Buried in today's New York Times story on public reaction to John Edwards' decision to continue his campaign despite the news of his wife Elizabeth's renewed cancer, is this line:

But in the interviews, and more than 500 reader postings to The Caucus, The New York Times’s national political blog, a major dividing point in how people reacted to the Edwardses’ decision was their experience with cancer in themselves or a loved one.

I do believe that this is the first time the Times has ever referred in print to reader postings as a source of relevant information in a political news article. Good for them; it's long past time that they joined in the online conversation that the web affords and acknowledged that their readers could be a source of useful information.