Hold the Hypocrisy, New York Times

By Daryl Montgomery and Jack Kemp

It was much to my amazement that I read in Kim Zigfeld's article on AT that Mark Bittman of the New York Times had written a hit piece on McDonald's new healthy breakfast item on their menu. It appears that Mr. Bittman has not visited the ground floor restaurants of the New York Times headquarters building itself to see the fat and sugar content what they serve.

Having been a patron of Schnipper's Quality Kitchen on the ground floor of the Times Building and having enjoyed their delicious fried sweet potatoes, the adage about people living in glass houses came to mind. In fact, the ground floor eatery has clear glass floor to ceiling windows. It is also a realistic assumption that a number of Times' own employees eat there as well. If one goes to Google Earth and looks at the images of Schnipper's from the 620 Eighth Avenue side and the 41^st Street sides, one will see huge window signs that say "Fries & Shakes" and "Mac & Cheese." Schnipper's menu, accessed in a pdf file on the left side of their company home page at www.schnippers.com, lists "fries, cheese fries, sweet potato fries, bacon cheeseburgers, cheese dogs" and so forth. Apparently the high fat content of items sold in the New York Times headquarters is magically immune to causing clogged arteries whereas the downscale McDonald's fare is assumed to be bad for you -- even if it is a healthy oatmeal and fruit breakfast item. This is nothing less than very thinly disguised selective criticism and class snobbery on the part of the Times and their dwindling readership. Since many patrons of McDonald's are from minorities, I could arguably say this is also racism against "Mickey D's."

A second Times Headquarters eatery, Montenapo, has closed after years of attempting to make a profit under three different owners. "They blame the economy."

As is, Montenapo's website is still up and features a dessert menu that would make a nutritionist recoil in horror.

It featured:

CHOCOLATE SOUFFLE

Vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce

CRÈME BRULE

Vanilla custard whipped cream berries

CREMINO DI RICOTTO

Italian cheese cake with mix berries

A third restaurant at the Times Headquarters, Dean & DeLuca, features at its website a beautiful layout of dessert cakes, presumably not made with skim milk, carob and sugar substitutes.

But there is no need to belabor the point any further.

The New York Times has, once again, managed to reach far into other neighborhoods for fault finding on the habits of the poor while ignoring what goes on LITERALLY under their noses on the first floor of their own building. It's "Do As I Say, Not As I Do" and "That works well in Practice, but doesn't work well in Theory" Day every day at the Gray Lady's front yard.