• Portfolio, Wednesday, July 16, 2008 9:15 AM

Katharine Weymouth, The Washington Post's publisher since February, is among the last of the great American newspaper families. She is also photogenic, driven and not given to corporatespeak.

Tough financial times mean "we have to make some choices about what we can cover and what we can't-and those are going to be hard choices," she says. "There are days when I look at the front page and think, You must be kidding me!"

Weymouth's goal seems to be to involve herself in any aspect of the newspaper that defines its brand--and she's comfortable with the resulting exposure. "Sam Zell [owner of the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times] may be a loon with Tourette's Syndrome," Weymouth says, "but he's not crazy. " She agrees with Zell that "to some degree, [in newspaper content today] it is all about puppies and Iraq."

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