On his blog, the Andy Rooney of travel, Arthur Frommer, frequently gripes about the pricey experiences sometimes covered in The New York Times' Sunday travel section. (Recently he was half-mystified, half-offended that the Times would report on The Plaza hotel, where rooms go for $875 a night.) But in his most recent rant--about this mention of a one-day, £345 Orient-Express train trip, Frommer has gone from crotchety complainer to conspiracy theorist:
The New York Times travel section has now plumbed such depths of absurdity that I, for one, have concluded that this senselessness can't be accidental. The decision to sprinkle the pages of a travel section with references to sky-high travel offerings can only have come about from a directive from on high to do so.
It must be part of an effort to attract advertising from the producers of luxury goods ... In writing as they do, I am now convinced that the travel writers and junior travel editors of the New York Times are attempting to execute a policy consciously set down by the Times.
Sounds bad! And it would be--if Frommer's suspicions had any basis in reality.]]>