The notoriously enterprising Jacob Bernstein sics his fangs into the new Times public editor, Clark Hoyt, in today's Women's Wear — and he's not letting go until he at least has the scent of blood. After all, Hoyt is a newspaper veteran who's gone on record talking about how the newspaper industry could be facing its demise, and here he is in a new gig waxing critical about the Grey Lady! It's sport.

WWD: Times executive editor Bill Keller said he hired you partially because of Knight Ridder's prewar coverage of Iraq. In retrospect, why do you think so few other news organizations showed skepticism?

C.H.: All I can say is that, at the time, we were focused on what we were doing. And we were certainly aware that we were often alone and wondered where the Times and The Washington Post were. But why they made the decisions they made and went down the roads they went down, I don't know.

WWD: Oh, come on. Surely you have a theory.

C.H.: I can't read their minds. But I think it's fair to ask whether they were skeptical enough and whether there's a tradition of leaning too much on official sources in exchange for entrée at the very highest levels. [...]

WWD: So you will pay attention to Arthur Sulzberger Jr.'s leadership?

C.H.: Yes. Whether I write about it or not depends on a whole lot of things.

WWD: What does that mean?

C.H.: It means I don't know.

Having read the full interview and cherry picked the quotes, it's hard to decide who we'd rather make out with: Jacob or Clark. Both such notable media figures, it's going to come down to cheekbones.