Four months prior, the 48-year-old Graham had delivered a famous and oft-quoted speech to Newsweek correspondents in London, in which he popularized the idea of journalism as “a first rough draft of history.” (Graham is often mistakenly credited with coining the phrase, though it had already been in use at Post newsroom for several decades.)

The year leading up to Graham’s death was a turbulent one for him and his family. In 1962, he began an affair with Australian journalist Robin Webb, for whom he would later threaten to divorce his wife Katharine Meyer Graham. With Webb, he traveled to a publishing convention in Phoenix and caused a stir when, taking the microphone in a manic state, he started talking about the alleged affairs of John F. Kennedy, with whom he had been closely associated for some time.

Post vice president James Truitt arranged with Kennedy to send Air Force 2 to retrieve Graham, who checked in for the first of two brief stays at Chestnut Lodge, then a leading psychiatric hospital in Rockville, Md., that has since burned down. There he was diagnosed with manic depression, a condition today known as bipolar disorder. On Aug. 3, having apparently made noticeable improvements, he convinced doctors to let him take a retreat to the Virginia farmhouse. He committed suicide that day.

Truitt, an intimate of the Grahams whom Ben Bradlee would later force to resign, committed suicide himself in 1981, still despondent over his treatment at the newspaper after Philip’s death.

Katharine Graham revealed in her 1997 autobiography Personal History (which her biographer Deborah Davis reviewed for Washington City Paper) that she felt her husband received inadequate treatment at Chestnut Lodge, going so far as to say that his condition required electroshock therapy. For her part, Katharine would go on to helm the Post, becoming its de facto publisher during the famed Watergate era and, in 1979, becoming the first woman to hold the title officially.

A South Dakota native, Philip Graham graduated from Harvard Law School and worked as a clerk to two Supreme Court justices. In 1940, he married Katharine, daughter of millionaire Post owner Eugene Meyer, who made Graham publisher in 1946. Two years later, the Grahams took control of the Post Company stock.

During his time in D.C., Graham rubbed shoulders with a group of like-minded politicos known as the Georgetown Set, and came to know both Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. In fact, Graham played a significant role in convincing JFK to appoint Johnson to the vice presidency instead of Missouri Senator Stuart Symington. Graham also had a hand in the appointments of no less than three more friends to the Kennedy administration, including then-Secretary of the Treasury Douglas Dillon.

WJLA-TV is reporting an "escalated response" to today's suspicious package at 19th and F Streets NW, which had authorities tied up for five hours, sealing off several square blocks surrounding the World Bank and parts of the George Washington University campus.

Some witnesses may have even heard a "small explosion," according the local ABC affiliate's Jennifer Donelan, who describes the overall level of police response as "much greater than normal, especially since the city sees as many as four suspicious-object calls a day."

Police Chief Cathy Lanier is reportedly on the scene, along with U.S. Secret Service. 

The television news report somewhat differs from a more down-played account in the college press. The GW Hatchet quotes MPD spokesperson Gwendolyn Crump describing the package as "not hazardous," adding, however, "They are still in the process of examining it."

UPDATE, 1:20 p.m.-D.C. Fire and EMS confirms via Twitter "no hazard" and "no injuries." MPD is investigating.

UPDATE, 1:40p.m.-Bomb squad units have "'disrupted' the object," WJLA reports, which authorities now describe as harmless:

George Washington University students, who had a clear view of the object, described it as a pipe wrapped in black tape, apparently to simulate the appearance of a pipe bomb.

The FBI has taken over the investigation of the incident, setting up a tent on 19th Street.

UPDATE, 2:14 p.m.-CNN reports that a "terrorism task force" will now study today's incident as a sort of object lesson in suspicious objects: "The focus of police attention appeared to be a hoax device that looked like a long microphone with tape on it, a law enforcement source said. It also could have looked like a pipe, the source said."

UPDATE, 2:18 p.m.-"19th Street mostly reopen," WaPo's Dr. Gridlock reports, "Authorities report the item was in a suitcase and a portion of the street will remain closed for about another 30 minutes."

UPDATE, 2:20 p.m.-The FBI tells WaPo the suspicious package at 19th and F streets NW contained "what looked like a pipe bomb, but it was not a bomb."

UPDATE, 3 p.m.-Not to be outdone, WTOP now reports on another suspicious package across town in Columbia Heights, where the local Metro station is closed on account of the curious object: "D.C. Police say the package is a silver and black briefcase at the corner of 14th and Irving streets in Northwest. Part of 14th Street is also closed in the area."

UPDATE, 3:31 p.m.- WaPo's Rick Rojas reports from the scene that the suspicious package turns out to be "a suitcase full of tools," screwdrivers and such. It looked like "old-school luggage," Rojas notes. The Columbia Heights Metro station is now back open.

UPDATE, 3:58 p.m.-"Fans gather around 'suspicious package' outside Nationals Park," according to a Mediabistro report. Turns out to be the name of a rock band performing at the 49th annual Roll Call Congressional Baseball Game.

The Virginian-Pilot reported Saturday that the seal on Cuccinelli's staff pins is different from the one usually used by the state. While the typical seal has Roman goddess Virtus baring one breast, in Cuccinnelli's version, both mammaries are covered with armor. How very John Ashcroft of him! When he passed out the pins, Cuccinnelli said the new version was more modest.

WaPo has Cuccinnelli saying he was joking, but that doesn't stop porn mustache cultivator Larry Sabato from dropping in for a laugh at Cuccinelli's expense:

The joke might be on him, said University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato.“When you ask to be ridiculed, it usually happens. And it will happen here, nationally,” he said. “This is classical art, for goodness’ sake.”

WAMU's Kojo Nnamdi, who is never modest in his loud shirts, gave outgoing Loose Lips Mike Debonis a Bud Light-inspired "Real Kojo Guests of Genius" send-off on Friday. Highlight: calling Debonis the "warlock of the Wilson Building."

Meanwhile, the Unification Church is looking for buyers for the Washington Times. Former editor John Solomon is listed as a potential buyer, but I've got a better idea.

Philip Anschutz, the conservative mogul behind the Examiner and the Weekly Standard, should buy it. He gets a marginally more respected publication, and a higher-tier stable of conservative pundits. It's the perfect opportunity to dump Gregory Kane!

Adam Eidinger, for one, thinks it's all a bad trip. The former Green Party candidate for Shadow Senator Representative and co-founder of Capitol Hemp says city lawmakers really need to chill out. "They're rushing it through!" Eidinger told attendees last night at the hemp shop's two-year anniversary party at the Rock & Roll Hotel on H Street NE. If the Washington Post supports the bill, Eidinger says, "you just know there's something wrong with it."

Coinciding with "National Weed Day," the hemp event and City Council vote also came on the same day that actor Kal Penn, star of the Harold & Kumar stoner-flick franchise, was reportedly robbed at gunpoint in the District. Harsh!

Somewhere amid the fog of last night's party, a guy I never met graciously passed me a small round object with a wink and a nod. What am I supposed to do with it? I asked him. Eat it?

"It's a button, dude," he says.

Oh.

Turns out, the guy's just promoting the evening's performers, reggae duo Nappy Riddem.

Upstairs, in the VIP area, a bartender hips me to the hemp crowd's big issue with the new legislation, the set limit on personal possession–just two ounces per month! That's simply not enough for some people, she says.

An array of fancy glass bongs displayed along the bar were being auctioned off throughout the evening. The bidding was up to $436 for one pipe in particular.

"I can't smoke out of these anymore," one guy tells me. "Tastes like wood." He prefers the more watery flavors of a vaporizer, he says. The bartender concurs.

Our conversation quickly turned to the new legislation, which vapor guy also has issues with, although he says, if it passes, he hopes to get in on the product's distribution.

He goes on to tell me about some mythical stoner mecca in West Virginia. "If you like disc golf, it's the place to be," he says.

He even gives me directions: "Go to Berkeley Springs, take a right at 7-11 and drive 30 miles..."

The scenery can't be beat. "It's the darkest place in the United States," he says. "You see every star in the sky."

But Jenkins took a short break from the confessional to say that in a previous post I'd made an error about how extensive the Jenkins/Armstrong library is: "By the way," she wrote, "tell Dave McKenna it’s only two books with Armstrong, not 'several.'"

Those words hurt, coming from such a high place. And her allegation seems so dead-on; I really had written that she wrote "several" books, and she really had only written two. And the first of several online dictionaries I visited in hopes of a reprieve gave definitions of "several" that indicated I was guilty as charged.

But then I thought of Lance, who would never ever just cave and admit his accusers were right, no matter how obvious his guilt, no matter how strong the evidence.

So on I googled...

...and I found this: "Several (sev ar ul) adj. As in many, multiple, more than one, quite a few, boy what a lot of 'em, etc."

"MORE THAN ONE!"

Ok, so it ain't Webster's. It's a definition used by the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's bio-chemistry department.

I'll ride with them!

So...while RPI nerds would clear me of your charges, Sally, I wonder what this gaggle of bio-chemists would say about Lance's guilt if given a look-see at several CC's of his vintage pee pee!

And while I've got you, Sally: You said in the comments section that you explored the Armstrong/Contador alliance because it was like watching Joan Crawford and Bette Davis brawl.

Well, in that very same column about Lance and Contador, you mention him being interviewed by Frankie Andreu.

Frankie Andreu? Lance's former teammate and most credible accuser? The guy whose accusation, in a court case, put the "Lance Is a Doper!" charges into high gear? The guy who never retracted his damning testimony?

That Frankie Andreu?

Heck, if Armstrong/Contador is like Joan Crawford/Bette Davis, then isn't Armstrong/Andreu like Joan Crawford vs. the dude who wrote "Mommie Dearest"?

Who wouldn't want to read how Lance feels about talking to his primary accuser? But that relationship gets no play in your Washington Post copy.

That's why some of us dwell on whether these Tour de France stories are affected by the several (RIP, RPI dictionary!) two books you've written with Lance.

Sorry for rambling through the Pyrenees here, Sally. It really was fab of you to stop by. Please come again.

"You all think it is inappropriate to hire a girlfriend. I don't think it is. In fact, there is no law against it," Barry told The Washington Post. When asked whether he would hire another woman he becomes romantically involved with, Barry said, "Unless the law changes, why not?

Maybe he wouldn't have done all of it over again, particularly the Denver hotel room drama. Maybe he wouldn't even have his camp constantly text and call Watts-Brighthaupt throughout this ordeal in an attempt to get her to recant or who knows what. Watts-Brighthaupt was never sure what his people wanted from her post-July 4. Maybe he wouldn't have insisted on labeling her "unstable" and giving her some kind of disorder.

What is so disappointing about the Post story is that the reporter doesn't call Barry's bluff. In fact, Barry had tried to do it all over again. On June 29, the councilmember offered Watts-Brighthaupt a new lucrative contract. And she turned him down in a scathing e-mail response.

"I feel as if I'm selling my soul to you for the tax payer’s dollar,” Watts-Brighthaupt wrote. At least one person in that relationship eventually believed those contract deals were fishy.

While we're on the subject of setting the record straight, the Washington Post printed an error in a previous story on the Watts-Brighthaupt affair. If not an error than a real whopper of a misquote. In Friday's story on the council's probe, the Post writes:

"In an interview yesterday with The Washington Post, Watts-Brighthaupt raised further questions about the contract when she said she was hired to study Barry's political life. That would appear to contradict the terms of the contract, which said she would consult on 'poverty reduction strategies.'"

In interviews with Watts-Brighthaupt, she told us that she was interested in studying Barry and his grasp on local politics. That's what attracted her to him in the first place. But she has always stated to us that she was hired to develop or consult on the Young Emerging Leaders program. She was never paid to study Barry. After the Post piece ran, she called us to complain about the error.

Some cancellations to report:

First and worst: Boxer Jimmy Lange's scheduled July 25 fight in Greensboro, N.C., is off. A Lange spokesman told me over the weekend that the cancellation, first reported by the great local boxing clearinghouse boxingaroundthebeltway.com, came "out of the blue" after North Carolina  authorities refused to sanction Lange's opponent, Jimmy LeBlanc. Lange's camp surmises that LeBlanc's record (12–16–4, with 10 of the losses coming in his last 12 fights) had regulators fearing a mismatch with the former cast member of NBC's reality fight show, "The Contender." Lange, from Great Falls, had hoped to use the Greensboro bout, his first outside of Fairfax since gaining TV stardom, to expand his considerable fan base beyond the beltway.

And Bruce Smith's hometown of Virginia Beach has cancelled a festival to honor the former Redskins defensive end. The cancellation comes after Smith was convicted last week of DUI, following his franchise-record-breaking third drunk driving arrest in the last 12 years.

Also, there will be no Allen Iverson Celebrity Softball or Flag Football games around here this year. The former Georgetown star's events had been held for several years at Prince George's Stadium and attracted an impressive number of big-name sports celebs to our area. Iverson this year moved the party to the Tidewater region of Virginia, the stomping grounds, so to speak, of his youth. Iverson's three-day shindig, now called the CrossOver Celebrity Weekend, was thrown over the weekend.

Tom Sedlacek, a spokesman for Prince George's Stadium, says: "We were open to holding it here again this year, and kept dates open on our calendar, but apparently there was no interest from [Iverson] to do it here."

I wonder if Iverson let Josh Howard sing the National Anthem this year?

AFTER THE JUMP: Asian Bias™ resurfaces at OTHER U.S. Open? Brock Lesnar needs some time to heel? Dan Snyder vintage videotapes? ANOTHER Sean Taylor ode?

***

Back to ignoring all that Post-Racial America talk: Turns out it's not just Congressional or the AT&T National that has an Asian Bias™! Yesterday's U.S. Women's Open golf championship had Eun Hee Ji banging home a long putt on the last hole to win by a stroke over Candie Kung. First round leader Na Yeon Choi fell to ninth. Defending champ Inbee Park managed 26th place. Past winners of the three-year-old AT&T National, remember, are KJ Choi, Anthony Kim and Tiger Woods. First rule of Journalism®: Three's a trend!

The LPGA Tour, unlike the men, tried to do something to eliminate its Asian Bias™ last season, in the process revealing a profound Anti-Asian Bias™ among the folks running the tour: Commissioner Carolyn Bivens briefly instituted an "English-only" policy after a meeting with South Korean players a year ago. Really! She did! I swear! It's one of the great sports stories of our time!

Bivens' Linguistic Cleansing™ scheme was scrapped almost as soon as the Liberal Media found out about it, and now as Cheap Seats Daily goes to press, she's about to be fired. Sic Semper Douchebaggius.

***

My ultimate ultimate fighter, Brock Lesnar, retained the UFC heavyweight belt with an artless pounding of Frank Mir on Saturday night. Here's what LA Times' T.J. Simers wrote of the spectacle.

"But what does this say about us, people screaming with glee because blood is running down someone's face and he's still in there punching? What does it say about violence's voyeuristic appeal, the sight of someone being choked into unconsciousness reason for howling approval?

It's hard to believe public executions wouldn't do well. And just think of the reality TV show that's sitting there waiting to be done, instead of the weigh-in, the final meal.

When you watch something like UFC 100, there's really no reason to believe there are limits to what might entertain people."

Well, I would watch a street fight video before any highlight reel from any accepted sport. I'm not proud of that, but damn if it ain't true. But the Lesnar fight was boring until after he was done pounding Mir and told the crowd to fuck off, then told prime sponsor Bud Light to fuck off. Now THAT's entertainment!

Especially after UFC 100, anybody who likes MMA but sneers at pro wrestling is clearly of the douchebaggius genus.

***

The Gazette reports that Rosecroft Raceway's bankrupt owners are proposing selling out to a guy who plans to make the racetrack a gambling center, with poker and other table games and, maybe, a little horse racing. Cheap Seats Daily has just set the odds of all this actually happening at 1,000,000,000-1.

***

Hogs Haven posts some interviews with then-new owner Dan Snyder from 10 years ago. Watching them, and knowing how things turned out, is like listening to George Bush talk about the need to disarm Iraq in 2003.

***

A fellow named Brooks J. DeGhetto is posting on Skins fan sites about "21 Sean," a song he wrote in tribute to Sean Taylor. The critic in me says the performance is Jim Morrison-meets-"A Mighty Wind" (sample lyric: "21 Sean your spirit carries on inside of me/Wherever you are you'll be a superstar, running free/You're running free for all to see, in burgundy/and gold." Ahem.) And the rest of me says: Enough with the tributes to a guy who had about the same number of good seasons as arrests. But it takes guts to put yourself out there like Mr. DeGhetto has here. Sean would like that.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

Somebody sent me a link today to the Billy Ripken Fleer card from 1989, one of the most famous baseball cards of all time, if not one of the most valuable. All because of what's written on the end of his bat.

Ripken's stunt card turns 20 years old this season. What a stir that was! Oh, for a time when athletes didn't have to show their naughty bits or burn a cow to get noticed...

"One out of 5 Americans admitted to peeing in the pool," said the voice.

Wham!

Then somebody from Georgetown University in a doctor's smock showed up on my screen to say, "Michael Phelps admitted peeing in the pool."

Bam!

Et tu, Mikey? Or, I guess, Et unus?

I love myUpshur Pool, and jump in all the time, even though my brain tells me folks are peeing away like it's the Preakness infield. That's why I don't think about it. Ignorance is piss, so to speak.

And even after the Fox report, I'll keep jumping in. But from now on I'm steering clear of crowds of five people or more.

And if I see Michael Phelps in the deep end, well, might as well cue the Jaws theme. I'm outta there.

Seems like a great hire. Weisman's been writing about the NFL for the Gannett paper since the early 1980s. I know him best from his frequent guest appearances over the years on the wonderful "The Sports Reporters" radio show on WTEM, a station which is now owned by Dan Snyder. And Weisman's great on that. Weisman was never as bombastic or entertaining as host Steve Czaban, but he came off as smart and plugged in.

And in his old typing job, Weisman didn't pull punches on the man who now signs his checks.

This from a USAToday chat in March 2006:

Ashburn, VA: Does Dan Snider have a clue? You think he would learn from his past mistakes. I wonder if looked at the number of catches El had last year or just the big pass in the Super Bowl. Even more funny is his pickup of T.O. lite from San Fran. 30 mil for a saftey that has taken one too many blows to the head? I give each player no more than two years before Dan cuts them.

Larry Weisman: Look at the bright side. He passes the costs on to season ticket holders and those who park cars at FedUpField. Ever heard that expression about people who know the price of everything and the value of nothing? Remember that Dan Snyder isn't so much playing with house money as with your money.

"FedUpField"? Nice!

Wonder if Weisman will call him "Mister Snyder" now.

***

Weisman will work under Larry Michael, the team's minister of propaganda "Senior Vice President/Executive Producer-Media."

Michael had an odd quote in the release welcoming Weisman: "Larry’s credibility and experience will give Redskins fans something new and compelling to look forward to this season and beyond.”

So having somebody with "credibility" in Redskins Park is something fans will regard as "new and compelling?" Wow. An era of honesty kicks off!

***

Weisman's first task will be to shmooze Rick Maese, the new Redskins beat reporter for the Washington Post. Maese replaces Jason La Canfora, one of a boatload of writer who Redskins officials have held vendettas against in the Snyder era. Mister Irrelevant introduced the new kid with a great Q&A.

Redskins Release after the jump, as well as Nats getting broomed, and local boy made good Maury Wills is HUGE in...North Dakota?

***

(Groundhog) Day Game for the Nats under the Miami sun: Manny Acta protects a young arm (Jordan Zimmermann), turns lead over bullpen, bullpen blows lead, Ryan Zimmerman makes an error, Nats lose game.

And, another sweep. The Nats should get an endorsement deal from Swiffer.

***

I let Joel Hanrahan's passing go too quietly. The guy who took the "C" out of closer lost the race out of town with Manny Acta. Hanrahan was shipped to Pittsburgh a couple days ago. This town's tolerance for bad baseball is big, but not big enough for the both of 'em. Hope Hanrahan turns into an All-Star, but, damn, he sure earned a bus ticket.

***

Went to see the DC Grays and Fairfax Nationals of the wood-bat Clark Griffith League at Maury Wills Field on Georgia Avenue NW last night. The rain stopped play in the fifth inning, but, the game was fab. This just in: The college kids today are good!

The rebuilt field, located across the street from where the Negro League Homestead Grays and Major League Washington Senators used to play at Griffith Stadium, looked great, was easy to get to, had plenty of parking and was an all-around great place to watch a game. I'm guessing, though, that whoever from D.C. Parks and Rec decided to put the fences just 295-feet down the lines wasn't a big baseball guy or gal. A concessions table should be added to the scene, too.

As disseminated yesterday: The D.C. Gray's field, next to Banneker Rec Center, is named after D.C. legend Maury Wills, who was an all-sports star at Cardozo in the 1950s and a base-stealing wizard with the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 1960s.

But it's not the first tribute to one of the greatest athletes ever produced in D.C.

No, there's already a Maury Wills Museum – in Fargo, N.D.! How'd that happen?

***

Skins Press Release:

LOUDOUN COUNTY, VA. —

The Washington Redskins announced today that Larry Weisman has left USA Today to become Editorial Director of the Redskins Media Department.  Weisman will start on July 20.

Weisman comes to the Redskins with an extensive background covering professional football.  In his 33 years as a professional sports writer, Weisman has authored more than 5,000 published stories, primarily with USA Today.  He has also covered college basketball, professional hockey, championship boxing and soccer, but has specialized in pro football since 1983.

Weisman began covering pro football in 1978, including 29 Super Bowls.  He joined USA Today, the nation’s largest general-interest daily newspaper, in 1983.  During his tenure with USA Today, he has covered and authored stories on all 32 NFL teams.  His writing and reporting have won awards from the Associated Press Sports Editors, the Pro Football Writers Association and the New York State Associated Press in the game story and spot news categories. Prior to joining USA Today, Weisman worked for what is now called the Westchester Journal News in White Plains, N.Y., where he covered the Stanley Cup champion New York Islanders. He has also been a contributing writer to The Sporting News NFL Preview, Street & Smith Football Annual and Patriots Football Weekly.

He has made various appearances on ESPN, CNN, NFL Films and CBS News programming.  He has been a regular contributor to ESPN Radio, Fox Sports Radio, Sirius Satellite Radio, and has frequently made guest appearances on local, national and syndicated radio stations throughout the United States and around the globe.

A graduate of the University of Maryland, Weisman is also the author of three books: “The Terry Bradshaw Franchise Football League,” “Companions in Courage in Courage; Triumphant Tales of Heroic Athletes,” co-written by Pat LaFontaine, Chas Griffin and Ernie Valutis, and “Let’s Go to the Videotape All the Plays and Replays from My Life in Sports,” with Warner Wolf.

Weisman also made it to Hollywood with a cameo appearance as a sports writer in Adam Sandler’s box office hit remake of the “The Longest Yard.”

“It’s exciting to have Larry Weisman join our media team,” said Senior Vice President/Executive Producer-Media Larry Michael.  “Larry is one of the most recognizable NFL writers in the country, and his work at USA Today was second to none. Larry’s credibility and experience will give Redskins fans something new and compelling to look forward to this season and beyond.”

Weisman will contribute to various Redskins television, radio and print properties.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com.

This wasn't just another media-personnel story for the trade publications. The act of a powerful news organization cutting off the head of a Bush-bashing media figure gave the Internet free license to indulge in Idiot Time.

Leading the charge was Atlantic.com's Andrew Sullivan, who connected the move to—what else?—politics and ideology:

Dan's work on torture may be one reason he is now gone. The way in which the WaPo has been coopted by the neocon right, especially in its editorial pages, is getting more and more disturbing. This purge will prompt a real revolt in the blogosphere. And it should...

Salon.com's Glenn Greenwald saw something scandalous here as well:

Why was Froomkin deemed "liberal," inappropriate and biased? Because he pointed out that the Bush administration's claims were false and their policies radical — i.e., he wrote what was factually true. But that — writing what is factually true and pointing out false statements from those in political power — is the number one sin in establishment journalism.

And here's a commenter on washingtonpost.com:

You publish Dana Milbank's pap column, you publish 14 part articles on Chadra Levy, and you can't put one honest voice in?

I am appalled.

At this point your paper has become simply a tool of the Washington establishment. Yet another place to read the same garbage I can get anywhere else.

There are obvious problems with these theories. To address Sullivan's point: Why would the Post bag Froomkin over torture when its own editorials have opposed the practice? And to address Greenwald's point: If the Post were really canning this guy over his Bush-related rantings, wouldn't Froomkin have been pushed out sometime during Bush's terms in office?

All the conjecture amounts to fantasy. It would be wonderful, that is, if the Post's move had really been motivated by partisan politics. Or, better yet, by a fear that this iconoclast was just too dangerous for the paper. What a Washington story that'd be.

Too bad that Froomkin's firing is a far less spectacular story, one that hinges on money and resources, with a side of standard newsroom conflict. Everything, in other words, except for ideology.

Froomkin started his online White House coverage for washingtonpost.com in January 2004, just as public skepticism of the Bush administration was starting to surface. His column's launch coincided with the publication of Ron Suskind's book The Price of Loyalty, which took a dim view of the reigning administration. "As it happened, that day was essentially the beginning of the Bush critique," says Froomkin.

Is it a touch arrogant for Froomkin to position himself as the catalyst of a political movement? Perhaps, but it's accurate, too. Other commentators, to be sure, bashed the Bush administration with great regularity. Froomkin, though, established a new standard for regularity. Each morning, he'd start his work at 6 a.m., as any good Web journalist must. He'd grind through just about everything that'd been written about the White House over the past news cycle. "From six in the morning on, I am reading voraciously and analyzing and synthesizing and writing. I finish filing by about one most days and start the next cycle fairly soon after that," he says.

Froomkin's synthesis rarely ended favorably for the Bushies. Here's a snippet from a February 2007 column:

President Bush has all but vanished from the national and international radar. But Vice President Cheney is everywhere and in the thick of it all.

His credibility may be shot, he and his boss may be lame ducks, his signal achievement — the war in Iraq — may now be almost universally disparaged, his former chief of staff may soon be found guilty of multiple felonies, but it would appear that rumors of the vice president's demise as a political force have been greatly exaggerated.

Consider the following:

* Cheney's latest stops on a highly-publicized world tour have been in Pakistan and Afghanistan, where he is said to be belatedly but forcefully pressing government leaders to be more aggressive in hunting down Al Qaeda operatives.

* Since the British announcement of a troop withdrawal from Iraq last week, Cheney has been the administration's point man in a fervid but inevitably fruitless attempt to spin that as a sign of success.

* Cheney has also become the foremost defender of the administration's Iraqi policy in general — though in doing so he has further fueled criticisms that his assertions are often unsupported and sometimes misleading.

* In an interview on Friday, Cheney defended his assertion in 1991 that invading Iraq would result in a quagmire — reopening speculation about what Cheney and Bush knew before they went to war in Iraq, what they told the American people, and the gulf between the two.

* Last week, Cheney suddenly spoke in highly critical terms about China, scolding it for behaviour he called "not consistent" with its stated aim of a peaceful rise as a global power.

* Even as I write, Cheney's former chief of staff if awaiting his fate at Washington's federal courthouse, and the verdict — whichever way it goes — will inevitably remind the public of Cheney's important and unseemly role in the leaking of a CIA operative's identity. (One juror was dismissed from the jury today, after being exposed to some sort of outside information about the case.)

* And then there's Iran. The reports that Bush is gearing up for strikes against that country may be ambiguous and speculative — but there appears to be little doubt that Cheney is the lead hawk pushing for a more aggressive posture.

Equivocation, hedging, shading, tiptoeing—none of those turn up in Froomkin's toolkit. While the White House press corps was busy minding their editors' standards, Froomkin was smashing mouths, and he had the traffic numbers to show for it. At the end of 2007, the Post published a list of its top ten most "popular opinions" of the year; Froomkin occupied three of the spots.

During that W. heyday, the column was pulling in a good 50,000 to 70,000 hits on a decent day. When it was really rocking, it would move to the 100,000 range, a phenomenal total.

The Obama administration has offered a less juicy target, in part because it hasn't had quite as much time to screw things up. In the past six months, accordingly, hits on White House Watch have dropped to the point that Post officials cite traffic as a reason for bagging the column.

"His traffic had gone way down," says Fred Hiatt, the paper's editorial page editor. Froomkin himself uses the same talking point: "Traffic definitely did go down."

And right there, the discussion hits something of a brick wall: Though washingtonpost.com's overall Web-hit numbers are public information, the paper places breakout stats for columns and blogs in a secret cache, which complicates any effort to piece together Froomkin's traffic trends.

A few snapshots from recent months, however, appear to corroborate the smaller Obama-era audience. Over three days in late March and early April, for example, White House Watch bounced from No. 3 to No. 7 to No. 11 on the list of top washingtonpost.com blogs. The hits for the column were 49,000, 29,000, and 15,000 on those days.

And over a three-day period in late May, Froomkin's rankings came in at No. 6, No. 6, and No. 7. Hits for each of those days were right around 20,000. A Post source says that White House Watch's traffic has suffered a two-thirds drop over time.

The traffic slump is apparently dire enough that Post brass could no longer justify paying Froomkin about $100,000 in contract money to crank out daily commentary—a sum that falls short of what the Post pays many national political reporters. "We have had to make a lot of hard decisions about resources," says Hiatt.

The Froomkin axing is a red-letter event in Post history because it's the first time that a major personnel decision has hinged so squarely on Web hits. For years, the orthodoxy from Post leaders is that the paper produces journalism that it believes in—mass popularity be damned. Perhaps that's no longer the case. Questions on this matter were sent to newspaper spokesperson Kris Coratti but went unanswered.

One of the tricky aspects of judging people on Web hits is that the digital playing field is a tough surface to level. Some bloggers, for instance, plug their work on TV appearances; others don't. Then there's the issue of link visibility. "A chronic problem had been promotion of the column on the homepage. My readers complained that it was harder and harder to find all the time," says Froomkin. Zero: The amount of sympathy Froomkin will get from other Posties on how visible and navigable his stories have been on washingtonpost.com—that's a common affliction at the paper.

Yet Froomkin was no stranger to prominent exposure on washingtonpost.com. Says former washingtonpost.com opinions editor Michael Newman: "If [White House Watch] weren’t on the homepage within a few minutes of publication, you would hear from Dan. I don't want to overstate it—sometimes it was good-natured, but sometimes it wasn't."

Special consideration was appropriate for White House Watch, argued Froomkin, because the column and the site benefited greatly from prime visibility for White House Watch. Equipped with this certitude, Froomkin wouldn't let up on homepage play: "If he was unsatisfied with the response, he would keep at it till he got the response he wanted," says Newman.

Froomkin and his editors clicked from the homepage onto other portals of conflict. Media criticism was a good one: The columnist considered commenting on how the media were portraying the White House a significant part of his job; his editors felt otherwise. "They told me they didn’t want me to do media criticism. I could never quite figure out how I could avoid it," says Froomkin. The friction produced a series of spiked Froomkin columns, which generally got published on the Nieman Watchdog blog, including the columnist's takedown of the White House Correspondents Association Dinner.

Marisa Katz, the paper's Web opinions editor, says the dinner story "read more like a Howie Kurtz media column, or one of Dan’s Nieman Watchdog items, than a post focused on the Obama White House."

Whatever the merits of banning Froomkin from the Romenesko beat, the move sure did anger the writer. "No journalist likes to have their work spiked," says Froomkin.

There were also battles over the column's direction, format, timing and length of its items, and chatting with followers. Says Katz: "The hope was for a feature that would be differentiated by Dan’s opinion and analysis and perspective and personality, and that would allow for greater timeliness, the incorporation of multimedia, and more opportunities for reader engagement, among other advantages."

And speaking of reinvention, once Post editors decided that White House Watch was no longer viable, they gave Froomkin a chance to come forward with "ideas for potential features that would take him in a new and different direction and that might resonate more with readers. Unfortunately, he wasn't interested in doing anything else for The Post," says Katz.

On that point, Froomkin says, "I felt what I was doing was absolutely the best thing I could do for the Washington Post."

Katz emphasizes that "artistic differences" didn't drive a wedge between the Post and White House Watch. "It was about the need to make budget cuts in a bad business climate and a feature that wasn't resonating like it used to," she says. The columnist heard an honest accounting when he met with Hiatt and Managing Editor Raju Narisetti. "They didn’t think the column was working anymore and I tried to make the case that it was," says Froomkin.

Yet just because the Post's decision wasn't tainted by neocon ideology and the cowardly calculations of an "establishment media" operation doesn't mean it wasn't dumb, short-sighted, and self-destructive. It was all of those things.

The key number in this whole saga is not the $100,000 that Froomkin was making. Nor is it the 20,000 hits to which his daily traffic sometimes sinks.

It's $500,000-plus. That's what the Post invested over the years in White House Watch. That's what it took to pay someone with the doggedness to mine every last detail about presidential coverage on the Web and turn it into something digestible. And that's what it took to actuate thousands upon thousands of fans to bookmark Froomkin for as long as he stayed at it. And what a wise investment it was, to judge by the outrage that has spilled onto comments boards around the Web.

To fire the guy six months into a new administration reflects a jittery approach to building a Web site, not to mention a betrayal of the Post's venerable MO of patient, long-haul planning. As President Obama faces more and more difficult decisions in reforming Washington, he's bound to alienate the lefty constituency that has formed a crowded party on Froomkin's platform for more than five years. Three to six months more—that's all it would have taken for Froomkin to get back to his old traffic neighborhood.

And Froomkin, 46, should have seen this coming. He's just the latest in a series of departures from the Web side of the Post. His first job with the organization was back in 1997, not long after the Post located its online operations in Arlington. Part of the motivation for placing Froomkin and other web people on the other side of the river was to keep their operation from getting swallowed whole by the retrograde print cluster. For more than a decade, washingtonpost.com's producers, bloggers, and executives managed the site on their own, a separate power center.

Over the past year, top Post officials have decided to merge the print and Web operations. But "merge," at this point, appears far too mutual a term to describe how the operations are conjoining: lopsidedly, that is. Over the past year or so, the site's top talent has either fled or been elbowed aside, including online Publisher Caroline Little, washingtonpost.com Executive Editor Jim Brady, Managing Editor Ju-Don Roberts, multimedia editor Tom Kennedy, and political editor Russ Walker. Their collective departure clarifies that the geographical separation merely delayed print's annexation of washingtonpost.com.

What does all this institutional babble mean for Froomkin? It means that once his contract came up for review, he essentially had to rely on the print team to back him up. Yeah, like that was going to happen.

In fairness to print-centric Posties, Froomkin is a new-media animal that just about any traditional newsroom would have trouble appreciating. He calls himself an accountability guy, yet he doesn't bang the phones all day and attend briefings. He does his work by reading and synthesizing what other journalists do. And he does it all from his Tenleytown home! How could a second-hand journalist like this guy become such a force on the Internet?

Via constancy. Day in and day out, Froomkin nailed the same themes and the same players—and delivered his package at the same hour, not unlike the evening newspapers of yore. His franchise fused the basic principles of Internet success: define your beat narrowly, post consistently, be passionate. It's a great formula, and the Post should be proud of having nurtured it. Pretty soon now, it'll be the asset of whatever organization hires Froomkin to replicate it. The columnist expects to reach a deal with a new employer "within a week or two."

The Sox fans not only stayed, they cheered til the end. Sure, they're hatable. But, man, they're good fans.

***

The Wizards drafted University of Central Florida's Jermaine Taylor with their second round pick last night. His dad is Kenny Green, the guy the Bullets drafted in 1985 instead of Karl Malone. The Bullets, then GM'd by Bob Ferry, also passed on John Stockton (for Mel Turpin).

Throughout the '90s, folks traced the franchise's woes to the Green-over-Malone pick. I called Green up years ago to ask if it bothered him.

It still did.

He asked me to pass on a message to Bullets/Wizards fans.

"Don't blame Kenny Green!" Green said.

Malone was available again last night when Green's kid was drafted. 'Course, he's 45 now and long retired. Abe Pollin had to be tempted. Ernie Grunfeld, the new Bob Ferry, passed. Wanna know what would be great? If Utah countered the Wiz by drafting Demetrius Bell. He's Malone's son. He's on the Buffalo Bills now.

***

For this week's Cheap Seats I wrote a column about about a party planned by former Redskins reciever Gary Clark that somehow got way out of bounds before it ever took place.

So out of bounds that it won't ever take place.

The party was allegedly going to be a fundraiser for a group called Athletes Committed to Educational Success, or ACES. That's a charity that Clark has said he started to provide youth mentoring services and the like. But as far as the governments in Virginia and D.C., where he has advertised previous fundraisers for the same group, are concerned, ACES does not exist.

***

Redskins from the Gibbs era are known for throwing events for charities they start. Clark’s teammates, Art Monk and Charles Mann, have been holding celebrity golf tournaments and assorted shindigs since 1999, when they first promised folks in Anacostia that they’d build them a job training and education center through their charity, called the Good Samaritan Foundation.

Based on Monk and Mann’s pledges, the players were given control of the historic Carver Theater, on Martin Luther King Avenue SE, in the heart of the business district of what has long been one of the most depressed neighborhoods in the city.

And through their fundraising efforts and lobbying of city officials and federal lawmakers, Monk and Mann's group has now accrued millions of dollars in private and public donations.

Yet the job training center in Anacostia never opened.

I’ve been writing about its non-opening for years, and every time I do another story somebody from the group, either a member of the board of directors or the project manager for the theater renovation or even Mann himself, has told me that it’s only a matter of days or weeks before the renovation will be complete and the training center will be open.

But that never happened.

At the end of 2008 I started hearing commercials during Redskins radio broadcasts for Wal-Mart promising money to a new charity for Monk and Mann called the Youth Power Center.

I drove past the Carver Theater the other day. The building was boarded up.

***

Shortly after Paul McCartney and Snyder announced a few days ago that the ex-Fab would be playing FedExField on August 1, the Redskins posted an offer on the team's website: Buy club seats for the 2009 football season, and you can also purchase Paul McCartney tickets before they go on sale to the general public next Friday.

If you sign on to redskins.com now, the first page that will hit you features a McCartney/premium seats offer.

This was a rare Redskins offseason without any real ooomph — Albert Haynesworth's skills far outweigh his name recognition, so his signing probably didn't sell a dozen season tickets.

That means to Snyder, McCartney is this year's Steve Spurrier, his Bruce Smith, his Deion Sanders and his Joe Gibbs 2.0. All in one.

Even if McCartney doesn't fill up all those yellow splotches in the club level, look for the Skins owner to set aside a massive amount of concert seats in his stadium to unload for big bucks on Stubhub, the official scalper of all things Snyder.

BTW: Snyder's early buy-in offer for the McCartney show isn't exclusive. American Express is also advertising on radio and TV (including spots during NBC-4's US Open coverage yesterday) saying tickets are now available to "American Express card holders only."

***

Nowhere is Snyder's black belt in gouging more evident than in the parking realm.

Parking was $10 at FedExField when he bought the place. By last season, he'd quadrupled the charge. Now, according to new rules posted by the entertaining putzes on Snyder's message board, extremeskins.com, the team has eliminated all cash parking lots for the 2009 season.

Since mass transit options to FedEx are paltry, that pretty much means every season ticket holder will have to buy a 10-game parking pass that will charge fees for the two preseason games.

This change, if it sticks, won't cause the big stink that Snyder's alleged War on Tailgating will.

But has Snyder ever done anything the fans like?

***

On to other Snyders, and some good news: Brandon Snyder, a Chantilly kid and former bonus baby who I saw hit homers in Little League, was just promoted from AA Bowie to the O's Triple-A affiliate in Richmond Norfolk. (Thanks, DH!)

Come September, he'll get his cup of coffee.

***

Sure, Calbert Cheaney was all-world with Bobby Knight at Indiana, and wasn't much as a pro.

But does Cheaney, the Washington Bullets top pick in 1993, really rate as the Fourth Biggest NBA Bust of All Time? Rivals.com blogger Chris Chase thinks so.

I dunno 'bout this. Cheaney was too bland for such a high ranking on the all-time shitlist.

***

The great Thom Loverro, fresh off pounding on Rob Dibble like he was a side of beef on the set of "Rocky," defended Manny Acta over the weekend.

But four Nats victories and two series wins in a row, before yesterday's return to form, means Acta won't really need anybody in his corner. Not for at least a week. John Feinstein, the Garth Brooks of sportswriters, got in Acta's corner a week ago, when the manager was getting a standing eight count from the national media.

When the Nats win the 2009 World Series, Feinstein's article will be viewed as the turning point.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com.

Back to me: Yesterday's press release announcing the show featured two testimonials of McCartney's greatness, from Dan Snyder...and "Dave McKenna."

Snyder got quoted ("I've been a fan of Paul's all my life, so it's going to be a memorable night for us all.") because he owns the stadium. Makes sense. Me? I guess because whoever put out the press release was under orders to find a quote about McCartney blander than Snyder's. And they hit gold with something I wrote about McCartney's voice ("still strong enough to leave listeners awestruck") for the Washington Post in 2005.

If it's mine, I'm embarrassed by that clause, for sure. But I've never felt so close to Snyder. Turns out we have a bond.

Now I want to know if Snyder's a "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" or "He Said She Said" guy? And how many times he played "Revolution #9" backwards just to hear "I buried Paul!"?

I wonder if he had a Beatles belt buckle!

We'll be picking out furniture soon! Text me, Dan!

***

Every little thing he does is magic, so...Nightspots are sending out press releases to let folks know ALEX OVECHKIN WAS HERE! I got this email from a Vegas  restaurant/club yesterday, a few hours before the Caps star was named MVP again.

"The NHL invasion arrived in Vegas and it is not surprising that hot spot LAVO inside The Palazzo was the destination of choice for the ice hockey stars, including Washington Capitals’ own Alexander Ovechkin. At LAVO Nightclub, NHL star Jeremy Roenick hosted a slew of on ice stars from teams across the NHL, including Vancouver Canuck Mats Sundin, and Edmonton Oiler Sheldon Souray, but one of the most notable almost didn’t make it into the club.  Twenty-three year old Russian phenomenon Alexander Ovechkin who is up for the league’s MVP award, arrived a bit underdressed  wearing flip flops.  Luckily those manning the velvet ropes recognized Ovechkin, who in 2008 signed the most lucrative contract in NHL history with his 13 year, $124 million contract extension, and made an exception so that the superstar and his group could join Roenick’s table upstairs.  Once safely inside, the league’s scoring leader danced on the banquettes to the sounds of DJ Crooked and made his rounds to visit various tables of hockey players throughout the club."

Ovechkin's the new Paris and Lindsay.

(DANG! Looks like the great Dan Steinberg got the same memo!)

***

Via DCsportsfan.com: Quinn Cook from, where else?, DeMatha led the U.S. Under-16 National basketball team to a rout of Venezuela yesterday at the FIBA Americas U16 Championship in Mendoza, Argentina.

Is there any prep sport NOT dominated by DeMatha? Well, besides field hockey?

If Quinn wasn't so good, he might have been able to join teammate Victor Oladipo and a group of DeMatha classmates at the White House today for BBQ/cooking session with Michelle Obama and Bobby Flay. True story!

***

These guys must be smarter than the fish: The FLW College Fishing tour is coming! Teams of anglers from a few dozen schools, including many I've never heard of (Messiah, anyone? Chestnut Hill? Glenville State? Geneseo?), are entered in a bass tournament on the Potomac next Saturday, June 27. Takeoff and weigh-in are at Smallwood State Park in Marbury, Md.

I can't mock kids who fish their way through school. The only thing I learned in college was that I was a loser at poker.

***

Triathlons are not fun. Proof? Well, here's what's tagged as a "Fun Fact" from the press kit of the Dextro Energy Triathlon, which will be clogging our arteries all over town on Sunday:

• The only person ever to beat Emma Snowsill of Australia since 2005 in an ITU sanctioned event has been Vanessa Fernandes of Portugal, who is sidelined through injury this weekend.

Who is that fact fun for? Other than Emma Snowsill, being free of her nemesis Vanessa of Portugal and all...

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com.

The party was allegedly scheduled for August 29 at RFK and was going to bring together 20,000 fans (paying $25 to $12,500) and at least one dead Redskin.

When you click the invitation pages now, you will get a message that says "The page you are trying to access is a password protected page. Please enter the password in the text box below then click the 'Enter' button."

I tried "Dionne Warwick Inaugural Ball" as a password. That didn't work.

Cheap Seats Daily will monitor all the Ultilmate Tailgate Party developments.