Michael Laris

Washington Post Metro reporter Aaron Davis has an excellent story in today's paper about ethically-deficient D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray (D) attending a reelection campaign fundraiser at the home of an "incarcerated real estate mogul" who is guilty of having "prey[ed] on homeowners facing foreclosure." Said home, by the way, is $36,000 in arrears on D.C. property taxes.  Last year some of Davis's…

The Washington Post kept up its crusade to attack Virginia GOP gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli in Thursday’s paper. In a story covering a debate between the two candidates vying to succeed Cuccinelli as attorney general, reporters Frederick Kunkle and Michael Laris put only one candidate’s quote on the front page: the Democrat attacking Cuccinelli as an extremist and abuser of power.…

After failing completely to offer one headline covering some liberal guy named Ralph Northam for most of 2013 -- he's the Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor of Virginia -- The Washington Post on Wednesday noticed "Northam targets Jackson's rhetoric." Because the Post wants absolutely every story on this campaign to be about Rev. E.W. Jackson's rhetoric. They put the ball on the tee and…

If black Rev. E.W. Jackson was a liberal and his white opponent Ralph Northam was a conservative, The Washington Post would have to accuse itself of racism.  In the Virginia campaign for lieutenant governor, Northam, a white liberal, is the beneficiary of obvious and massive discrimination. He hasn’t drawn a single headline from the Post since he won the primary in June. No one needs to know…

"For those scraping by on minimum wage, an increase sounds good." That was the Einstein-brilliant headline for the February 25 Metro section article by Washington Post staff writer Michael Laris, which looked at how a "Young Pr[ince] George's [County] father finds little money left to advance dreams." Laris's 44-paragraph story began with the plight of 24-year-old father Tyrrell Brown, who "…

Most of the January 2 front page for The Washington Post was devoted to the resolution of the so-called fiscal cliff, but editors made sure to leave space for a gauzy 33-paragraph story entitled "History at the altar: Maryland sees wave of same-sex weddings as law takes effect." By contrast, an uplifting story involving a non-controversial religious tradition in African-American churches was…

Yesterday the Montgomery County [Md.] Council passed into law a 5-cent tax on plastic and paper bags dispensed by  "nearly all retail establishments, not just those that sell food" within the county. "Among the few exceptions are paper bags from restaurants and pharmacy bags holding prescription drugs," Post staffer Michael Laris noted in his page A1 story. But Laris left out one huge…

As I noted yesterday in my NB Extra piece, in an October 26 editorial listing endorsements for the Montgomery County [Md.] Council, the Washington Post erroneously stated that the incumbent County Executive Isiah "Ike" Leggett (D) was unopposed in his reelection bid. That simply is not true, and the Post today issued a correction noting that Leggett does indeed face a challenge, from…

In seven days, the Washington Post: Ran 11 articles related to D.C.'s new law allowing same-sex marriage. Devoted 543 inches of column space to the ruling - equal to nearly four full pages. Printed 14 photos of gay celebrations, including a prominent one of two men kissing. Quoted supporters 11 times more often than opponents - 67 to 6. Repeatedly compared gay marriage…

If abortion clinics serve up abortions, do anti-abortion clinics perform anti-abortions?I couldn't help but muse that as I read the Washington Post's Metro section below-the-fold front-pager "Disclaimer proposed for anti-abortion clinics."The November 11 story by Michael Laris explained that "Montgomery County [Md.] officials" are considering a "regulation" that "would require pregnancy centers…