Maybe the New York Times needs a lesson in French? Turns out the letter that was published by the paper earlier today, ostensibly sent in by the mayor of Paris, which criticized Caroline Kennedy's bid for the New York Senate, was a fake! The Times posted a correction later today notifying readers of the letter's inauthenticity, saying that shouldn't have been published.

This letter, like most Letters to the Editor these days, arrived by email. It is Times procedure to verify the authenticity of every letter. In this case, our staff sent an edited version of the letter to the sender of the email and did not hear back. At that point, we should have contacted Mr. Delanoe's office to verify that he had, in fact, written to us. We did not do that. Without that verification, the letter should never have been printed. We are reviewing our procedures for verifying letters to avoid such an incident in the future.