This story is old, I saved it when I was visiting my Mother-in-Law’s, but my sense of this remains the same.

There was a snowball fight in Washington, DC, and some people threw snowballs at a Hummer driven by a Washington, DC police officer, who then drew his gun and threatened the participants.

If it hadn’t been caught on video, and posted to Youtube (included), and the police claimed that it never happened, until, of course the video, and the photographs showed up all over the web.

This is actually pretty standard: Until you have outrageous law enforcement misconduct on tape, the police deny that it ever happened, and so I have very little to say about this.

That being said, I do have something to say about the Washington Post‘s coverage of the incident.

You see, they took the original police story, “Nothing to see here, move along,” at face value, and they did so despite the fact that a Washington Post editorial staffer was at the event and reported what happened:

Washington Post editorial aide Stephen Lowman was at 14th and U on Saturday when the controversial snowball-fight-cum-police-indiscretion went down. He wasn’t there on assignment–he was just taking it all in.

And take it all in he did. He eye-witnessed the snowball fest and the cop waving around a gun, not to mention all the hubbub that ensued.

So Lowman got on the phone to the Post, to give the newsroom a heads-up. He says he was placed in contact with staff writer Matt Zapotosky. Lowman told Zapotosky about the confrontation and the gun. It was just after 3 pm.

………………

Two hours later, at 5:40 pm, the inexplicable takes place: The Washington Post files a post by Zapotosky and Martin Weilrefuting the photographic evidence already on the Web and taking the official position of the D.C. Police Department. Here are some key excerpts:

Assistant Chief Pete Newsham, who leads the department’s investigative services bureau, said it appears the patrol officer acted appropriately, and the worst the detective might have done is use inappropriate language in dealing with the snowball fighters.

So, what we have by the time that the Post covers the story is:

• A staffer who says that a cop pulled a gun at a snowball fight.
• Pictures and videos all over the internet showing that the cop pulled his gun and brandished it, which is technically assault with a deadly weapon.

Now the folks at DC’s alternative paper, the Washington City Paper, whose link I am citing in the story, broke this. They had the pictures, they linked to the Youtube, etc., and they, or at least their reporter Erik Wemple, think that this is all about the WaPo not wanting to link to them, because they are a bunch of DFH’s^* from the alternative weekly.

I think that they are wrong. I think that what is going on is far more malevolent.

I think that this has nothing to do with the Post dissing an alternative weekly competitor, and it has everything to do with being an upper middle class, and overwhelmingly white institution in a city that is majority black.

Simply put, they went with the police story, because the unspoken bias of the Washington Post editors is that they need to keep the N***ers down. They go with a blatantly false police account of the events for the same reason that they so so aggressively repeat and amply blatantly false Republican spin: They believe that the police and the Republicans are the best way to keep N***ers in their place in the District.

Then again, maybe I am just reading way to much into this, and it’s just a crappy and lazy reporter.

^*Dirty F%$#ing Hippies.