As I’ve mentioned before, I’m in awe of the work the New York Times has done this election season. Yes, I was angry about an early NYT interview with Donald Trump that painted him as a slightly irreverent great-uncle rather than holding him to his racist, fascistic noises, but the daily reports from the trail have been balanced, thoughtful and provocative (in the best sense of the word).

One of the key figures in the coverage has been Maggie Haberman, an excellent journalist who identifies important issues and writes about them from interesting angles. Just yesterday, she published a smart piece about Trump’s reliance on conspiracy theories he unearths by noodling around online. There’s some question as to whether the Times’ stellar work–and facts, in general–are permeating our Reality TV culture, but the news organization has held up its end of the bargain.

Haberman took time from her Super Tuesday for a Reddit Ask Me Anything. A few exchanges follow.

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Question:

Of the reporters I read, it seems you and the staff at the NYT were the most measured/cautious to not treat Trump as a “joke” candidate. Did you have any inkling early on that Trump was unlike other burnout candidates a la Herman Cain? To that point, I’m amazed that there are still skeptics within the media and particularly within the GOP that Trump can somehow be stopped — save a brokered convention — as he’s now polling nationally at 49%.

Maggie Haberman:

Hi there – nice to meet you again! Since the first debate I have not thought treating Trump like a “joke” was advisable, given where he was in the polls and given his ability to command media and survive controversies that would have killed other candidates. I also never thought he was a boom-and-bust candidate like Cain because he was a known commodity well ahead of the 2016 campaign cycle. He’s spent years being broadcast into homes of millions of people on The Apprentice, where he sat in a leather chair and looked, well, leaderly. That said, I did not think he would be as dominant as he is now and was skeptical that he could hold this plurality win. I did not think even in November that he was likely to be the nominee. And I misread early on, when he first got in, how strong he would be.

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Question:

Besides Trump, is there anything that surprised you about 2016 election?

Maggie Haberman:

Great question. One surprise has been how little super PACs have mattered. Part of that is because they basically are only useful to air ads, and negative ads still have the most currency. But given the hype about how this was going to be the super PAC election, it hasn’t worked out that way.

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Question:

How has reporting changed given the near fact-free environment we are currently in? Facts matter less than ever.

Maggie Haberman:

I don’t think it’s quite right to say facts have little to no impact. But I do think we are operating in a particularly post-truth moment, as my colleague Michael Barbaro wrote a few months ago. In this primary race, direct contradictions to what candidates have said have mattered little to their supporters in many cases.

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Question:

What is the Republican path to victory at this point? If Trump wins, some have already started to mull a third party and many say they won’t support him. Will they just focus on down ballots? Is there any chance of a big name third party run?

Maggie Haberman:

There’s a chance – Mike Bloomberg is still considering it, and there might be others. But a third party run is logistically really, really hard and expensive, in terms of petitions to get on ballots. Trump could have a path to victory but the refusal to disavow Duke on CNN on Sunday — and while I know he said he had an earpiece problem, he answered Jake Tapper repeatedly and showed no evidence of not hearing the questions — will linger in a general, and makes it easier for other Republicans to criticize him.•