Decimated

Tamara Jones, interviewed by John Temple: The Post newsroom has been decimated, and the people left behind keep being told to do more, more, more with less, less, less. They're exhausted, they're anxious, they're beyond demoralized. And guess what? They're still committed 110% to serving a misguided public that considers them disposable. Has quality been impacted? Of course it has, especially in feature-writing. Voice is being replaced with attitude, and there are more and more 'lite' quickies. The lack of warm bodies and resources in the newsroom also results in less first-hand observation. Travel budgets have been slashed, which translates to a lot more reporting done by phone and surfing the web. You can get quotes and factoids that way, yes, but you won't get poetry. What's sacrificed is depth, nuance, layers. Steve Coll, when he was managing editor, used to call it "sitting still inside the story." I also notice a lot of promising reporters flatlining instead of flourishing, because editors and senior writers who served as coaches have either left or no longer have the luxury of time to mentor. When I wrote my first Style piece, Gene Weingarten was my editor, and we spent two entire days locked in his office, fine-tuning every single sentence of a 100-inch piece. It was about a miracle in Baltimore that had been used to canonize a saint. Gene told me I had "to prove whether or not God exists." Those heady days are gone for good. If I pitched the same idea today, I'd probably be told to just do a phoner with God and cobble together a 10-inch Q&A for tomorrow.