NY Times' decision to publish anonymous column carries risks

The coup of publishing a column by an anonymous Trump administration official bashing the boss could backfire on The New York Times if the author is unmasked and turns out to be a little-known person, or if the newspaper's own reporters solve the puzzle.

Within hours of the essay appearing on the paper's website, the mystery of the writer's identity began to rival the Watergate-era hunt for "Deep Throat" in Washington, and a parade of Trump team members issued statements Thursday saying, in effect, "it's not me."
The Times' only clue was calling the author a "senior administration official."
Jennifer Palmieri, former communications director for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, tweeted that, based on her experience with the Times and sourcing, "this person could easily be someone most of us have never heard of and more junior than you'd expect."
"And I think it gets held against them in the biggest possible way. I have enough respect for the Times to believe that they wouldn't hold themselves up to that."
It would look like the Times was trying to stir the pot if it were not a high-level person, said Chuck Todd, host of NBC's "Meet the Press."
The Times' own news story about the column said the author's identity is "known to the Times' editorial page department but not to the reporters who cover the White House."