Inside the Post, the paper’s extensive coverage of racial epithets supposedly uttered by Virginia senatorial candidates George Allen and Jim Webb touched off a round of introspection.

Vanessa Williams, an editor on the continuous-news desk, used the Post’s internal critique to say that the handling of this story might “suggest we’re not comfortable reporting/writing about race. Well, we need to [get] over that, given the rapidly changing demographics of this region. If people don’t feel we’re being honest and representing their myriad points of view, they’re not going to look to The Post to help them navigate their changing worlds.”

To which columnist Courtland Milloy responded: “I wish we would write as much about people who treat blacks like niggers as we do about people who use the word. Who knows who we might end up writing about—maybe even ourselves.”