Washington Post to Truthiness

STFU.

I mean, seriously. Deborah Howell wrote a piece that featured the GOP talking point of "Abramoff gave to both Democrats and Republicans." The fact is that this is not the truth, and Howell could have discovered this via a simple Google search, which she chose not to do, which is another sign of how shoddy her reporting is. Her entire piece carried water - water full of lies - for the GOP, and when commenters on the Washington Post blog complained about it, she had the comments on the blog shut down because some of them were hateful and used profanity.

At its inception, the purpose of this blog was to open a dialogue about this site, the events of the day, the journalism of The Washington Post Company and other related issues. Among the things that we knew would be part of that discussion would be the news and opinion coming from the pages of The Washington Post and washingtonpost.com. We knew a lot of that discussion would be critical in nature. And we were fine with that. Great journalism companies need feedback from readers to stay sharp.

But there are things that we said we would not allow, including personal attacks, the use of profanity and hate speech. Because a significant number of folks who have posted in this blog have refused to follow any of those relatively simple rules, we've decided not to allow comments for the time being. It's a shame that it's come to this. Transparency and reasoned debate are crucial parts of the Web culture, and it's a disappointment to us that we have not been able to maintain a civil conversation, especially about issues that people feel strongly (and differently) about.

How is this any different from Bush's "we need to have an open and honest debate about the war, but Democrats are hurting America by engaging in that kind of speech." This is the kind of reporting I'd expect out of a propaganda outlet, not an institute that practices journalism. How can commenters remain civil when Howell disrespects all of them by publishing her dishonest column? That's a slap in the face to everyone who reads it.

I'm going to get some popcorn and wait for the next "blogs don't have standards and are inferior to established journamalism" article. Maybe some nachos. But no Snickers bars.

Update: Here's Howell's lame response with all the comments before the WaPo shut it down. The comments are awesome. The only profanity I've found so far has been one instance of "shit." One of my favorites:

Dear Mrs. Howell,

Gilligan, the Skipper, the Professor and Mary Ann all voted you off the island.

Thurston Howell III says he wants a divorce.

Better start looking for a raft.

Heeee :)