For decades, the journalistic norm had been that the private lives of public officials remained private unless that life impinged on public performance.

Given what the media have put the country through this past decade, it must come as a surprise to most Americans that the press has a code of ethics.

But the time has come for journalists to acknowledge that a zone of privacy does exist.

And what it depends on, of course, is whether the story itself is worth the ethical compromise it requires and whether the competition is onto the story.

For decades, the journalistic norm had been that the private lives of public officials remained private unless that life impinged on public performance.

The networks found themselves having to compete for an increasingly Balkanized audience.

No matter what name we give it or how we judge it, a candidate's character is central to political reporting because it is central to a citizen's decision in voting.