed.

“Not only that, you named the day!” Mr. Trump said incredulously. “They couldn’t believe it. They sat back and said, I can’t believe it!”

Frantic to deflect the debate away from her own sordid record, Mrs. Clinton tapped the canvas for the ref to break it up and change the subject.

“Lester, we’ve covered — We’ve covered this ground,” she squealed.

Mr. Trump bull-dozed through for a moment talking about how ISIS has since spread into 30 countries, slaughtering innocents and mutilating women and children.

But Lester the Media Molester had received his instructions and quickly swung into action to save his damsel in distress.

“Mr. Trump, a lot of these are judgement questions. You had supported the war in Iraq before the invasion. What makes your—”

Mr. Trump protested that he did not support the war, calling it “mainstream media nonsense.”

Fitting the bill, the Media Molester carried on. “Since you supported it…”

Mr. Trump again protested and the Molester went on to interrupt him five more times and ultimately succeeded in changing the subject from Mrs. Clinton’s record.

It is true, there is ample evidence that Mr. Trump as a private citizen voiced opposition to the war in Iraq when it was launched.

The only evidence Mr. Holt and the lyin’ media can dig up to prove otherwise is a September 2002 interview with radio shock jock Howard Stern in which Mr. Trump is asked a series of quick unrelated questions until he is uncharacteristically stumped.

“Are you for invading Iraq?” Mr. Stern asks him.

“Yeah,” Mr. Trump responds unsteadily. “I guee-e-e-e-ssss so. Uh, you know, I wish it was — I wish the first time it was done correctly.”

And then off to the next question about an entirely different topic.

Now, mind you, Mr. Stern’s question on Iraq comes shortly after this serious query: “Probably the most important question I could ask you on a day like today is, ‘Where is Melania and is she naked?’”

Yes, we are talking serious Senate debate here.

But you know what Lester the Media Molester failed to ask about during the 90-minute debate? He failed to ask one single question about Mrs. Clinton’s judgement regarding her long, twisted history with the Iraq invasion.

She was a sitting United States senator on October 11, 2002, just weeks after Mr. Trump’s shock jock radio interview. At 12:50 a.m., she cast her solemn vote to invade Iraq after what she insists was careful and meticulous consideration. It wasn’t just an off-hand question.

Mrs. Clinton’s vote had the force of law to authorize the Iraq invasion.

In a long, detailed speech on the Senate floor hours earlier, Mrs. Clinton said she cast her vote for authorizing war “with conviction.”

As a result of Mrs. Clinton’s vote to go to war, 4,424 American troops died — fighting for her “conviction.” Another 31,952 came home wounded, many of them with grievous injuries and utterly broken — all fighting for Mrs. Clinton’s “conviction.”

The number of Americans killed as a result of Donald Trump’s shock jock radio interview: Zero.

Of course, we all know what later happened to Mrs. Clinton’s “conviction” — that “conviction” that led to so much bloodshed, so many deaths, so much misery. In a bid to rescue her political career, Mrs. Clinton’s “conviction” eventually melted into “a mistake.”

And this ________ wants to be commander-in-chief???

To hell with that and all her lies and all her “convictions.”

Make Donald Trump commander-in-chief. And let Howard Stern moderate the next debate.

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