Times-Staples Controversy

* Readers’ representative Narda Zacchino stated that the Times Magazine’s “editorial content was free of influence from The Times’ advertising department or from Staples” (“Staples Incident Rocks Times, Inside and Out,” Commentary, Nov. 7). That’s wishful thinking. If that had been the case, there wouldn’t have been a “Staples issue” of the magazine at all.

If The Times wasn’t sleeping under the balance sheets with those reaping huge profits from the development of the arena, there may have actually been an article decrying the $70 million in public subsidies given away to those folks in the luxury boxes.

MARTIN SCHLAGETER

Los Angeles

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* If reporters and editors of The Times are not tainted by business considerations--a point made over and over again in Times stories--why was the tone of the now-infamous Oct. 10 Times Magazine so slavishly devoted and gushy toward the Staples Center?

I think Times readers, and those who care about civic issues, are looking for a paper that is a watchdog, not a lap dog. Read the Oct. 10 issue again, and tell me which sort of canine comes to mind.

BENJAMIN MARK COLE

Los Angeles

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* Regarding the special Staples Center issue and your publisher’s belief that withholding revenue-splitting arrangements from the editorial staff would preserve the “church-state” wall of objectivity: What must be remembered is that perceptions and appearances of bias or conflict of interest are as crucial in the news business as the actual absence of such conflicts. What was supposed to keep the Staples Center people from possibly conveying to others the impression that The Times’ editorial staff was in on the deal?

RICHARD MARTIN

Anaheim Hills