posted by trina in Currents.

The Washington Post apparently is feeling the heat for its atrocious coverage of the DSM last week. Dana Milbank’s snide, childish column generated a storm of protest to the Post.

But more importantly, although they haven’t admitted it, Michael Smith, the reporter who received the documents, has revealed that he got them eight months ago, and tried to give them to the US press, but they were not interested.

I Know most of us thought they were first made public on May 1st of this year, (the first one) and then more released later.

I hope Michael Smith eventually tells us which news outlets he sent them to. I would imagine he would have tried the WP and the NYT.

However, the Post seems to be having second thoughts about their lack of coverage, and the ombudsman wrote this column this week, but if the Post knew about the memo/minutes, they have a lot to explain, imo.

There was a torrent of critical e-mails and calls about a Washington Sketch column on June 17 by Post columnist Dana Milbank that appeared in the news section and was about the unofficial hearing on Iraq held by Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) and other opponents of the war the day before. I thought it was a serious mistake for editors to assign a columnist to cover a news event. There are large numbers of people who oppose the war and care about what Conyers was trying to accomplish, and a reporter should have covered the event as news. If a columnist wants to write a separate piece with his take on it, that’s fine. But it is not enough by itself.

Washington Post Ombudsman

He seems to be apologizing for lack of coverage of the war also, especially the deaths of the troops.

But what the Post should have done was to publish Rep. Conyers response to Dana Milbank erronious column, with an apology for the actual untruths contained in that column. Instead, they defended Milbank, and he himself never issued an apology.

But it looks like the truth is getting out without them. They have a lot to answer for. They could have helped to stop this war, and they chose instead, to go along with the propaganda. Too late now for these kinds of half admissions that they ‘aren’t doing enough’. I guess they are beginning to feel irrelevant.