Why did the Times run the ad?

I'm sure you've heard about the MoveOn.org ad in the New York Times. I found it sad: Sad that the Democrats and news media have done such a good job of destroying the credibility not just of George Bush but of the presidency itself and the U.S. military that such an ad would find any audience at all. And the audience that finds this ad unremarkable is quite large.

Recent polls have shown that a full third of people calling themselves Democrats believe that Bush and the military are responsible for 9/11: That they either knew beforehand and let it happen, or that they destroyed the World Trade Center with explosives and flew a missile into the Pentagon. [Correction: According to this poll, a third of the public believes this.]

These same people, I'm sure, believe the military routinely practices torture.

They believe that Guantanamo is hell on earth.

They believe "Bush lied," or that we're in Iraq to steal Arab oil.

They believe -- because John Murtha and Dick Durbin tell them so -- that American soldiers behave like Nazis.

They believe -- because John Kerry tells them so -- that American soldiers are idiots.

They -- including the New York Times -- don't take the War on Terror seriously. Why else would the Times so cavalierly reveal secret intelligence operations?

And why, in the end, would the New York Times run this ad?

MoveOn.org is entitled to say whatever it wants to say, no matter how nauseously despicable that speech happens to be. The New York Times is under no obligation to amplify it.

Just a couple of weeks ago, CNBC refused to run advertising by a group supporting the war. That's CNBC's right, misguided as it may be.

And the Times certainly has the right to run MoveOn's ad. Considering the Times' stock price, maybe they had a higher moral purpose to serve.

But we should be asking of the Times, not MoveOn.org: Do you hate your country that much?