Their first-day editorial was the low point of the Times's coverage of the Colorado massacre. A lengthy story on Friday about Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the two killers, was an exceptional bit of reporting. It did have some under-explained details, though. The boys, according to the story, came "from middle-class, two-parent families. . . . Colorado vehicle registration records show that the Klebold family owns at least seven cars, including four BMW's that date from the 1980's. 'As far as I can tell, this family was utterly, utterly normal," a colleague of Klebold's father said.
Seven cars? Four BMW's? Utterly normal? Some sort of West 43rd St. provincialism is at work in the idea that this is the middle-class suburban norm. But THE SCRAPBOOK isn't sure whether it's the provincialism of the Times's Manhattanite reporters without cars -- who think everyone else has more wheels than they actually do -- or the provincialism of the Times's haute-suburban editors, living in New Jersey tract mansions with four-car garages.