Keith Richburg

In the domain of what properly constitutes human rights issues, forced abortions and sterilizations have to fall in that category. So why isn't the Washington Post describing Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng as a "human rights activist"?

In two stories packaged side-by-side on page A9 of the May 8 paper, the Post's Andrew Higgins and Keith B. Richburg failed to use the term to describe Chen. Higgins tagged Chen a "blind activist," as in an activist who is blind, not an activist for the blind, but the term could confuse casual readers unfamiliar with Chen's plight. Richburg opened his story by tagging Chen as "the self-taught lawyer who has become the center of a diplomatic crisis between the United States and China."

At the top of the 12PM EST hour of MSNBC news coverage on Tuesday, anchor David Shuster spoke with Washington Post reporter Keith Richburg about the recent divide between Rush Limbaugh and RNC Chair Michael Steele: "Following the latest Republican Party civil war. A complete about-face by Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, after calling Rush Limbaugh's show 'ugly' and 'incendiary.' Steele's now apologized in the face of a withering attack from the radio host." Richburg later observed: "You know, it's fascinating. It's like the circular firing squad. I mean, maybe this is what Rush had in mind when he was talking about ‘Operation Chaos.’"

Shuster later asked Richburg: "I mean, when Rush Limbaugh says that all Republicans want President Obama to fail. What's so difficult with somebody saying, 'no, no, we think that his policies may fail, but we don't want them to fail.' What's so difficult about that?" Richburg replied: "...it almost seems like the Republican Party needs a 'Sister Soljah' moment...It seems like the Republicans need somebody who's willing to stand up and say Rush doesn't represent all of the views of the Republican Party and then not rush and apologize to him...I'll bet you whoever does that could end up as the, you know, the nominee of the party or at least the major party."

In reporting on who will replace Hillary Clinton in the Senate in Tuesday’s Washington Post, reporter Keith Richburg unspooled a weird sentence about someone being a conservative Democrat. "There is also pressure to replace Clinton with a woman; one name being mentioned is Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand, a conservative Blue Dog Democrat from Albany."

Gillibrand may be an up-and-coming talent and may have joined the Blue Dog Democrats, but she cannot be described as "conservative" based on her first year of votes in the House. For her 2007 votes, the American Conservative Union gave her a single-digit score of eight and the liberal Americans for Democratic Action classified her as a nearly perfect 95 percent liberal.

The Washington Post is paying due diligence to one of Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani's accomplishments as mayor of the Big Apple: cleaning up 42nd Street from its seedy adult-oriented businesses.

Ah, but the adult video stores and strip clubs just moved a few blocks over, the Washington Post's Keith B. Richburg reminds us in his January 29 article. Richburg made sure he took an inside look at the matter, interviewing an exotic dancer while she was, uh, working: