What Tim Egan writes about in The New York Times--the survival risks facing newspapers --is notably true of The New York Times itself.
There are many reasons for the decline of advertising and readers, but one that is almost always neglected in stories like Egan's is that many center-right readers finally have had it with the bias of much news coverage. Bias is understandable on editorial pages, although the Times' unintentionally droll quarrel with Barack Obama today surprises one by the extent of the paper's dogmatic liberalism. It is that dogmatic liberalism, unfortunately, that spills readily into other sections of the paper and alienates conservatives and many moderates. You just can't count on the Times for objective news coverage, and that goes double for feature stories.
Some people take their view-cues from the Times and will never notice when the paper is factually unfair. Others recognize the lack of objectivity when they see a story on a subject they know personally, but they wrongly assume that other stories probably are accurate. Still others--including a body of readers who would like a national paper of serious depth, but have come to believe that The New York Times simply cannot be trusted--don't read it at all.
Editors and owners of the Times don't care, of course. They are willing to write off such readership. But they can't expect others to care, either, when their flagship runs into rough seas.
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