Over the weekend, Vox published an article headlined “Hillary Clinton personally took money from companies that sought to influence her.” Given Vox’s overwhelmingly liberal audience and the astounding lengths the publication’s top editors will go to defend liberal politicians, the fact they’re being so blunt tells you something about just how damning the scandals circling Hillary are. Vox isn’t even trying to spin it. And the George Stephanopoulos brouhaha notwithstanding, for the most part, the major media have dutifully reported the accusations without pulling too many punches.

But I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that the media are banking a good deal of credibility reporting on Hillary now, because they intend to spend it later. For one thing, nearly all of the reporting is piggybacking on Peter Schweizer’s investigative work, who the media never fail to remind us worked for Sarah Palin briefly, without disclosing their own conflict of interest. For another, the media are letting Hillary Clinton stonewall even as various Clintonistas make laughable excuses. Lanny Davis must have carpal tunnel syndrome from furiously banging out disingenuous op-eds, and it almost goes without saying that David Brock and the rest of the flying monkeys at Media Matters are bad at what they do and should feel bad about themselves for doing it. Even those elements of the overtly liberal press that don’t have direct ties to the Clintons (that we know of, anyway) are already falling back on whatever flavor of “vast right-wing conspiracy” they think sounds discrediting.