• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, March 10, 2025

The controversy over billionaire newspaper owners trying to control opinions just won’t quiet down. 

Ruth Marcus -- a columnist at The Washington Post, has resigned -- claiming that Post CEO Will Lewis killed a column she wrote. 

The subject? The effort by Bezos to reposition the opinion section of the Post to reflect a pro-market orientation. 

Marcus argued that the new strategy will “"break the trust of readers that columnists are writing what they believe, and not what the owners has deemed acceptable." 

This is not the first, nor most likely, the last such resignation at the venerable newspaper, or at other publications. 

Politics aside, one has to accept the practical reality. As A.J. Liebling famously wrote, “freedom of the press belongs to the man who owns one.”

Bezos and LA Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong are within their rights to control or position opinions in their publications. 

That doesn’t make it laudable. But Bezos, for one, has a vast ecommerce and retail business that he must protect. 

Meanwhile, the Post is proceeding with a newsroom overhaul designed to drive circulation. According to Axios, the overhauled Post will have a politics and government desk, a national desk and a business, technology, health, science and cllmate desk. The changes are expected to occur by Mau 5, Axios writes. 

As for Marcus, she is well-positioned to survive this episode, between books and TV appearances. Other less well-known writers may not be so fortunate -- they could face severe financial damage if they take a stand in circumstances like these. Substack is becoming crowded.

It’s a shame. Marcus has worked at the Post since 1984. Even the Post acknowledges her “significant contributions to The Washington Post over the past 40 years. We respect her decision to leave and wish her the best." 

But for Marcus, it was no go. 

"Will's decision to not …run the column that I wrote respectfully dissenting from Jeff's edict – something that I have not experienced in almost two decades of column-writing – underscores that the traditional freedom of columnists to select the topics they wish to address and say what they think has been dangerously eroded.”