Jacques Steinberg's article in today's Times about a media ethics quandary is not a throwaway article: It represents one media critic taking on another, which is something usually left to Jack Shafer's rants and websites like this one.

Steinberg, very carefully, throws Howard Kurtz under the bus.

And for good reason: Kurtz, who writes a media crit column for the Washington Post, also hosts CNN's Reliable Sources, where he invited Kimberly Dozier (the CBS journalist wounded in Iraq) on the show to talk about her book Breathing the Fire.

Turns out, Kurtz's wife Sheri Annis, is Dozier's book publicist, which makes Kurtz's decision to have her on the program – and calling Dozier things like "a remarkable woman" – quite questionable.

Though for what it's worth, Kurtz did disclose his wife's involvement, in a throwaway aside at the end of the interview.

Now Steinberg is talking up media ethics types, who maintain Kurtz's interview crossed the line.

And Kurtz? He's saying he did nothing wrong, and accepting zero responsibility for semi-sneaking things past viewers.

But shouldn't a media critic be the first to understand that even the mere perception of wrongdoing is justification enough to place blame? And that, hey, maybe he did make a misstep, and he should probably own up to it?

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ETHICS CONUNDRUM "The publisher of a cockfighting magazine has agreed to stop selling it on Amazon.com after the Humane Society charged that its sale violated federal law.

"But Amazon has vowed to fight on, arguing it has the constitutional right to do so." [Folio]

ETHICS Page Six's Paula Froelich could not attend the party where a drink named after her would be poured because the event was an open bar, not cash. [Gawker]

New England Patriots' coach Bill Belichick is fined $500,000 (and the team $200,000) after he was caught unnecessarily cheating to beat the worst team in football. Or, as one Daily News opinion letter summarizes it, "Belichick is a low-down rotten skunk varmint slug of a four-flushing cheat, and not a gentleman at all." [NYDN]

It's been minutes since we've heard from Buzzmachine blogger and CUNY bigshot Jeff Jarvis opining on blogger ethics. We thought if we watched a little less MSNBC, perhaps the gods would smile upon us and bring less frequent ramblings better suited for a Jason Calacanis type. But alas, Katie Couric's peeps had to book somebody to discuss blogger ethics, and even Robert Thompson has to draw the line somwhere.

Conde Nast isn't the only media nazi when it comes to its email system; the Associated Press keeps its @ap.org under closer guard than Tom Cruise does Katie Holmes, especially when it comes to staffers sending out Jerry Maguire-style memos — about AP ethics policy. When Darius Hudson, an AP tech, sent out a late-night missive yesterday, top brass had some of his tech peers remove it from everyone's inbox. But like Kenneth Lay knows all too well, email isn't easily deleted, which is how forward-friendly tipster got us this.

This is the text of an email, criticizing the newly implemented Associated Press employee ethics policy, which was sent to the entire staff of the Associated Press on the graveyard shift early tuesday, March 28, 2006. It was sent by a technician, one among a group, who has recently agreed to a severance package. Many people were able to read it in the morning when most staff arrived to work. Unfortunately, all were not allowed to even see it because it was removed from everyone's email account - sometime before 10 a.m. the same morning. This silent and unexplained deletion has incensed many of the people who try to report fairly and openly on the news of the world - removed by the management of a company who purports to cherish freedom of information and strives to present both sides of every issue. It is a real shame that the management of The Associated Press cannot trust its own people to weigh information presented to them and decide for themselves. — a concerned journalist

In addition, i have heard a rumour that AP HR has rescinded the severance package to the employee who sent this email.

All this in the wake of "Sunshine Week"…

You see, Darius Hudson is pissed over the AP's requirements of him as an employee — which means gem after gem of blockquote sizzle.

I think the demands in this document to be bordering on the ludicrous! I have to now be wary of the organizations that my FRIENDS AND FAMILY are associated with too? And I should report to AP if they violate any of these gestapo-like rules? What organization did I join: The Associated Press or Hitler Youth? …

As a technical unit employee, does this mean that since I work on equipment that may support operating systems such as the Macintosh, Vax VMS, Unix or Linux that I cannot be part of an online Microsoft support or user group due to conflict of interest? Should I give up my Microsoft-owned Hotmail E-mail account if I’m doing a story on Microsoft?

As a member of a union, isn’t much of my activity & relationship with The AP “in support of a cause or movement” that is a “contentious public issue?” Am I allowed to go to our Internet-hosted union website which is about as public a forum as you can get?

I’m a vegetarian. Can I march on “Fur-Free Friday” on my day off?

The full diatribe, after the jump. (It's good, read it all.)

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