The Washington Post taught that lesson to pols during the Watergate scandal a generation ago. They didn’t learn it themselves. The WaPo ombudsman exposes the initial reaction of the newspaper to the “salon” scandal—wherein WaPo would get money, lobbyists would get access to pols, and pols would get favorable coverage—as a lie. Ed Morrissey provides the vital comparison of what WaPo said in the hours after the story broke to the reality reported now.
I also noted this passage from the ombudsman’s report:
But Pelton raised questions about some of those very issues in a May 21 e-mail to Weymouth, Brauchli and Stephen P. Hills, The Post’s president and general manager. Pelton reports to Hills, who declined to be interviewed.
So the publisher of the Washington Post sends the ombudsman to investigate something, and this guy “declines”? I think the nation’s pols have a new standard to invoke when refusing to speak with WaPo reporters. Or perhaps Hills will shortly have a new job, elsewhere.
UPDATE: Separately, Ed notes that Obambi’s highly fluid ethics rules prohibit his minions getting free dinners from lobbyists, but not from journalists pimping for lobbyists. Convenient, no?
