William Booth

SecState Kerry Deeply Offends Ally Israel with 'Boycott' Comments; WashPost Spins, Buries on A8
By Ken Shepherd | February 3, 2014 | 3:10 PM EST

Imagine, if you will, it's the midterm election year of 2006 and President George W. Bush's secretary of state making careless remarks which seem to lend moral validity to an economic boycott of the United States's staunchest ally in the Middle East. The Washington Post would surely glom onto such an embarrassing gaffe and play it up as much as possible.

Yet when John Kerry made such remarks about the State of Israel, the Post's William Booth spun the gaffe as best he could, seemingly exasperated that Israeli statesmen were even complaining about the remarks. For their part, Booth's bosses dutifully shuffled to story to page A8 of the February 3 edition, rather than give it more prominent coverage (emphasis mine):

WaPo's Booth Hails 'Half-Century of Revolution' in Cuba
By Ken Shepherd | January 2, 2009 | 1:14 PM EST

Filing his January 1 story from Santiago, Cuba, Washington Post foreign service staffer William Booth paid homage to the 50-year mark of the Castro revolution, pinning blame on "mostly hostile U.S. presidents" and a "decades-long trade and travel embargo" for the big 5-0 being celebrated as a "low-key event that was far removed from the triumphant displays and mass rallies of [Cuba's] socialist glory days."

Booth's 14-paragraph article failed to label either ailing despot Fidel nor ruling substitute despot Raul Castro as dictators, although the man they deposed in 1959, Fulgencio Batista, was tagged as a "despised dictator."

What's more, the word "revolution" to describe the Castro regime a total of seven times in the story, four of them by Booth himself, the other three in quotes from Castro. At no point did Booth quote a Cuban dissident or any Castro opponent, although he made efforts to paint the younger Castro brother as something of a reformer: