Watching The Watchmen

We noted the front page evaluation of the Washington Post's pre-war coverage, by Howard Kurtz, on Wednesday.

Take a look at the reader response from Saturday's edition; the word unfavorable comes to mind. Here's a sample.

So the stories skeptical of weapons of mass destruction were "incremental, difficult-to-read stories." Howard Kurtz's report on The Post's prewar coverage repeatedly cited the difficulty of editing such stories.

Who said editing a newspaper was supposed to be easy? Newspapers fill an essential role in our system. The Post's uncritical coverage failed the nation, and the excuse proffered by some of its top editors is that it was (self-) victimized by "groupthink" and that it would have been "difficult" to swim against the stream?

What do they pay you guys for anyway?

BILL KALISH
Alexandria

I believe these days employees of the Post are specifically paid not to swim against the stream.