Denis Horgan has managed to put into words what a lot of people (none of them at Tribune, I suspect) have been thinking:

I wonder if it is too soon to simply insist that the top leadership of the Courant should be replaced. Immediately. What more fundamental considerations as the newspaper’s very credibility, ethics and professionalism can be explained away with some sort of, “oops, my bad” or the loathsome, “Oh, everyone does it” — the latter, at least abandoned by the paper even as its proponents continue to push it?

What has undeniably happened in recent days is that the paper’s formal polices about how advertisers’ interests trump those of the readers and matters of plagiarism and theft have been exposed to run deep and high.

It should not be enough to say, “ah, but they’re nice people.” These are grievous offenses to the traditions, policies and expectations of the business. Those who so thoroughly reject them should go.

– Denis