What the Hell is Happening at the Washington Post

One very minor sign of the collapse is a view of who signs whose bill which can not easily be reconciled with the Constitution

Bush Restates Vow to Block Iraq Withdrawal

President says congressional Democrats are jeopardizing safety of military service members by refusing to sign his $100B war funding bill.

As I recalled congress writes the bills and the President decides whether to sign them or not. Presidential proposals to congress have no legal standing. The idea that congress ever would simply agree to a text written elsewhere (as the President does when he signs a bill) is shocking when coming from George the 43rd. Coming from Washington Post staff writer Bill Brubaker it is appalling. No reasonable reporter would dream of opening with a restatement of Bush's proposal to turn the legislative process on its head written in his own voice as if he played hooky from his junior high school civics class just as junior did.

As I said, this is minor compared to the true horror noted by atrios here in which the fact that EFD's, which the Bush administration claims are made in Iran are in fact made in Iraq was posted at www.washingtonpost.com then supressed and replaced by a reference to the Bush administration's disproven claim.

Or the fact noted by TeddySanFran at Firedoglake that WaPo reporter Lindsey Layton claims that an editor removed her lead paragraph criticizing Florida congressman Adam Putnam, new head of the Republican Conference Committee, thereby making the article a puff piece.

Or the fact noted by little old me (and linked by my main man Kevin who referred to me as Robert showing we are on a first name basis) that the key incriminating lines in one of Kyle Sampson's e-mails was posted on www.washingtonpost.com then deleted.

There is now a clear systematic pattern of editorial deletions and modifications of the sort Republicans would order if they could. Looks like they can and do.

I think the Washington Post can only save its reputation by identifying the editor or editors who sure seem to be acting as Republican operatives and then firing them if they can't come up with a non partisan explanation of their decisions which suppress information inconvenient to Republicans.


update: I am not reassured that I just took an online popup "reader feedback survey" hoping to express my concerns and found that it asked me what I thought of Lockheed Martin, if I had seen an on line add for Lockheed Martin, if it piqued my interest and if I have anything to do with defense procurement. The Washington Post doesn't seem to care what I think of their journalism (I guess I shouldn't be surprised)