Sun-Times business editor's global warming letter a serious ethical breach

Jon Coifman of The Huffington Post writes Tuesday that Chicago Sun-Times business editor Dan Miller‘s decision to send a letter to other journalists on behalf of a conservative organization to keep an open mind about global warming is a serious breath of journalism ethics.

Coifman wrote, “To be clear: It would have been perfectly legitimate for Miller to raise this sort of question in a column, under the cold hard light of day. Or to assign a reporter to a news story examining the issue.

“But it is *not* OK for him to be using his name and that of the paper as part of a one-sided, behind-the-scenes sales pitch from an organization with an expressly unbalanced view of a critical public issue. (It wouldn’t be any more appropriate for him to stick his name on something from us, for the same reason.)

“Miller would have a hard time claiming he was taken in by the interest group, since he used to work there himself.”

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