Bill Keller's self-defense on "torture"

(Updated below - Update II - Update III - Update IV [Sunday:])

In response to the Harvard study documenting how newspapers labeled waterboarding as "torture" for almost 100 years until the Bush administration told them not to, The New York Times issued a statement justifying this behavior on the ground that it did not want to take sides in the debate.  Andrew Sullivan, Greg Sargent and all pointed out that "taking a side" is precisely what the NYT did:  by dutifully...