The New York Times has been under heavy fire from US newspapers, media, journalists and readers, after it published on Thursday Feb. 20. a front page investigative article about senator and Republican candidate John McCain.

The story asserted in its second paragraph that during McCain's first run for the White House eight years ago, top advisers were convinced he was having a romantic relationship with a lobbyist, which could have been detrimental to his campaign. However, in addition to lack of any specific sourcing, the article offered no substantial evidence about the alleged romance - which was subsequently denied by both McCain and the lobbyist.

This wasn't the point of the story though, according to Bill Keller, executive editor of the Times, who said the article was the story of a man who rebuilt himself as a fighter against corruption but is still "careless about appearances, careless about his reputation, and that's a pretty important thing to know about somebody who wants to be president of the United States."

But this explanation didn't appease many readers, outraged by the Times' angle on the story - or what they perceived as the angle, namely the claim that McCain had had an affair with a lobbyist.

"I am most disappointed in The New York Times for engaging in this sort of trash-the-candidate journalism," said one commenter to the story. The Times "has sunk below its standards and created a salacious distraction from an otherwise substantive campaign," said another. And so on.

Last Friday, the Times' story had already received over 2,000 comments, many critical of the handling of the article. "But judging by the explosive reaction to the 3,000-word article, most readers saw it as something else altogether. They saw it as a story about illicit sex. And most were furious at The Times," wrote Clark Hoyt, public editor of the Times, in a column on Feb. 24.

Should the Times have run the story? Numerous pieces have already been written, and Al Tompkins from the Poynter Institute did a good compilation of the scope of reactions, which have been varied, and offered his views on how to report the McCain story. Some believe that the Times' story had valid points about McCain that were of public interest, including Jack Shafer for Slate.

However, by choosing to refer to the affair in such a prominent way, and with loose evidence of it, the Times' opted for an angle that overwhelmingly hid the newsworthy components of the story.

"What's most remarkable about the article is that it appeared in the paper at all: The new information it reveals focuses on the private matters of the candidate, and relies entirely on the anecdotal evidence of McCain's former staffers," commented The New Republic (TNR). Similarly harsh criticism from Hanna Rosin, Slate.

According to TNR, Time magazine editor Rick Stengel told MSNBC that he wouldn't have published the piece as it was.

One of the more balanced analyses of the Times' McCain story came from the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz:

"To be sure, the piece included significant details about whether the Arizona senator had done legislative favors for Iseman's clients."

But "the hardest thing in journalism is to spend months on a story and then admit you haven't got the goods. There is, instead, a tendency to dress the thing up with fine writing and larger themes in an effort to demonstrate that it's not just about sex, when of course that is the only element most readers -- and the rest of the media -- will focus on."

In fact, Hoyt was probably one of the harshest critics of the Times' approach to the McCain story (although this may also be a strategy by the Times to weather through this storm):

"A newspaper cannot begin a story about the all-but-certain Republican presidential nominee with the suggestion of an extramarital affair with an attractive lobbyist 31 years his junior and expect readers to focus on anything other than what most of them did. And if a newspaper is going to suggest an improper sexual affair, whether editors think that is the central point or not, it owes readers more proof than The Times was able to provide."

That's a politically correct way of saying that the Times published a front page 3000-word piece that was based more on appearances than substance (read Michael Kinsley, Slate). A poor decision coming from the US' paper of record (Miami Herald).

Last Friday, the Times (re)opened the discussion about the McCain story and angle to readers. Read here.

And please send us your views.

Source: New York Times (here and here) - Los Angeles Times - Publishing 2.0 - The New Republic - Slate - Poynter Institute - Washington Post - Miami Herald