November 12, 2007
WaPo Critic on Leave for Insulting Marion Barry
Channel 9 reporter Bruce Johnson has broken the story on the dust-up at the Washington Post this past week. Classical music critic Tim Page, winner of a Pulitzer prize, has long been one of the best writers in the Style section, making the paper's shrinking coverage of classical music all the more shameful. In response to a mass email from the staff of Ward 8 Council member Marion Barry, which was sent to Page apparently by mistake, the irritated classical critic fired back an off-the-cuff response. Danger! Danger! As everyone should know by now, when you send an email you should just assume that everyone in the world is going to read it. Johnson quotes the copy of the email he obtained:
Must we hear about it every time this Crack Addict attempts to rehabilitate himself with some new — and typically half-witted — political grandstanding? I'd be grateful if you would take me off your mailing list. I cannot think of anything the useless Marion Barry could do that would interest me in the slightest, up to and including overdose. Sincerely, Tim Page.
Should Page be allowed to besmirch the good name of the former mayor? True, Barry's recent checkered past has included some shady goings-on reported in the news, like telling police not to investigate a burglary of his house, not paying his taxes, again, violating the terms of his probation, being a "friend" to underworld hustlers, and being pulled over for erratic driving. Still, it's not like he has tested positive for cocaine use in the last two years. Oh, wait, yes, actually he has. In fact, our own Martin Austermuhle called Marion Barry the District's "most famous crack addict" in 2006. Given Barry's continued struggle with illegal drugs, it is hard to see how the epithet is undeserved. "Half-witted" and "useless" and "overdose" could conceivably cross the line, though.
Barry and his staff are demanding that the Post fire Page, and the paper has actually placed him on leave. It looks like an early vacation for the distinguished classical critic (and sufferer of a form of Asperger's Syndrome, as revealed in a powerful personal profile in The New Yorker this summer), who had already planned to take a sabbatical later this year (not yet announced by the Post). According to Musical America, Page will begin a teaching appointment at the University of Southern California next semester.
Anne Midgette, a junior critic at The New York Times, will become Interim Classical Music Critic on January 1. At the top of her Washington Post orientation packet should be instructions about not responding to any emails with Marion Barry in the subject line.
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Well then, as a Ward 8 homeowner, I demand that Marion Barry cease all association with my ward and the District for that manner. Can we ban him from the city? Why should we listen to Barry and his staff and fire a Post writer for speaking the truth?
Barry is a loser and if he can't handle the truth spoken of him, maybe he should clean up his life and act like a decent citizen.
You can't possibly be serious? Are you actually asking if the Post took the correct action?!?! HolySweetJeususon14crutches!!! Marion Barry is an elected official. If someone wants to call him a purple headed people eater from Mars, they ought to be able to. In this case what he said is actually TRUE!! The man doesn't write about politics or anything relating to it, so I have no problem with him expressing his personal opinions on the subject. I'm frankly disappointed that the leftest rage that generally permeates political coverage here has somehow manged to take a vacation on this issue. In closing I think its pretty clear that the bitch set him up.
Oh MY GOD! A critic was critical of what is basically PR SPAM being sent to him and was asked to be taken off a mailing list. He didn't print it in his column after all. I can't believe the Post put him on leave.
Only 'overdose' crosses the line with an itty bitty little toe... and again... only if he printed it in his column... not just emailed back the spam he was sent incorrectly since as a classical music critic, wtf?
ARGHHH I hate the world today.
Page would have been better off doing what most of us do with Marion Barry - ignoring him, seeing his largely wasted life as a cautionary tale, waiting for him to finally disappear from the scene, etc. But, while the "overdose" bit was uncalled for, this
is a non-issue and the Post should let Page get back to writing about classical music ASAP.
Damn Reply All.
Wowsa. And I was thinking today would be low on drama.
Yep, the WP folks are pussies if they take any sort of punitive action against this guy. He doesn't cover politics, he was responding to spam, and he has a right to his own opinion.
As for besmirching his reputation, I'm assuming it's the Barry campaign that publicized the actual email, not this Page guy.
As Barry once famously said, "Get over it."
Did he send this from his work account? If so, then he should expect nothing better, and deserves to be fired if only for his stupidity. It never failed to amaze me when people can't be bothered with controlling their idiocy while in the workplace.
...and somewhere, not to far away, Al Sharpton has an enormous erection.
EmoEmu, I guess I did not make my irony drip as overtly as intended. I agree with the comments so far that this is a non-issue. The Post is probably just covering itself by placing Page on leave.
"Should Page be allowed to besmirch the good name of the former mayor?"
Um, isn't *Barry* the one who besmirched his name? Maybe crack addict is too strong -- recovering crack addict? -- but I hardly think what Page wrote warrants anything more than a reminder about what "reply all" means.
The Post are a bunch of...oh, nevermind, if I finish that sentence, they might suspend my subscription.
The Post is going down hill faster than any paper i can remember. The paper's failure to critique elected officials is one of the main reasons we're in this shitfuck of a crisis in Iraq. The editors are far too cozy with those in power and out of fear of an awkward moment at a dc elite cocktail party, they fail miserably at fostering honest discussion. Yeah the email included some potentially line-crossing material, but who the hell cares. If anything Marion Berry brought it upon himself with his actions and careless cc's.
Also, i sure hope they're not doing this to appease the handful of readers in ward 8. It's not like they're going to switch to the Washington Times or that other paper that only litters the lawns of suburbia.
Marion Barry is a joke, and it should hardly be out of bounds for a reporter to address him as such, especially in a semi-private manner.
Doesn't seem appropriate and it does reflect poorly on the Post. Whatever you may think of Barry (and I don't have any problem with him). It's the kind of off the cuff snark that seems ill advised to come from a reporter for the paper of record for DC. He should have known not to send it. Or even to have said it.
This is the kind of stuff that you can expect from Barry's chief staffer Keith Perry. I can't believe the Post went belly up on supporting their own staffer's right to free speech.
No one, under any circumstances, should be punished for calling Marion Barry a crack addict.
Sure Page's email was inappropriate, but it was also inappropriate for him to be sent not only spam PR but spam PR that says absolutely nothing. The spam message in question seems to have basically said, "Marion Barry voted for the Southeast hospital deal, but he's not sure it was a good idea to have done so," . . . how is that worthy of press release in the first place, much less one that gets sent to journalists who never cover local politics?
The only reason this is coming to light is because one particular politician and his lackeys had their egos bruised, and they saw releasing the email and making a big stink about it as an opportunity to gain points at the expense of the Post. I think Tim Page was right to apologize in an effort to put this behind him, but the fact that the Post would actually suspend him is totally outrageous. If we want these politicians to stop thinking that they deserve special treatment, we have to stop giving it to them.
i hope marion's ego has been properly stroked. glad to see that the post believes in freedom of expression too. mr. page shouldn't have used a work email to make this response (if that's the case), but PLEASE people. insults happen in real life. it wasn't printed in the paper.
the sooner marion barry isn't a distraction on the local political scene, the better. what a waste.
I wonder if the Post would have fired a reporter on the local politics beat who wrote a similar email about some really obnoxious classical musician (not that I can think of any who could rival Barry in drug-addled hijinks.) Methinks not.
I kind of want to email page an mp3 of Free Speech For the Dumb... don't know if he's into metal...
oh, sure, we're allowed to say all sorts of shockingly mean things about celebrities, actors, authors (read any Mailer obits over the weekend? or Vonnegut before him?), musicians (Winehouse and hubby), any creative person is fair game... and if we think they are media whores, even more so....and politicians are generally fair game too..... except when they're not?!?
what's so icky about this is the way the critic (note that he is NOT a reporter but someone who gives his opinion all the time) is being punished with a leave of absense for popping off (as we all do) with a reply all on work letterhead when he really has nothing to do with Barry or politics and pretty much no one in Barry's core constiuency knows the man's name or anything he writes about.
was it ill advised and inappropriate.... sure whatever. humanity happens. and thank Christ for that.
thank you Tim Page for saying what we all think every time Marion Barry says anything.
as a Ward 8 resident, Anyone But Barry in the next election!
In a related story, Marc Fisher just called Shostakovich a jerk-off.
Oh no he didn't!
It would be really idiotic of the Post to fire Tim Page; he's a respected music critic, he's a good writer, and he was wooed to the Post from the Baltimore Sun, if I remember correctly.
That's not to say he was A-OK in firing off intemperate e-mails; merely to say that any punitive action beyond, say, a week or month suspension from writing will make the Post the poorer outlet, and leave some other periodical better off.
I want to get angry about this, but I can't. If it is true that he responded like that with his post email, then I think a reprimand is justified. When you send an email out with your work email, that's pretty much like sending out a letter on your company's letterhead. Using your company's letterhead to write to anyone and wish their drug-induced death is pretty irresponsible, and stupid to boot.
Is Barry acting like a baby? Yes. Does he have a history of lashing out against the press for negative coverage? Yes. And I think he's a skeezy politician and I look forward to his dismissal, but that doesn't excuse writing something stupid on the company's stationary (as it were).
Although if it was on his personal email account, I take back all of this and think the Post is overreacting, and should support its writers more. What leverage does Barry have over them anyway? He needs them more than they need him.
Marion Barry’s Media Consultant/Communications Director is upset that I emailed him. And it wasn’t even spam.
Everyone keeps saying that Tim Page hit "Reply All," assuming that he sent his response to everyone else who had received the pitch. Is there actually any evidence that this is the case, because it certainly doesn't say so in Johnson's blog post?
It's all fine and dandy to say that sending something on your work email is "the same as sending it on company letterhead," but the fact is that the way communications technologies have evolved it's much MORE analogous to using your office phone to make a personal phone call.
Also, while Page did state that he wouldn't find news of Barry overdosing "interesting," it's wildly inaccurate to claim that he "wished for [Barry's] drug-induced death." The only reprimand Page deserved for this incident was a verbal scolding, if that.
Finally, wasn't it just a few weeks ago that Barry announced that he was "cutting off" the Post and other media outlets due to unfavorable coverage? Guess the message didn't get to his media director . . .
Unbelievable. I take that back; only too believable. The POST has proven that it's just as craven as 98% of the population. Tim Page -- gasp! -- "offended" someone??! The eminent Marion Barry, no less?? Perish the thought!
Leave aside Barry's persona. What the POST did was collapse and fold into a long line of embarrassing, pathetic, Stalinist p.c. bullshit. More power to Page on all grounds -- for speaking his mind, for telling an abusive PR person to take a hike, for already planning to leave the pusillanimous POST for a more intellectually challenging job. Let's hope his employers in California support him more than the wankers in Washington.
I'm sure the only reason this is an issue is because of the tone. If you had said 'drug problem' instead of 'crack addict', it would be a non-issue. Because of the inflamatory language, the Post will institute the token leave of absence until the political hot heads cool off, and then everything will be back to normal. No big deal.
1. Did he reply from his personal or his wapo email?
2. Uhm, and maybe they should cut him a break since he has trouble in social situations anyway.
The problem is definitely connected to the fact that Page sent the e-mail from his WaPo account (my post did not imply that it was from another account). It was not a mistaken send either, as if he hit the Reply All button by mistake (an idea introduced in Comment 5, not in my post).
Anyone heard anything else about this? I have a hunch there is more to the story.
ummmmm.... never mind.
Any sympathy I may have had for Barry (which was limited already) pretty much evaporated when I read in the WP today that his response included this statement...
Barry said the note amounted to "character assassination" at a time when "around the nation, it's almost open season on black people."
Nice job, Barry. Way to fan the race flames once again. Criticizng an ex mayor for his crack use and general worthlessness is not the same as participating in 'open season on black people'.
What was most interesting about the email by Tim Page to Councilmember Marion Barry was the anger/rage shown by a white male. Over the years, the most angry statements that I have heard and read are by white males- who often live in the suburbs and or are new to D.C.
They were not around when Marion Barry was on our school board, council member and while he was Mayor. It is something that some of us white folks call a "white thang" something that many white folks do not see - their own whiteness. For all I know, they may be some of the same white folks who still buy their drugs at 15th and Mass. Ave. SE on their way home from gov. jobs...that business has been going since l966!We still haven't won that war on drugs!