Yesterday I relayed some comments from Maria Cramer, the Globe reporter who chaired the trial board that recently expelled Dan Totten as head of the Boston Newspaper Guild, the paper's largest union. Cramer took vigorous issue with the notion that Totten's expulsion was payback for the way he handled negotiations with the New York Times Co.

If you followed today's coverage of last night's debate between the would-be Democratic successors to Ted Kennedy, you're well acquainted with the following theme: frontrunner Martha Coakley remained above the fray while Mike Capuano and Steve Pagliuca duked it out--and as a result, Coakley's going to waltz into the general election.

Suppose you're still weighing who to vote for in next week's Democratic US Senate primary--and then you read this, courtesy of the Globe's Alex Beam:

Martha Coakley is a very good-looking woman, and by far the handsomest candidate among the four Democrats running for Ted Kennedy's seat.

Call it the babe factor.

Start with the Globe staffer's explanation, over at Esquire.com, of why Tigergate should come as no surprise. Then read Pierce's 1997 profile of Woods, which does indeed anticipate Woods' fall from grace:

"I believe that Tiger will break the gospel"--i.e., the myth of Woods as a heaven-sent superhuman--"before the gospel breaks him.

So says a recent, no-nonsense memo from outgoing publisher Steve Ainsley. Five percent less, to be precise--so they're still doing a bit better than their unionized colleagues:

Dear Colleagues,

We are in the final stages of completing the 2010 budget and have carefully reviewed our revenue and expense estimates for the year ahead.

Interesting, this: the Herald's story on GOP gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker's new running mate, State Sen. Richard Tisei, doesn't mention Tisei's sexuality once.

The Globe, however, takes a different tack. Last week, Frank Phillips cited Tisei's orientation in a piece on Baker's shortlist of possible running mates--albeit in casual terms, as my Phoenix colleague David Bernstein aptly noted

A few minutes ago, I raised some questions about Jeff Jacoby's column on Barack Obama's allegedly outsized ego. One of my queries: had Jacoby--who notes that Obama used the pronoun "I" 34 times in his speech announcing the federal takeover of GM--sought similar data on other presidents? And if so, why hadn't he included it?

I don't want to waste too much time on Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby's assault on Barack Obama's ego, because it's literally yesterday's news. I do, however, have a few questions after reading Jacoby's piece:

--Jacoby hits Obama for not going to Germany this past week to mark the 20th anniversary of the Berlin Wall's fall.

In this week's Phoenix, I size up the ongoing feud between Herald columnist Howie Carr and "Ernie Boch, III," his mysterious Blue Mass. Group-based tormentor. (Note: EB3, as he's frequently called, is no relation to car magnate Ernie Boch, Jr.) In the process, I argue that Carr doesn't really seem to understand his nemesis--and that, despite some strong ideological and biographical differences between the two, there are some noteworthy similarities as well.

Some things to ponder in the wake of today's news that the New York Times Co. won't be selling the Boston Globe after all (Herald story here, Globe story here, entire memo to follow):

1. Given the speed with which the Times Co. decided to reject the bids assembled by Steve Taylor and Platinum, it seems--at least from the outside--like not a lot of deliberation was required.

As reported earlier today by Bruce Allen of Boston Sports Media Watch, there are some big changes afoot at the Globe's sports desk--including the hiring of Albert Breer from the Sporting News to replace Mike Reiss; Adam Kilgore moving from Red Sox to Patriots coverage; Chris Gasper taking over Tony Massarotti's online-columnist slot; and Julian Benbow moving to the Celtics beat.

The Globe story of the moment is the (possibly) impending sale of the paper--but mounting resistance to a new, high-cost health plan among the members of the paper's biggest union is a noteworthy subplot.

Earlier this afternoon, a letter went out from more than 100 employees to publisher Steve Ainsley. They're asking management to restore a "significant portion" of $1.

Just received an email sent from several Globe staffers to the leadership of the Boston Newspaper Guild (with the exception of the embattled Dan Totten), in which they ask the union to find some way to avoid implementation of what sounds like a very bare-bones healthcare plan.

In terms of management-union and intra-union dynamics at the Globe, what's really striking is the paragaph in which the signers claim they received misleading information from the NYT Co.