Via Romenesko, after the NYT ran a column by Thomas Friedman titled, “A Quick Fix for the Gas Addicts” (sub. req.) (teaser: “The sooner General Motors gets taken over by Toyota, the better off our country will be”), GM vice president Steve Harris wrote a letter to the editors addressing some of Friedman’s accusations. The NYT frustrated GM’s efforts to correct the record, and now it won’t be running the letter. Here’s GM’s Brian Akre’s account:

Now, you’d think it would be relatively easy to get a letter from a GM vice president published in the Times after GM’s reputation was so unfairly questioned. Just a matter of simple journalistic fairness, right? You’d also think that the newspaper’s editing of letters would be minimal — to fix grammar, remove any profane language, that sort of thing. Not so. Even for me, who worked for nearly 20 years as a reporter and editor, this was an enlightening experience.

Even if you’re already convinced that the NYT is, shall we say, resistent to criticism, prepare to be surprised by the rest of the story.

UPDATE: David Mastio found some instances in which the NYT had no problem with the word “rubbish” — a word the paper deemed unacceptable when GM tried to use it.