Sad that The New York Times copies sentences from its own, previously published stories

"Nearly four years behind schedule, several tons overweight and as much as 7 billion euros ($10.6 billion) over budget, the A400M has become a financial albatross for Airbus and its parent company, European Aeronautic Defense and Space. The company has already written off 2.4 billion euros in costs for a project that continues to expend cash at a rate of around 100 million euros each month." - (Source: Hopes for Costly Plane Are Riding on a Test Flight, The New York Times, 3-Dec-09)


"The A400M has become a financial albatross for Airbus and EADS: nearly four years behind schedule, several tons overweight and as much as €7 billion, or $10.6 billion, over budget. EADS has already written off €2.4 billion in costs for a project that continues to expend cash at a rate of around €100 million each month." - (Source: Airbus Issues Warning on Military Plane Project, The New York Times, 12-Jan-10)


"EADS has already written off 2.4 billion euros in costs for a project that continues to expend cash at a rate of about 100 million euros each month." - (Source: No Progress in Talks for Financing of European Military Plane, The New York Times, 22-Jan-10)


Since when did The New York Times start lengthening its stories by copying stuff from previous stories? Does NYT believe that its readers don't read with enough concentration and interest to be able to remember previously read words, phrases and sentences? What is sad is that the author(s) have chosen to use classic methods to avoid accusations of plagiarism - changing the order of phrases and sentences, replacing € with euro and euro with €, and so on, something that I did not expect from NYT.

Really sad. Because I enjoy reading NYT and trust it.