Hurdles? Really, you think?

In a Times magazine piece about gay romance novels, we were presented with perhaps the best lede ever:

Back in his pre-Times days, some of David Brooks' best-known writings were about the Times wedding page. "Unabashed elitist, secretive, and totally honest, the 'mergers and acquisitions page' (as some of its devotees call it) has always provided an accurate look at at least a chunk of the American ruling class. And over the years it has reflected the changing ingredients of elite status," he wrote in Bobos in Paradise. "The Times emaphasizes four things about a person — college degrees, graduate degrees, career path, and parents' profession — for these are the markers of upscale Americans today."

Gather round, children. It's time for a game of Who's Earning Their Keep?, in which we vote on the comparative worth of two staffers based solely on their output. For our inaugural competition, we're pitting somewhat error-prone, fluff reporter Sarah Boxer against real estate-obsessed, hard-nosed news slave Anna Bahney. First, as of last Friday, the facts:

As mentioned yesterday, the Times' Marketplace Weekly hit the streets yesterday, to reactions ranging from a yawn to pummelling rage. The Post, cackling as always, finds vendors who couldn't get rid of them. Part of the problem: The lead story was more than a month old and had been heavily cut down.

This morning, we presented you with the biggest question since, say, why the latest Vanity Fair has a 11-page spread on the saga of 5th Avenue hawks Pale Male and Lola six months after the fact.

We'll be honest: We never pick up the crappy free newspapers. In fact, we hate people for picking them up. We live in the greatest newspaper city in the world: Break out the freaking quarters already, tightwad.

It's amazing what you can do with photography these days, isn't it? Last night, at Tucker Carlson's party to celebrate his new MSNBC show (requisite party crash TK), Gawker photographer Jennifer Snow caught this image of Carlson's wife handing him a business card. Using our stalkerazzi skill and a little zooming, we were able to identify the New York Times logo and see that the card beared a message. K, it seems, is a little hurt, and sent her sentiment via the average 8th grader's preferred method of note-passing.

It might be easy to dial 911, or even 311, but as our boy Russell can tell you, when you cross that dangerous three-button barrier, using a telephone can be treacherous. Heck, it's the type of thing that might even lend itself to satire.

· NYT introduces its new public editor. Staffers already looking drawing bunny ears and handlebar mustaches on his mugshot. [NYT]
· Interviewees just ram right through Tim Russert. Funny: We thought that was Anderson Cooper. [Huffington Post]
· No one in the U.S. is writing about France's anti-Semitic newspaper. Well, we don't speak French. We speak English. Duh. [HonestReporting]—WL

Crazy, creepy Clyde Haberman finds the angle no one else is working on the Deep Throat story:

And so the noble experiment comes to an end. I think we're all psychologically prepared for the iron curtain of paid content to be erected twixt us and the OpEd page. As a final, gala send-off, the Times has asked each one of their columnists to prepare a completely archetypical column that best defines their personal gimmick. Today, having replaced Paul Krugman with a charticle as punishment for his disrespect for the position of "Public Editor," they give us Thomas Friedman's essential self, a couple hundred words he could've written 10 years ago or 10 years from now.

We apologize for not catching this yesterday but, frankly, our knowledge of the internet's degenerate history is shamefully lacking. Thank heavens an observant reader alerted us to brilliant photo detail in yesterday's Times piece on Google: Blogger and Movable Type geek Anil Dash seems to be sporting a GOATSE t-shirt.

David Brooks: I'd rather be right than have health care. Sure, subsidized education and socialized medicine sound all right, but they will cause you to vote against the European constitution for all the wrong reasons. Let David Brooks tell you what's good for you.

Thanks to an alert tipster who heroically refused to allow something this immature to go un-screengrabbed. Frankly, I'm embarrassed I didn't notice this earlier. Has the Times hired spammers as copy editors?

Well, it was bound to happen — and really, it's amazing that it took this long. Just over two months since first taking over the Times' Boldface Names column, Campbell Robertson seems to have reached a level of batshit insanity formerly reserved for his predecessor, our Auntie Joyce Wadler.

Boy, yesterday was exciting, wasn't it?

Was that it? Really?

Tierney: The existence of losers and my knowledge of Scrabble proves my earlier point. I will use discredited tropes of evolutionary psychology to back it up. Is there a phrenologist in the house?

Krugman and Friedman? Fuck yeah, New York Times! Jackpot!