Public Editor Hits 'NYT' He As Exits

'In his farewell column, NYT public editor Arthur Brisbane tomorrow declares that the paper still lacks "transparency" and "humility."  But notice misspelling of Lake Wobegon.  He also offers absurd charge that the paper is somehow failing because polls show that increasingly fact-adverse Republicans now give it lower credibility than before.

Two years ago, when I wrote my “why on earth” column, I suggested that the pace of change called for a re-emphasis on “transparency, accountability, humility.” Looking back now, I think The Times could do better with these.

The Times is hardly transparent. A reader still has to work very hard to find any Times policies online (though some are tucked away there), and there is still no place where Times editors speak on the issues. 

As for humility, well, The Times is Lake Wobegone on steroids (everybody’s way above average). I don’t remember many autopsies in which, as we assembled over the body, anyone conceded that maybe this could have been done differently.