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With So Many Staffers Rushing for the Exits, Washington Post Should Just Remove the Door From the Hinges

Brad Slager
Brad Slager  |  Jul 28, 2025
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.

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Reporting on the Mirror – WASHINGTON POST

  • Does anyone have dibs on Glenn’s red stapler?

The list of WaPo names fleeing the paper continues to grow, as the announcement came today that resident fact-checker Glenn Kessler would be accepting the offer of a buyout. The veteran of nearly three decades will be making his final truth detection on July 31.

No word yet on whether there will be a replacement for Glenn’s brand of factual analysis – that is to say, re-interpreting facts to fit an agenda. Kessler’s record is very well known to us, and we have detailed his exploits over the years. Glenn has always placed highly on our “Townhall 50,” the annual rundown of the worst journalism of the year.

It would be tough to find a “worst” example from Glenn, so we’ll just go with two favorites. The first displays how the supposed final word on the facts did not do the work needed to obtain those final words.

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He tried to defend Pete Buttigieg after declaring that bridges were racist because they were made low to prevent buses from taking minorities to New York beaches. Glenn explained this claim was fully valid as he cited a book about the career of city planner Robert Moses, which he described as “a majestic biography.” He then came back the next day to correct his column to explain “this story has been largely debunked,” as the bridges were all built to existing standards, and were crossing roadways that did not permit commercial traffic.

Another shining example was the time he achieved a wrong-trifect on Xitter. His fact-check on George Soros donating to Alvin Bragg’s campaign received a Community Note correction, and as he flailed to defend himself, he ended up being shown to be wrong yet again with another community note. He then denied that the second note was accurate by relying on the headline and not the accuracy pointed out in the article.

Pulitzer Prize Nomination – NBC NEWS

  • When you are simping for a crazy cat lady, that really is the time to reassess your career choices.

NBC News decided to really abandon journalistic integrity and unbiased reporting — as well as common sense — on a story of a Seattle citizen protesting the flying of the Navy’s Blue Angels squadron. The breakdown of this is somewhat involved, but to summarize, a resident is suing the Blue Angels because their loud noise led to her cat’s death.

Now, for the details. The cat did not die from the jets flying overhead, but from heart disease. But allegedly her final days saw that “she died knowing only fear when she should have known only love." But the lawsuit is not based on the death of the cat.

It is over censorship.

The Instagram account of the Blue Angels blocked Lombardi after her rather caustic post to the flyers: 

"Stop with your F------g bull---- you are terrorizing my cat and all the other animals and wildlife," Lombardi wrote to the squadron via Instagram on Aug. 3 last year. "Nobody gives a f--- about your stupid little planes."

She tried to direct message the aviators but found that, too, was not delivered due to the blocking of her account. As a result, she is suing over what she describes as an act of cowardly censorship:

They called their performances "auditory carpet bombing" with the "subtlety of a military occupation."They described squad commanders as "emotionally fragile snowflakes" who blocked the plaintiff on social media, transforming "personal tragedy into Constitutional treason."

It should also be noted that as the press has been struggling with assigning gender to humans who are giving birth, here NBC News seemed just fine describing Lombardi and her husband (who filed the suit) as the cat’s “human mother” and “human father.”

Anti-Social Media – PUBLIC BROADCASTING SERVICE

  • You all realize that was not your money to lobby with, correct?

As NPR and PBS are dealing with the after-effects of their federal funding being pulled, a new item emerged to show that ending that financial support was probably the wise decision. At the Media Resource Center, Joseph Vasquez found that in one year, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — which operated entirely with taxpayer dollars — had given about $600,000 to the Poynter organization, the outfit behind PolitiFact.

The two entities have partnered on a few projects, and notably, PBS and NPR have managed to maintain their claims of down-the-middle news reporting by never receiving a fact-check from Poynter’s corrective website.

Demolition Project – CBS

  • What is the opposite of a “groundswell,” a crater?

This weekend, a rally was planned to both lend support for and protest against the cancellation of Stephen Colbert’s “The Late Show.” We may have some firm evidence now that all of the outrage seen for over a week has been a wholly media-manufactured controversy.

The “We’re With Colbert” rally was not exactly a firestorm of public activism. Considering this was in New York City makes the fact that they could not even inspire two dozen people to come out is all the more sad and pathetic.

Low-Octane Gaslighting – THE DAILY BEAST

  • What does it say when a supposed news outlet cannot obtain widely known evidence?

While visiting Scotland, President Trump has, of course, done his share of golfing. It was seen this weekend that they debuted a new armored golf cart, given that the second attempt made on Trump’s life last year took place at a golf course.

Well, if that is in fact true. We say this because despite the fact that a known gunman was apprehended and arrested, The Daily Beast described this as an “alleged” attempt on his life.

Anti-Social Media – TIME MAGAZINE

  • Since they did not listen, you should not read.

TIME came out with one of those desperate-for-traffic lists, coming up with its “definitive” list of the 100 podcasts that shaped the genre. Amazingly (but not surprisingly), it did not include the biggest show, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” nor Adam Corolla, who expanded the medium years ago. Nor will you find among the shows from news outlets like NPR and The New York Times anything approaching right-of-center media.