Silly NYT! Trying to stop anyone from talking about the relationship between Caroline and Pinch will have everyone talking about it!

Only Caroline and Pinch know the truth, but even the NYT
surely understands that it has become part of the story.

by Ken

Let me stress that I'm not aware of any independent verification of the rumors that Gawker has been hawking. That said, let's look at Pareene's report there on a NYT blog reader's report of having a comment deleted by an online censor:

Times City Room Will Not Mention Caroline Kennedy's Special Friendship With Pinch Sulzberger

Don't even bother to leave a comment at the Times local news blog suggesting a sexy patrician affair between the Senator-to-be and the publisher of the Times.

It seems like a mostly legitimate question to ask, doesn't it? Whether or not they're having sexy sexy old rich scion sex, the special friendship between Sulzberger and Kennedy is well-documented. And when the publisher of your paper is BFF with a public figure, asking whether that friendship affects coverage of that public figure is certainly fair game.

But no, no comments allowed asking about the affair. When this guy tried, the City Room editors asked him to please not bring it up again. "we don't report stuff like this, regardless of the people involved." Stuff like... what? The Times certainly does report on the sexual lives of public figures, all the damn time, from Giuliani to Spitzer to Paterson. But reporting on the Sulzbergers not so much.

For the record, in the e-mail exchange Gawker reproduces, the City Room points out to the complaining reader that "Paterson called a new conference," and this is absolutely true. Is it really that hard to see the difference between reporting on rumors and reporting on the subject matter of a public figure's own news conference?

So David Paterson, at least, is a lousy example. And I'm not sure that Giuliani or Spitzer is a better one. In both those cases, there was actual news being reported.

However, the reality is that the Times's situation is much graver than whether or not to report on unsubstantiated rumors, and I can't believe that they don't know it. Rightly or wrongly, their publisher has become part of the story of Ms. Kennedy's candidacy for the Senate appointment. Talk about a nightmare!

Imagine what it must be like if you're a high-ranking NYT editor -- and I guess, realistically, we're talking about the highest-ranking NYT editor, Exec Ed Bill Keller, since who else would dare talk to Pinch Sulzberger about this? I have to assume that the subject has already come up in conversation, though I'm not at all sure that our Bill has had the nerve to say, "Now lookit, Pinch, just between us, you gotta level with me. Is there any truth to these rumors, 'cause if so, do have you any idea the size damage-control problem we got?"

Talk about a conflict of interest! I have no idea how the paper would go about reporting on a story that includes its highest-ranking official.

Come to think of it, thanks to the gossip-mongers, the NYT is really in that situation regardless of the truth of the rumors, or lack thereof. Because now that Pinch has been dragged into the story, how can the paper claim that its coverage is uninfluenced by this if it continues to fail to acknowledge the involvement?

Damned if I see any way out for the poor buggers. The only thought that occurs to me is that it's Pinch's problem, and he's going to have to solve it. Certainly nobody else can. I think that means some kind of public statement, the very thing I assume all the Timespeople are trying to avoid. And that statement had better not be coy or weasel-worded, regardless of what the facts are, because in that case everybody's going to come down on them, and they'll deserve it.

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