The New York Times and the wecloming New York City

The New York Times has a propensity to engage in self-praise and in the praise of New York City (typical demagoguery). I thought about that this morning when I read this in the New York Times: "But New York City, renowned for welcoming all manner of cultural traditions..." Yet, the New York Times itself had said back on August 20th, 1899: " 'Little Syria' is curious in that it is made up of Orientals of many stations in life. The lower class, men and women alike, have little that is attractive about them. They have been called the dirtiest people in all New York, and their tenement rooms are dens of grime and odor. The women have no beauty of either face or form." And on May 25, 1890, the New York Times said this about Maronite Lebanese: "The foreign population in the lower part of this city has of late years been increased by the Arabic-speaking element from the Lebanon, in Syria. In clannishness and outlandish manners these people resemeble Chinese and what are called the Diego Italians. Nearly all of them are Maronites, and in many respects they are inferior to the Chinese and Italians, who do possess a certain amount of self-respect and are willing to work honestly and work hard for a living...No sooner had these people passed through the gates of Castle Garden and emerged into the city than they at once began to ply their trade of begging. Thrusting a hand under a citizen's nose, they would cross themselves with the other and mutter, "Christian poor." Such a forlorn and wretched expression of countenance could these people assume that their appeals were generally successful, and at the end his first day in America the whining Maronite could have added at least $5 to his hoard, while the Irish or German immigrant would be hustling around trying to find work to enable him to earn a dollar...In this they resemble other natives of Lebanon, but the teachings that are instilled into them in childhood seem to encourage their natural laziness, which a sense of self-respect and independence enables their fellow-countrymen, the Druzes, Mohammedans, and Greeks to overcome...."