Abstract: It was strange enough to see male politicians from Canada's top three parties duking it out over which had a better plan for bringing up baby the during the last federal election campaign. But stranger, still, was the media's inability to sift reality from rhetoric on the Tory's marquee child care platform - until after the votes were counted - despite a readily available cacophony of critical voices and studies from daycare advocates and big business alike. Here journalist Dianne Rinehart takes a look at how - and why - the media dropped "baby" during the campaign, and why daycare advocates say it was a crying shame.