Today's guest post is by Peppercommer Dandy Stevenson

Have you heard about the recent barroom brawl at the tony New York Athletic Club? No, well apparently it was a doozie, the likes of which that storied Club has not seen in its almost 150 year history. 

Apparently it had everything: men from 18 to 80, not-so lady like women, otherwise stuffy bartenders, square-jawed members, hair brained non-members, the police, cowboys and indians. Three arrests. Two hospitalizations.  One really pissed off club president.

According to blogger on Wall Street Jackass: "two broken noses right off the bat, one dude knocked straight on his butt on the first punch, glasses thrown, broken glass everywhere , and all the tables turned over or shoved to the side, they were making their arena…”  I envision a cross between a battering in ‘Rocky’ and a Three Stooges pie fight. 

It’s noted not just because of how down and out a brutish melee it was, but also because it played out within the confines of one of the country’s most exclusive and decorum soaked clubs.

The New York Times got its mitts on a letter President Colin O'Neill sent privately to members in which he strongly encouraged members to keep incident details quiet and "Similarly, the distribution of via the various social media of photographs and letters that are detrimental to the Club and its reputation will not be tolerated."

So what does the Times do? They use this story to debut its new feature “Kids Draw the News.” With this new offering which they call for children under 12 “to render a current event in pictorial form.”  WHAT?

Is this a case of one-downsmanship?  We have a low-class brawl in a high-class club and a once revered newspaper resorting to childish pranks to drum up readers. I don’t object to the feature, but if this lead story is indicative of what’s in store, I shudder to think what’s next:
•    A pre-pubescent teenager drawing his interpretation of a rape that occurred in the Bronx last weekend?  Done in colored pencils.
•    School bus off the cliff, killing 10 kids? This is what it looks like to little Susie from Miss Mary Margaret’s pre-school.  Rendered in red finger paint, of course.
•    Federal Border Patrol officers nabbed a family of 12 trying to skooch under a fence separating Mexico from Arizona. Oops! Somebody’s head didn’t make it, but it makes for a fine Crayola illustration by a 7 year-old.

Shame on you NYTimes. You make the slobs from the Athletic Club look perfectly angelic.