New York Times-Democrat?

As I posted here the other day, the New York Times went over the line when they started trolling for Republicans, via e-mail, to trash Tom DeLay. Considering all of the so called "reporting" that is favorable to the DNC, perhaps the Times should be honest and change it's name to the New York Times-Democrat. Russ Smith, in his commentary, cites the reasons why this would be a flash of honesty from the self proclaimed "paper of record".

"It'd be an overdue act of integrity if the country's most influential liberal daily newspaper altered its name to The New York Times-Democrat. Any number of editorial employees might actually applaud the liberating move, but the "branding" implications would kill the idea in the business and marketing departments. Likewise, the elimination of the anachronistic and grand motto (and the Times sneers about George W. Bush's "hubris"!) "All the News That's Fit to Print" won't happen on a Sulzberger watch, even if the company's extensive tax breaks from the city aren't considered "news."

So the paper's p.r. hacks and editors continue the charade that the Times is impartial in its news coverage and offers readers a wide array of views on its opinion pages. Executive editor Bill Keller is probably heartened by the claims of extreme left-wing media critics (often found rustling about the Neverland of college campuses) that in reality the Times is getting redder month by month. And not the "good" kind of red, but rather the color that television broadcasters decided five years ago represented states that voted for Bush rather than Al Gore."

When Congressman Bob Livingston told the Times that he would write an Op-Ed piece on DeLay that would be positive in nautre, the Times, who has solicited him via e-mail, to write an Op-Ed piece, decided not to take the Congressman's offer. Of course, that is because the Times is trolling for an Op-Ed piece from a Republican that beats DeLay up. Naturally favorable tax breaks are not news.

"The paper's antipathy—more shrill than the mere condescension of a decade ago—toward any creature that "smells" Republican, is aptly typified by Sheryl Gay Stolberg's homage to 87-year-old Sen. Robert Byrd in the news section on April 3. The reporter's affection for the showboating Byrd is so pronounced that, again, in an honest world, the article would've been slugged at the top, "A Times Editorial." The ostensible reason for the piece is the upcoming congressional battle, with Byrd as lead gladiator, over the GOP's attempt to torpedo the filibuster so that Bush's judicial nominees are subject to a majority Senate vote rather than the 60-vote supermajority that thwarted some of them in the president's first administration.

Stolberg taps away, presumably not chuckling at the keyboard, "Christian conservatives and right-wing bloggers are unearthing [Byrd's] past as a one-time member of the Ku Klux Klan," as if that obituary-leading blot on the West Virginia legislator's record hasn't been well-reported by mainstream media outlets for years now. She goes on to describe the left-wing ATM group MoveOn.org's infatuation with Byrd, claiming that at a recent rally the "crowd swooned like schoolgirls catching their first glimpse of the Beatles," when the man who has compared the Bush administration's tactics to those of the Third Reich gave a speech. And, in an interview with Byrd at his office last week, Stolberg swoons herself, saying "Mr. Byrd seemed energized, casting thunderbolts like Zeus from the mountaintop."

This is the very first time I'd ever considered that Zeus was an asshole."

Of course, the Times never mentions Byrd's hypocrisy, or their own, for that matter, on ending filibusters.

Smith goes on to cite a couple of more examples of the Times' bias. This couples with the recent Times attempt to find a Republican to trash Tom DeLay, is ample reason for a name change for the Times. - Sailor