We all know that there’s no such thing as a free lunch, but, according to President Obama, there is such a thing as free birth control. And the mainstream media seem to believe him.

When Obama announced on Friday that the insurers of religious employers–and not the religious employers themselves–would pay for the full price of all abortive and contraceptive drugs, many in the mainstream media credulously reported the announcement as a significant shift in policy.  But the mainstream media, for the most part, failed to ask the basic questions: Is this a substantive change in policy? Is a deal a compromise just because it pleased both Planned Parenthood and liberal Catholics who supported Obamacare? Many journalists simply accepted the premise of the White House’s spin that the president had “compromised.”