WaPost, Embrace the Neutral
Last week the Washington Post endured a scandal of its own making: a newly-signed blogger, Ben Domenech, resigned only a week after being hired to be the "conservative" blogger on WashingtonPost.com, which is, oddly, separate both editorially and geographically from the Washington Post.
"Dot com," as Post insiders call their web site, with disdain, made a huge blunder in hiring a Republican party mouthpiece who is 24 and had plagiarized wildly in his past. My (unsolicited) advice to the paper press, specifically the WaPost, whose subscriptions are falling, but I still love, is thus:
1. You have one brand. While in 1999 it might have made sense to have a "dot com," it no longer does. Realize that the editorial decisions made at dot com impact the Post.
2. While all of your reporters work hard to get the story neutral, most readers don't separate the reporting and the editorial. Ergo they think that your reporting is biased. The fact that the Post editorial board supported the Iraq war undermines its reporting on this issue, in most peoples' minds, desite what you do.
3. Do what you are best at, which is reporting neutrally. Neutrality doesn't mean having a left wing blogger opposed to a right wing blogger. That is watching Tucker Carlson. Rather, it means getting the story as best you know how. This is what differentiates the Post and is why people pay for the subscriptions.
4. Finally, please don't simplify the debate so much, as the hiring of Domenech did. You, the Wa Post, do influence the conversation of the world. Does the Post really endorse, via its Masthead, a gay-hating, anti-abortion idiot to represent the Right, and, more broadly, non-liberal America? The Right, if there is such a thing, also includes me and other TtPers who are pro-abortion, anti-drug law and pro-gay. We have nothing in common with some 24 year-old social conservative who wants me to fry in the ninth circle of hell while he goes and rips off other articles.
"Dot com," as Post insiders call their web site, with disdain, made a huge blunder in hiring a Republican party mouthpiece who is 24 and had plagiarized wildly in his past. My (unsolicited) advice to the paper press, specifically the WaPost, whose subscriptions are falling, but I still love, is thus:
1. You have one brand. While in 1999 it might have made sense to have a "dot com," it no longer does. Realize that the editorial decisions made at dot com impact the Post.
2. While all of your reporters work hard to get the story neutral, most readers don't separate the reporting and the editorial. Ergo they think that your reporting is biased. The fact that the Post editorial board supported the Iraq war undermines its reporting on this issue, in most peoples' minds, desite what you do.
3. Do what you are best at, which is reporting neutrally. Neutrality doesn't mean having a left wing blogger opposed to a right wing blogger. That is watching Tucker Carlson. Rather, it means getting the story as best you know how. This is what differentiates the Post and is why people pay for the subscriptions.
4. Finally, please don't simplify the debate so much, as the hiring of Domenech did. You, the Wa Post, do influence the conversation of the world. Does the Post really endorse, via its Masthead, a gay-hating, anti-abortion idiot to represent the Right, and, more broadly, non-liberal America? The Right, if there is such a thing, also includes me and other TtPers who are pro-abortion, anti-drug law and pro-gay. We have nothing in common with some 24 year-old social conservative who wants me to fry in the ninth circle of hell while he goes and rips off other articles.
posted by Jess @ 3/26/2006
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