Reporting on the mass shooting last night at a Colorado movie theater showing The Dark Knight Rises, Brian Ross of ABC News speculated on the identity of the shooter:

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Out of all the people in Colorado named Jim Holmes, Brian Ross only thought one of them was worth mentioning on national TV. Wonder why?

Then, later this morning:

Yeah, that’s a pretty big mistake, Mr. Ross.

So, if you have the same name as a mass murderer and you have anything at all to do with the Tea Party, you get to be on the news. Verifying whether or not you’re the murderer? That can come later. That’s “journalism.”

If George Stephanopoulos was a reporter instead of a Democratic Party operative, he might’ve had a more substantive response to Brian Ross’s stunning act of journalistic malfeasance than, “And now, let’s take a look at the weather.” But he didn’t even blink, because the idea of it fit perfectly with his view of the world. And he won’t learn from this, because it’s not in his best interest to do so.

This goes beyond speculating about a murderer’s motives. This is slandering an individual who had nothing to do with a terrible crime, while the families of the victims are still reeling, just because of his political beliefs. You’d think liberals and the media (pardon the redundancy) would’ve learned something after Gabby Giffords and all those other people got shot, and somehow it became Sarah Palin’s fault. But again, learning from their mistakes: What’s in it for them?

Apparently this news isn’t awful enough as it is. Apparently people aren’t suffering enough as it is. Can’t miss a chance to put one up on the scoreboard, eh, ABC?

The following assumes facts not in evidence:

Update: Breitbart.com did the work Brian Ross was supposed to do and actually talked to the guy who was falsely implicated: James Michael Holmes. Holmes is Hispanic, a former law-enforcement officer, and a member of the Tea Party. Of course, only one of those things mattered to Brian Ross.

Update: “What kind of idiot makes that kind of statement? Really, seriously, how do we take a journalist seriously when it’s pretty clear they really haven’t done any sort of check on their facts?”