I don't like conspiracy theories. I think they are stupid. For instance, I admit The New York Times recently had to borrow against its own real estate to keep afloat. It's also true the Times needs every penny of ad revenue it can get. But I don't suggest the Times slants its coverage to please its advertisers. That would be irresponsible.
I do point out that the ineffable Maureen is in fine form today, skewering President Obama in her prep-school-brat way for not being man enough kick ass and take names. She suggests a tragic fatal flaw in the Obama's character, an indecisiveness on the order of Hamlet's, that will shit-sure bring down the Obama Presidency.
And I do also notice that you can read otherwise in the Times--particularly, you can turn to an actual news article in which the President of the United States publicly rips the insurance industry a new asshole, in which he threatens to smash the insurance industry to kindling with the Antitrust Act, in which he calls them greedy profit-driven death machines who are losing the healthcare reform fight and who as a result will do anything and say anything (such as that latest industry report) to keep raking in the cash at the expense of America's health, safety, welfare, security, and dignity.
Did he really say all of that? Yes, he did--well, okay, he didn't really say "death machines," but mostly--and just yesterday, too. But you have to dig in the Times to find that speech; indeed you won't find it at all unless you're looking, because it is buried on page 27--next to great big colorful advertisement for a banking concern.
I just point out that the ad is for a bank. I don't seriously think that the New York Times would slant the news to please its advertisers. I really don't. I think the Times is, like every other newspaper in America, a courageous and uncompromising (ooh, Maureen loves that word, it's manly) messenger of the truth. Or at least more so than, say, the New York Post.
Still--page fucking 27?