The 15th St. NW entrance to the Washington Post building.
One of my favorite things about my two and half years of living in Washington DC was waking up every morning to the Post on my doorstep. It’s hard to imagine a finer paper, one that is as stellar a national and international journal yet still serves it’s community as well as the Post does. Sorry, New York Times, you’re a lousy local rag. So imagine my glee yesterday as I got a tour of the newsroom and chance to chat finally meet cultural critic Philip Kennicott, who has become something of a pal, in person. He toured me around the fourth and fifth floors before showing me his desk, where I met classical music critic Anne Midgette, whose forthcoming Post blog Classical Beat I await impatiently. The New York Times is lauded perpetually for its arts coverage, and though it’s often quite good, those who think the Post is just a vehicle for Tom Toles should really peruse the arts and culture writing.
As Philip and I wandered around the fifth floor, admiring a massive aerial photo of the city and stumbling across a large poster of Shirley Povich, longtime Post sportswriter and a cousin of mine by marriage, I even further lamented the fact that I no longer rise to the dulcet prose of Ghivan, Robinson, Applebaum and yes, dare I say it, bellicose old Krauthammer.
I’ve long been a Post devotee, but wandering around the offices and then chatting with Philip about music, the city and architecture in a nearby Caribou Coffee (a most Washingtonian of rituals) my love for not just the Post but for papers soared. Writing for the San Francisco Chronicle has been a delight and the prospect of my city without it is a deeply worrying thought. Any major city without a proper paper is a strike against it. Bad for the arts, bad for we citizens, bad for our democracy.