?This is really troubling,? said New York Times reporter Peter Baker in an e-mail to POLITICO. ?We?re blurring the line between news and punditry even further and opening ourselves to legitimate questions among readers about where the White House press corps gets its information.?
Baker said he has no problem with outlets like Huffington Post, which he described ?an important part of the marketplace of ideas.? But the site, he said, has a mission ?to produce pieces with strongly argued points of view? and that puts the Times ? or other nonpartisan news organizations ? ?in a position of relying on overtly ideological or opinionated organizations as our surrogate news gatherers.?
