Here’s a letter (Tim Graham alerted me to) over at Romanesko:

From JOHN MAGNER: Subject: NY Times’ Conservatives beat. I eagerly look forward to the Times’ forthcoming establishment of a Liberals beat. The lucky reporter will, of course, “examine liberal forces in religion, politics, law, business and the media.”
The idea will be to “delve into the issues and personalities that drive — and sometimes divide — liberals.”
The Times’ Liberals beat will examine the disparate but at times interconnected liberal organizations — teachers’ unions and Affirmative Action supporters, for example — all as a way of gaining a peek into who establishment Democrats listen to, and why.
Can’t wait!

Me: I bet we’ll hear more of this from the Franken-Alterman-MoveOn crowd. Now, I’m still working out what I think about the Times-conservative-beat thing, but the notion that the Times hasn’t been covering liberals and liberal ideas as a fulltime vocation is sheer luncacy. More important, the Times hasn’t even bothered to label the ideas and people it covers as “liberal.” Rather the Times objectively calls them pioneers, geniuses, innovators, artists, philanthropists, heros, martyrs etc. The Harvard black studies department isn’t brimming with black “liberal” geniuses and titans. It’s brimming with plain old geniuses and titans. Susan Sontag isn’t a “great” liberal writer, she’s a great writer. Etc etc etc.