7.13.2003
Raines: I was the best person to take the Times where it needed to go
[Posted 8:53 PM by James Panero]
The transcript from Howell Raines’s Friday interview with Charlie Rose is now online (n.b. Roger Kimball’s earlier post).
It’s always worse than you think. As executive editor, Raines in under two years managed to bring The New York Times to one of the lowest points in the paper’s history, all the while alienating the Times staff and dumbing up the paper’s contents. Now, in an interview that is more a species of farce than journalistic revelation, Raines says that Sulzberger forced him out… and that he was still the best man for the job.
HOWELL RAINES: I could show you a stack of hundreds of communications from people on the staff editors and writers saying this is a terrible mistake; we know where you were going; it was the right place; we were with you.
CHARLIE ROSE: What was a terrible mistake — sorry — the fact you left the paper was a terrible mistake?
HOWELL RAINES: Yes. That’s a body of opinion.
And just where is Pinch Sulzberger in all this? Why, easy riding of course:
HOWELL RAINES: I spoke to Arthur this morning; he is motorcycling in upstate New York. I urged him, as I always do, to drive carefully because I think his future is important to the Times� future.
The only shame is to have none, so said Pascal.