Exchange with Ombudsman at The Washington Post

The following is an excerpt from the ombudsman’s Sunday column of which I responded (her response follows mine):

The Limits of E-Mails En Masse by Deborah Howell [Nov. 13, 2005] “A ton of email was prompted by a photo of the grieving mother of a Palestinian suicide bomber with a story about a bombing that killed several people in Israel. I thought the picture was inappropriate and said so in my second column, on Oct. 23. This did not stop the mail, which led me to believe that it didn’t matter that I had dealt with it; people were e-mailing on the basis of a lobby’s request.”

From: Dr. Michael Berenhaus [mailto:mberenhaus@comcast.net]
Sent: Sunday, November 13, 2005 9:56 PM
To: 'ombudsman@washpost.com'
Subject: your Sunday column [ what else :-) ]

Dear Ms. Howell,

It did matter to me that you dealt with the inappropriate picture of the grieving mother of a Palestinian suicide bomber, and I thank you for that. Whether you got a bunch of email after your comments or not doesn’t negate that what you did was the right thing to do – and that shows integrity.

Thank you for your good work.

Michael Berenhaus



-----Original Message-----
From: Deborah C Howell [mailto:HowellDC@washpost.com] On Behalf Of Ombudsman Internet DropBox
Sent: Monday, November 14, 2005 2:44 PM
To: Dr. Michael BerenhausSubject: Re: your Sunday column [ what else :-) ]

Thanks! I felt like I was being punished for doing the right thing. Deborah