Did NYT Change Criteria for Bestselling List for Political Reasons?

The New York Times has been criticized in recent years for dishonest representation of the news, but that dishonesty apparently has expanded to include its New York Times Bestseller List claims political analyst and former advisor to President Bill Clinton, Dick Morris.

Until last Sunday, the following political books have appeared on the New York Times Non-Fiction Hardcover Bestseller List:

No Apology by Mitt Romney
Courage and Consequence by Karl Rove
Lies the Government Told You by Judge Andrew Napolitano
Broke by Glenn Beck
Liberty and Tyranny by Mark Levin
Catastrophe by Dick Morris

Last Sunday, however, the New York Times elected to change its criteria for the New York Times Non-Fiction Hardcover Bestseller List so that books such as those above may no longer appear in that category. Those books will now appear in the Advice & Misc. Hardcover Bestseller List category, alongside items such as the Weight Watchers New Complete Cookbook and other Self-Help books.

The change in the criteria has resulted in the following books being transitioned from the Non-Fiction Hardcover Bestseller List to the Advice & Misc. Hardcover Bestseller List, which is a far less prominent and reputable category:

A Simple Government by Mike Huckabee
Revolt! By Dick Morris

In an appearance on Bill OReillys Fox News program, The OReilly Factor, Dick Morris claimed that he and other Fox News authors are being targeted and kicked off the Times bestseller list and reassigned to the less prestigious list of How To books.

During the segment, Dick Morris asserted that his book, Revolt! How to Defeat Obama and Repeal His Socialist Programs, as well as books written by Mike Huckabee and Frank Luntz, have been targeted in the hopes that it will impact their sales since the bookstores will no longer be featuring them on the New York Times Non-Fiction Hardcover Bestseller shelves.

OReilly agreed that it seems likely that the New York Times has an agenda in this change of criteria, noting that the impacted authors happen to be Fox News contributors and declaring that theres a war going on between Fox News and the New York Times.

Even the liberal outlet Mediaite acknowledged the war on March 5 when it wrote:

The seemingly organic feud between the New York Times and Fox News took the forefront once more this week when the newspapers Executive Editor Bill Keller called Fox viewers among the most cynical people on planet earth and blamed Rupert Murdoch for the agitated tone of todays media. If you thought Fox was going to take this lightly, youd be wrong. Fox News contributor Liz Trotta came out swinging today, thanking Keller for the cynical label and accusing him of doublespeak on the Murdoch matter.

We dont take things that are handed to us on a plate and we dont have an agenda, she noted, concluding this was the basis for Kellers disdain. Specifically, she continued, the New York Times cant stand anybody that disagrees with them and has become a megaphone for the left and throwaway newspaper that is dissolving in red ink.

By the end of the segment with Dick Morris, OReilly concluded, I dont like the New York Times and their shenanigans, because this is another example of not honest expositions.

The New York Times already has a reputation for dishonest reporting, perhaps the most notable example taking place in the 1930s, when Pulitzer Prize winning NYT writer Walter Duranty visited Russia and wrote that nothing unseemly was happening there no famine or starvation when in fact Josef Stalin was starving 10 million people in the Ukraine. The American Thinker notes that Durantys writing matched Russian propaganda almost exactly. Sadly, Durantys Pulitzer Prize still stands.

When a publication appears willing to publish such blatant falsities as those purported by Duranty, it somehow does not seem far-fetched to contend that the same publication may be playing politics with its bestseller list.