Called for banning people from entering the country based on religion. Email. Endorsed torture. Email. Called a deaf actress “retarded.” Email. Declared he would make the military commit war crimes. Email. Said a reporter was lying because she wasn’t attractive enough to be sexually assaulted. Email. Urged supporters to attack protesters at his rallies. Email. Mocked a reporter with a disability. Email. Called Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. Email. Said he’d release tax returns, then refused. Email. Repeat ad infinitum.

A study for Harvard's Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy put some numbers to what we already knew: media coverage in 2016 was filled with false equivalency.

“False equivalencies abound in today’s reporting,” writes Patterson. “When journalists can’t, or won’t, distinguish between allegations directed at the Trump Foundation and those directed at the Clinton Foundation, there’s something seriously amiss. And false equivalencies are developing on a grand scale as a result of relentlessly negative news. If everything and everyone is portrayed negatively, there’s a leveling effect that opens the door to charlatans.”

A foundation that did genuinely good works and which violated no rules was treated the same—or worse—than a personal foundation that was treated as a slush fund and primarily served to help Donald Trump. Arcane details of handing email were treated as equivalent of … anything at all.

The result was that despite the clear differences, the media coverage came down the same: 87 percent of stories about Trump and Clinton indicated they were not fit for office.

But it was more than just the numbers that Clinton and Trump shared. It was the source. Donald Trump was allowed to define himself. He was also allowed to define Hillary Clinton.