A future NFL linebacker tells a story about a fake girlfriend and the story leads the national news for two days, accompanied by psychological analysis and commentary about its societal impact. A future commander-in-chief tells a story about a fake girlfriend and most of the media shrug.
Perhaps if Manti Te’o could find a way to spend the country into oblivion and turn the finest health-care system in the world into a dysfunctional bureaucracy the press would cut him some slack.