The New York Daily News was bought by Mortimer Zuckerman in 1993 for $36 million; last year he weighed a bid by Cablevision to buy it for $1.00. Yes, one dollar. In January, it lowered its newsstand price to $1.00. To prove how little influence it has these days, the newspaper vendor on the northwest corner of 34th and 7th—across the street from the Long Island Rail Road and Madison Square Garden—has stopped carrying it. If there are no buyers there, it's time to close shop.

None of this is an excuse for its deceitful attack on Catholics. On the front page of today's paper is a picture of Cardinal Timothy Dolan and State Sen. John Flanagan; both oppose bills that would lift the statute of limitations on crimes involving the sexual abuse of minors. With good reason: The bills have one target—the Catholic Church.

As it turns out, there is no news story on this issue. Instead, there is a column by the disgraced former prosecutor for the Manhattan DA's office. In 1990, she successfully prosecuted five teenagers in the "Central Park Joggers" case; it was overturned in 2002. In 1993, an appellate court judge said she "deliberately engineered the 15-year-old's confession [Yousef Salaam]...Fairstein wanted to make a name. She didn't care. She wasn't a human."

Fairstein says today that when she joined the Manhattan DA's office in 1972, the laws on sexual assault in New York were "archaic." They still are—thanks to her. We still don't have mandatory reporting laws for unlicensed counselors, and that is because Planned Parenthood opposes them (their counselors learn of statutory rape cases daily and they don't want to rat on male abusers). Also, she has done nothing to see to it that bills that would lift the statute of limitations on the sexual abuse of minors cover the public schools. And today she cites private schools for moving molesting teachers to another school! This practice is so rampant in the public schools that they coined the term, "passing the trash."

Contact Jim Rich, editor-in-chief: jrich@nydailynews.com