You can tell a nerve has been touched when a highly placed wordsmith resorts to vulgar epithets in response to criticism.  So we can reasonably assume that New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet has some deeply conflicted emotions regarding the Gray Lady’s decision to not run the cartoons published by Charlie Hebdo. The NYT editorial honcho’s descent to boorishness began with a comment on Facebook by USC Annenberg School associate professor of journalism Marc Cooper:  “Exactly how many people have to be shot in cold blood before your paper rules that you can show us what provoked the killers? Apparently 23 shot including 11 dead is not enough. What absolute cowardice. These MSM managers act is if they are running insurance companies, not news organizations." Baquet fired back, also in comments: “Dear Marc, appreciate the self righteous second guessing without even considering there might be another point of view,”...(Read Full Post)