When is 'brutal' not 'brutal'?

By David Paulin

Hint: when Nancy Pelosi must be protected. It's amusing that the NYT recently used the word "brutal" to describe alleged "torture" techniques within the context of the Bush administration. Yet when the NYT was talking about Nancy Pelosi not having raised objections to "waterboarding" in Friday's paper, the paper was content to use the word "harsh"-- not " brutal" -- to describe waterboarding. For example, there's this sentence:

Ms. Pelosi said she was told at that briefing that waterboarding, one of the most controversial of the harsh techniques employed, was not being used.

On another front: an interesting Editor's Note appeared in Friday's NYT regarding a staged photo in Afghanistan. It seems the NYT removed the photo from its online story. I'm curious to know if the photographer was a staff photographer. It's taboo among professional photojournalists to stage photos as was done here. Of course, staged photos were a big issue during Israeli's invasion of Gaza and Lebanon, with the wire services taking the heat for its photos that bloggers raised questions about. Staged photos were an issue in Iraq, too.

I just noticed a shocking front-page headline in Saturday's paper: "Minorities hit hardest by forclosures in New York."

The Times is in a hole, and keeps digging, just like the Speaker.