Jim Brady, executive editor of washingtonpost.com, decided Thursday to temporarily take down a blog popular with readers after hundreds of hateful comments, profanities and personal attacks directed at Ombudsman Deborah Howell inundated the blog, reports Editor & Publisher. The Post staff was apparently unable to keep up with having to sift through the torrent of comments. In a controversial column on Sunday, she stated (incorrectly) that notorious lobbyist Jack Abramoff had given money to Democrats, too, not just Republicans - whereas "most research shows he only gave directly to Republicans," according to the article.
"We got about 1,000 posts and at least 150 to 200 were using…profanity, hate speech or personal attacks," Brady said.
The blog, post.blog, is one of two dozen for Post readers and was launched in November to allow comments on Post-related issues. Brady said the blog would be back and speculated a better filter might block profanity or anonymous comments.
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