Some of the news that’s fit to print

Greg Sargent, TPM Horse’s Mouth:

Hey, whaddaya know! It looks as if there is a level of snarkiness that is considered out of bounds for The New York Times Op ed page!

Over on his blog, Paul Krugman reveals today that the paper told him he couldn’t use the following lede on his column on last year’s State of the Union Address:

“Before the State of the Union address, there had been hints and hopes that President Bush would offer a serious plan to reduce our dependence on imported oil. Instead, however, he took refuge in alcohol.”

“I’m almost never censored at The Times,” Krugman writes.

I note this not to defend mockery of human tragedies such as alcoholism, but merely to note that this shows that the paper’s editors will, if they feel like something a columnist says is out of bounds, step in and intervene.

If mockery of George Bush’s alcoholism had been permitted, it would have prevented a lot of tragedies. But as Sargent goes on to note, if MoDowdy says something much more insane about Obama or one of the Clintons, if Bill Kristol and John Tierney and Bill Safire make stuff up, there’s no editing because that, after all, is Opinion.