FORMER TOP EDITOR AT `TIMES' TELLS OF OUSTER.(MAIN)

Byline: TARA BURGHART Associated Press

NEW YORK -- Howell Raines, the former executive editor of The New York Times, said in his first public interview since resigning over the Jayson Blair scandal that he stepped aside only because of pressure from Publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr.

``Arthur said, `I don't think we can calm this place down. ... I'm having to ask you to step aside,''' Raines said Friday on ``The Charlie Rose Show.''

Raines resigned June 5, five weeks after the discovery that Blair had fabricated parts of stories and lifted material from other publications.

Asked by Rose whether he would have quit on his own, Raines said, ``I …