NY Times editor: our paper is 'cosmopolitan,' not 'liberal

New York Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson denies that the paper of record has a liberal point of view in a new interview with The New Republic.

From the Q&A:

New Republic: [W]ould you say someone from Mars coming to read The New York Times for a month would recognize any ideological preference?

Jill Abramson: Well, on the editorial and opinion pages they would.

New Republic: No, no, on the news pages.

Jill Abramson: Um, I think that they would recognize a sort of cosmopolitan outlook that reflects that, even as we become international, we’re a New York–based news institution. I can see how the intensity of coverage on certain issues may to some people seem to reflect a liberal point of view. But I actually don’t think it does. And I’ve been a very close New York Times reader going back to when I began to read, and I don’t see it as profoundly different now. I think a lot about something: Abe Rosenthal was once asked what he wanted on his headstone, and he said he wanted it just to say, “He kept the paper straight.” And I think about that a lot. You can verify that in news meetings I sometimes say, “This is skewed too far to the left,” or “The mix of stories seems overweeningly appealing to a reader with a certain set of sensibilities and it shouldn’t.”