 
                        20030515.01

     I have my doubts, whether the editors of the Times
would recognize truth if it jumped into their lap and bit
them in the face.  I am, no, not surprised, nor even
particularly offended, by the unctuous, complacent self-
righteousness with which your newspaper celebrates the
persecution of perhaps the most gifted - and truthful - of
its reporters, one who understood intuitively that most of
the "news" that you find "fit to print" is fiction, and who
acted accordingly.

     Admittedly, to the extent that all societies live by
falsehood, requiring their kings or presidents to function,
above all, as Liars-in-Chief, truth is ineffable and
inaudible.  One ought not demand the impossible, even of the
New York Times.  Where it is ineffective, truth is ignored,
where it threatens, truth is criminalized, - he who is not
for us is against us -.  Truth is tolerable only as the
expression of fools, of jesters, or of idiots.

                         * * * * *
Copyright 2005, Ernst Jochen Meyer
