Part: 1234         Session: 1234         Page 262263264265266267268269270271272273274275276277278279280281282283284285286287288289290291292293294295296297298299300301302303304305306307 of 512

Dick Peters. And he was in on this meeting, which was indicative of the idea. He was writing editorials, but this was very much in my mind, that Dick Peters would be very useful in helping to develop the Op-Ed idea. And I stated at that next meeting that, as I handed out the dummy pages, that I'd incorporated as many of the ideas expressed at the last meeting as seemed feasible, and I included, by the way, - and it was always my idea on the Op-Ed page to include what we had a great deal of in those days in the news columns, so-called Q heads, which were kind of analytical or, in my view quite often quite opinionated, pieces rewritten by members of the Times news staff, which were often quite good pieces, but I always felt had no business in the news columns at all. My idea was to bring those columns, not to abolish them, but to print them on the Op-Ed page, which I conceived of as an opinion page, a forum and an opinion page. And I thought that any such columns that were produced by the news department people, that weren't directly related and real sidebars to the day's news - those, I recognized, would have to stay in the news columns - but more general ones, and we had plenty of them in the paper at that time, should go appropriately on the Op-Ed page. A point, by the way, that was never accepted, and in fact never carried out. But I always felt that the Op-Ed page -

Was there some safety valve notion attached to this?

That this would permit -

People to blow off?