Column: Vanishing Domestic Bureaus a Blow to Post’s National Reputation
It’s a blow to the paper’s news coverage. It’s demoralizing to the staff. But just as importantly, it’s a blow to the paper’s image as a national newspaper. Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli, who came from the Wall Street Journal, may disagree.
Watergate helped the Post earn a national reputation
In fact, he was quoted in the Post as saying: “We are not a national news organization of record serving a general audience.”
The facts be told — there may be some wiggle room for semantics here — but he’s wrong. The Post is a unique paper. It’s clearly a local paper, but yes, it is clearly a national newspaper, up there with the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, LA Times and USA Today, that serves a general audience around the country that has come to rely on it for national politics and national and international news.
As far as being a “paper of record”, I’m not really sure what that really means anymore. Is the New York Times the only paper of record?
Image may not be everything, but it’s important to newspapers. The Post has an image as a world class newspaper that provides in depth local, national and international coverage. That’s good for business.
It is the paper that broke Watergate and the secret CIA prisons overseas, the paper that has stood up to the mightiest of powers. It is the paper that has won many Pulitzers for its local, national and international coverage.
As far as substance, the Post bureaus have generated some great journalism over the years. Can the paper do as well parachuting in reporters for the big stories in big towns like Chicago and New York? Can they serve readers as well by using free lance writers? The answer is most likely no. As the cuts come, the paper has to be careful its credo does not become “Good Enough”.
Of all the bureaus, it would make most sense to at least keep a business reporter in New York to cover Wall Street. That’s still a big story. And will be for some time to come. The Post should have someone on the ground there. It just makes sense.
Understandably, these are rotten times for many newspapers. The economy sucks. Cuts need to be made. But too many cuts in the long run may do the paper far more harm than good, financially and journalistically.
The Washington Post needs to continue generating original, solid content for the paper and the website. It’s good business.
Unfortunately, perhaps, the Post’s readers have been spoiled over the years. They’re a sophisticated lot that has come to expect a lot. They haven’t often been disappointed. And many won’t start settling for less in good times or bad.
Filed under: Guild News
Loading ...
Alan
I couldn’t agree more. This is a sad day for what was, most certainly, a national even international newspaper. And the decision reflects a misreading of its audience, which is the best educated in the nation and expects a sophisticated read. When we moved to Washington in the mid-1990s, my wife–a born New Yorker–found herself missing the New York Times (where I currently work) not at all. The Post delivered a sophisticated national and international report, and erudite movie, art and book critics and coverage, not to mention a fine magazine. To claim now, as Brauchli does, that the Washington Post is returning to its local roots, is ridiculous. Brauchl’s intellectual dishonesty and lack of courage adds to my dismay at this move
Best
Michael.
Allan,
Unfortunately, nobody cares anymore except journalists and former journalists. And we have become so inwardly looking and at times full of self-pity that rest of the world, who gets its information from the vast Internet and social media portals, has past us by. Mourn the closings, but remember we are still at the station while the trains have left years ago. Look at those papers that you worked at in Detroit. At this point in time, there is a good chance they won’t be around in a year. I hate to say survival is a fact of life but its better than extinction.
[...] closing these domestic bureaus a significant blow to the Post? Former reporter Allen Lengel thinks so: As far as substance, the Post bureaus have generated some great journalism over the years. Can the [...]