Political correctness in New England...

Gee, race is important if you want to hire someone, not important if there's been a crime.

An e-mail exchange about the use of racial descriptions in newspaper crime stories led to the suspension of two Eagle-Tribune staffers and a mini-brouhaha about political correctness run amok at the Lawrence newspaper.

The incident began late last month when an Eagle-Tribune production editor sent a company-wide e-mail to reporters and editors announcing a new edict.

"Refrain from using race to describe or identify people in crime stories, for example, `a black man in a green jacket and baseball cap.' "

The message said that "unless the rest of the description is detailed enough to be meaningful and distinguishes that person from other members of his or her race, such sketchy descriptions are meaningless, may apply to large numbers of innocent people and tend to stereotype ethnic groups."

Ken Johnson, the newspaper's editorial page editor, fired back in his own e-mail.

"This strikes me as just so much wrongheaded PC nonsense," wrote Johnson, in a copy of the exchange obtained by the Herald.

"Are we to write that `Three men from east Texas were convicted of dragging James Byrd behind a pickup truck until he was decapitated' without mentioning that the thugs were white and the victim black?" asked Johnson, referring to the infamous 1998 racial killing in Jasper, Texas.

A staffer, Bryan McGonigle, then chipped in with his own anti-edict sarcasm.

"Actually, the victim would technically be black and blue and maybe red all over," he wrote. "And he'd be called a `cerebrally-challenged American with dramatic skull deficiency.' "

Both men were suspended for three days.