<Maybe what you're seeing isn't so much a matter of ideology as it is personality. Journalists see targets, especially wounded targets like Lott, and reflexively attack. They assume wrongdoing unless proven otherwise, and that's the story.

There is certainly something to what you say. The "confrontation" mode seems to come naturally. But that doesn't explain their choices of who to "confront." Many liberals like to point out the grief that Clinton got from the press as evidence that the press doesn't just pick on Republicans, but a look at the stories of the time show it to be a poor second to the grief that Starr got.

The fact remains that Republicans like Lott are strung up for the same things Democrats get away with.