Ann Coulter’s grossest triumph: How she fleeced the New York Times — salon.com

When the New York Times recently added fuel to the bogus plagiarism attacks on Rick Perlstein’s new book on Reagan, “The Invisible Bridge,” with what Paul Krugman rightly derided as “‘opinions differ on shape of the planet’ reporting,’” I was immediately reminded of a somewhat mirror-image situation involving Ann Coulter’s “Slander,” in a 2002 review by Janet Maslin. “Slander” was every bit as vacuous as Perlstein’s book is weighty, yet, though the Times’ review of “Slander” was largely negative, the way both books were treated reinforced an odd, implicit false  equivalence between the two — and that is what I found particularly troubling. Much to the credit of the Times, its public editor, Margaret Sullivan, wrote a measured, yet devastating critique of how the Times had dealt with Perlstein’s book and the accusations against him. For example:

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