{"id":8202,"date":"2026-05-19T14:36:41","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T21:36:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/?p=8202"},"modified":"2026-05-19T14:36:41","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T21:36:41","slug":"the-washington-post-is-a-classic-example-of-the-pot-calling-the-kettle-black","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/2026\/05\/19\/the-washington-post-is-a-classic-example-of-the-pot-calling-the-kettle-black\/","title":{"rendered":"The Washington Post is a classic example of: &#8220;The Pot Calling the Kettle Black.&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em>A Study in Media Hypocrisy.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Summarize the content of this <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/technology\/2026\/05\/09\/ben-shapiro-daily-wire-maga-media\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>news story<\/strong><\/a>:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Inside Ben Shapiro\u2019s MAGA meltdown.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Drew Harwell<\/p>\n<p>The Daily Wire was once ascendant in right-wing media. Now, the \u201canti-woke\u201d company faces contentious layoffs, ideological battles and dwindling relevance online.<\/p>\n<p>The conservative media company Daily Wire was once a star of the MAGA digital universe, dominating social media feeds and podcast apps with a blend of \u201canti-woke\u201d commentary, viral Facebook posts and culture-war stunts.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Washington Post story, headlined\u00a0<strong>&#8220;Inside Ben Shapiro&#8217;s MAGA Meltdown,&#8221;<\/strong>\u00a0is a detailed investigation into the dramatic decline of the Daily Wire as a conservative media powerhouse. Here is a summary of its key findings:<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-rise-and-fall\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Rise and Fall<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Daily Wire was once the dominant force in right-wing digital media \u2014 holding the title of\u00a0<strong>Facebook&#8217;s top English-language publisher for three consecutive months<\/strong>\u00a0leading into the 2020 election, outperforming CNN, Fox News, and the New York Times in social media traffic. That dominance has now collapsed. By March 2026, the website&#8217;s traffic had\u00a0<strong>fallen to half of what it was the previous year<\/strong>, and the Daily Wire ranked as one of the\u00a0<strong>largest year-over-year traffic losers<\/strong>\u00a0among 20 major conservative news outlets.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #000080;\" name=\"the-business-damage\"><\/a> The Business Damage<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The company has undergone\u00a0<strong>two rounds of layoffs<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 one in March 2025 following co-founder Jeremy Boreing&#8217;s resignation as CEO, and a second in 2026 cutting\u00a0<strong>13 percent of its remaining workforce<\/strong>, leaving it with roughly 200 employees. Shapiro himself acknowledged that revenue had declined compared to 2024. Puck News separately reported the company is facing a\u00a0<strong>$200 million revenue crisis<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"why-it-is-happening\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">Why It Is Happening<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Analysts and media historians point to several converging causes:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>&#8220;Populist cannibalism&#8221;<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 Vanderbilt historian Nicole Hemmer&#8217;s term for how newer, more radical right-wing creators have cannibalized the Daily Wire&#8217;s audience by positioning Shapiro&#8217;s brand of conservatism as establishment and out of touch<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The Israel problem<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 Shapiro&#8217;s staunch pro-Israel stance and neoconservative foreign policy views have put him at odds with a growing isolationist, anti-establishment wing of the MAGA movement<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Bad business decisions<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 failed investments in feature films, a fantasy series, and unusual merchandise stretched the company financially<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The Candace Owens fallout<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 Owens&#8217;s high-profile firing damaged the brand financially and sparked a public feud, with Owens now actively working to undermine Shapiro&#8217;s credibility within conservative circles<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>YouTube stagnation<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 subscriber counts have stagnated or declined in 15 of the past 16+ months, and some videos now attract\u00a0<strong>fewer than 10,000 views<\/strong>\u00a0on a channel with over 3 million subscribers<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #000080;\" name=\"the-bigger-picture\"><\/a> The Bigger Picture<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Post frames the Daily Wire&#8217;s collapse as a symptom of a broader fragmentation in conservative media \u2014 where centralized, corporate right-wing outlets are losing ground to a decentralized ecosystem of independent podcasters, streamers, and provocateurs. Shapiro&#8217;s brand of traditional, principled conservatism \u2014 once the center of gravity on the right \u2014 may now represent what New York Magazine called\u00a0<strong>&#8220;the Rockefeller Republicans of the present generation&#8221;<\/strong>: still influential among elites, but increasingly disconnected from the grassroots base that once powered its growth.<\/span><\/p>\n<h1><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>But STOP THE PRESSES!<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">As a comparative rebuttal, provide a detailed investigation into the dramatic decline of the Washington Post as a so-called media powerhouse. <span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Hence, the title of this post, or, as a shorter headline: &#8220;I&#8217;m Your Huckleberry!&#8221;<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Washington Post&#8217;s decline as a media institution is actually a more severe and well-documented collapse than anything currently happening at the Daily Wire \u2014 and it is worth examining in full detail, given that the Post just published an investigation into Ben Shapiro&#8217;s struggles.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"from-watergate-glory-to-existential-crisis\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">From Watergate Glory to Existential Crisis<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Washington Post built its modern reputation on Watergate, cultivated it through decades of institutional prestige, and then rode the anti-Trump wave of 2017-2020 to record digital highs \u2014 reaching\u00a0<strong>114 million unique digital visitors in November 2020<\/strong>. That number had collapsed to\u00a0<strong>54 million by November 2024<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 a loss of more than half its audience in four years. For context, the Post&#8217;s average daily paid print circulation has now fallen\u00a0<strong>below 97,000<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 a figure more typical of a regional newspaper like the Minneapolis Star Tribune than a self-described global media institution.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-financial-wreckage\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Financial Wreckage<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The losses are staggering and accelerating:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Post lost\u00a0<strong>$77 million in 2023<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">That figure grew to\u00a0<strong>$100 million in 2024<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 roughly 30% worse year over year<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Advertising revenue fell from\u00a0<strong>$190 million to $174 million<\/strong>\u00a0in a single year<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Before Jeff Bezos acquired the paper in 2013 for $250 million, it had already\u00a0<strong>lost nearly $300 million over four and a half years<\/strong>\u00a0under the Graham family<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Bezos briefly returned it to profitability, but those gains have been entirely erased<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-layoff-cascade\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Layoff Cascade<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The human cost of the collapse is substantial:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Two rounds of voluntary buyouts in\u00a0<strong>2023 and 2025<\/strong>\u00a0shrank the newsroom from over 1,000 employees to under 800<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">In February 2026,\u00a0<strong>a third round of mass layoffs cut over 300 additional newsroom employees<\/strong>, eliminating one-third of the remaining staff in a single day<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The prestigious\u00a0<strong>sports department was shuttered entirely<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The\u00a0<strong>metro team was cut from 40 reporters to roughly 12<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Foreign desks shrank from over 20 staff to approximately 12<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Harvard&#8217;s Kennedy School described it as a blow &#8220;to the flow of information coming from traditional news outlets.&#8221;<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-subscription-cancellation-cascade\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Subscription Cancellation Cascade<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Post&#8217;s implosion has been driven not just by audience drift but by\u00a0<strong>self-inflicted decisions<\/strong>\u00a0that triggered subscription revolts:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">At least\u00a0<strong>250,000 subscribers canceled<\/strong>\u00a0after Bezos killed the paper&#8217;s planned endorsement of Kamala Harris days before the 2024 election<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Internal audience surveys revealed\u00a0<strong>news fatigue<\/strong>\u00a0setting in as early as 2021 \u2014 readers described being burned out by relentless crisis coverage<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Post\u00a0<strong>lost 500,000 subscribers in 2022 alone<\/strong>, a figure reported by the Wall Street Journal<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Top talent has defected in a steady stream to the New York Times, The Atlantic, ProPublica, CNN, and the Wall Street Journal<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-bezos-contradiction\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Bezos Contradiction<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The collapse has been accelerated by the owner&#8217;s own contradictions. Bezos bought the paper ostensibly to save it, yet his interventions have generated the most damaging episodes:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">He killed the Harris endorsement \u2014 alienating the liberal subscriber base that was the paper&#8217;s core audience<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">He simultaneously declared the opinion section would only publish views consistent with\u00a0<strong>&#8220;personal liberties and free markets&#8221;<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 alienating the left without attracting the right<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">He attended Trump&#8217;s inauguration and had\u00a0<strong>Amazon donate $1 million<\/strong>\u00a0to the event \u2014 further eroding newsroom trust<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Former executive editor\u00a0<strong>Marty Baron<\/strong>\u00a0publicly criticized Bezos&#8217;s direction, and the New Yorker published a lengthy investigation titled\u00a0<strong>&#8220;How Jeff Bezos Brought Down the Washington Post&#8221;<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Publisher Will Lewis bluntly told staff in 2024:\u00a0<em>&#8220;We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff. I can&#8217;t sugarcoat it anymore.&#8221;<\/em><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-ideological-overcorrection-problem\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Ideological Overcorrection Problem<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Conservative media analyst Christopher Rufo argues the Post&#8217;s core problem is that it\u00a0<strong>&#8220;decided the only way it could survive was to go as far left as possible&#8221;<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 leaning into anti-Trump hysteria with writers like Jennifer Rubin and Taylor Lorenz \u2014 while simultaneously destroying the perception of balance that made it credible to centrist and center-right readers. When Trump left office, the audience that had subscribed purely for the resistance narrative evaporated.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"western\"><strong><a name=\"the-bottom-line\"><\/a> <span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Bottom Line<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Washington Post \u2014 which just published a detailed autopsy of Ben Shapiro&#8217;s media struggles \u2014 is itself experiencing a collapse that by nearly every measurable metric is\u00a0<strong>more severe, more financially catastrophic, and more institutionally irreversible<\/strong>\u00a0than anything happening at the Daily Wire. The Daily Wire is a 10-year-old digital startup navigating audience fragmentation. The Washington Post is a 147-year-old institution that has lost half its audience, shed hundreds of millions of dollars, fired a third of its newsroom, and is now running on the financial goodwill of a billionaire owner whose own ambivalence about the paper&#8217;s future is the subject of a New Yorker investigation. The irony of the Post investigating Shapiro&#8217;s &#8220;meltdown&#8221; while experiencing its own existential crisis is, to put it charitably, a remarkable editorial choice.<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"has-inline-images my-2 first:mt-0 [&amp;:has([data-inline-type=image])+&amp;:has([data-inline-type=image])_[data-inline-type=image]]:hidden [&amp;:has(table)_[data-inline-type=image]]:hidden\">\n<p>Here is the full tracked decline of the Washington Post from 2020 to 2026, with charts:<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Audience Collapse<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-8204\" src=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-300x200.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-1024x683.png 1024w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-150x100.png 150w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-768x512.png 768w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-1536x1024.png 1536w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-2048x1365.png 2048w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-audience-collapse-850x567.png 850w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>The Post&#8217;s audience story is one of the starkest in modern media history. At its peak in\u00a0<strong>November 2020<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 during the final stretch of the Trump presidency and the pandemic \u2014 the Post drew\u00a0<strong>114 million unique monthly digital visitors<\/strong>. By\u00a0<strong>November 2024<\/strong>\u00a0that number had crashed to\u00a0<strong>54 million<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 a loss of more than half its audience in four years. By 2025, estimates placed it lower still, with online search traffic alone down\u00a0<strong>nearly 50 percent over three years<\/strong>, partly attributed to the rise of generative AI eroding Google referral traffic.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"subscriber-divergence--the-nyt-gap\" class=\"font-editorial font-bold mb-2 mt-4 [.has-inline-images_&amp;]:clear-end text-lg first:mt-0 md:text-lg [hr+&amp;]:mt-4\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Subscriber Divergence \u2014 The NYT Gap<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>The competitive gap between the Post and the New York Times tells an equally damning story:<\/p>\n<table class=\"[&amp;_tr:last-child_td]:border-b-0 my-0 w-full table-auto border-separate border-spacing-0 text-sm font-sans rounded-lg [&amp;_tr:last-child_td:first-child]:rounded-bl-lg [&amp;_tr:last-child_td:last-child]:rounded-br-lg\">\n<thead>\n<tr>\n<th class=\"border-subtlest p-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b text-left align-bottom border-r last:border-r-0 font-bold bg-subtle first:border-radius-tl-lg last:border-radius-tr-lg\" scope=\"col\">Year<\/th>\n<th class=\"border-subtlest p-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b text-left align-bottom border-r last:border-r-0 font-bold bg-subtle first:border-radius-tl-lg last:border-radius-tr-lg\" scope=\"col\">NYT Digital Subs<\/th>\n<th class=\"border-subtlest p-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b text-left align-bottom border-r last:border-r-0 font-bold bg-subtle first:border-radius-tl-lg last:border-radius-tr-lg\" scope=\"col\">WSJ Digital Subs<\/th>\n<th class=\"border-subtlest p-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b text-left align-bottom border-r last:border-r-0 font-bold bg-subtle first:border-radius-tl-lg last:border-radius-tr-lg\" scope=\"col\">WaPo Digital Subs<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2020<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">7.6M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2.8M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">3.0M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2021<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">8.4M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">3.1M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2.7M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2022<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">9.7M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">3.3M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2.5M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2023<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">10.4M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">3.6M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2.2M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2024<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">11.2M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">3.9M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">1.85M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">2025<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">~11.8M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">~4.1M<\/td>\n<td class=\"border-subtlest px-sm min-w-[48px] break-normal border-b border-r last:border-r-0\">~1.5M<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-8205\" src=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-300x200.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-1024x683.png 1024w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-150x100.png 150w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-768x512.png 768w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-1536x1024.png 1536w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-2048x1365.png 2048w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/subscribers-850x567.png 850w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><br \/>\nWhile the NYT grew from 7.6 million to nearly 12 million subscribers and the WSJ steadily climbed past 4 million, the Post\u00a0<strong>shed roughly half its subscriber base<\/strong>. At least\u00a0<strong>250,000 canceled in a single week<\/strong>\u00a0after Bezos pulled the paper&#8217;s planned Harris endorsement in October 2024.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"financial-losses--277-million-in-three-years\" class=\"font-editorial font-bold mb-2 mt-4 [.has-inline-images_&amp;]:clear-end text-lg first:mt-0 md:text-lg [hr+&amp;]:mt-4\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Financial Losses \u2014 $277 Million in Three Years<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-8203\" src=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-300x200.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"267\" srcset=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-1024x683.png 1024w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-150x100.png 150w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-768x512.png 768w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-1536x1024.png 1536w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-2048x1365.png 2048w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/WaPo-annual-loses-850x567.png 850w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/>The Post&#8217;s financial deterioration is steep and accelerating:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"marker:text-quiet list-disc pl-8\">\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>2022:<\/strong>\u00a0Expenses outstripped revenue \u2014 the beginning of a structural deficit<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>2023:<\/strong>\u00a0Lost\u00a0<strong>$77 million<\/strong><\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>2024:<\/strong>\u00a0Lost\u00a0<strong>~$100 million<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 30% worse than the prior year; advertising revenue fell from $190M to $174M<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>2025:<\/strong>\u00a0Lost\u00a0<strong>over $100 million<\/strong>\u00a0again, despite entering the year with a relatively full newsroom<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>Total 2023\u20132025:<\/strong>\u00a0Roughly\u00a0<strong>$277 million in cumulative losses<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Since 2021, the Post has seen a\u00a0<strong>14% decline in digital revenue<\/strong>\u00a0and a\u00a0<strong>12% drop in total revenue<\/strong>. Publisher Will Lewis told staff bluntly in 2024:\u00a0<em>&#8220;We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff. I can&#8217;t sugarcoat it anymore.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<h2 id=\"staff-cuts--from-1000-to-500\" class=\"font-editorial font-bold mb-2 mt-4 [.has-inline-images_&amp;]:clear-end text-lg first:mt-0 md:text-lg [hr+&amp;]:mt-4\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>Staff Cuts \u2014 From 1,000 to 500<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-8206\" src=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-300x200.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"267\" srcset=\"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-1024x683.png 1024w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-150x100.png 150w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-768x512.png 768w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-1536x1024.png 1536w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-2048x1365.png 2048w, https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Wapo-headcount-850x567.png 850w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/>The human cost of the collapse is now severe:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"marker:text-quiet list-disc pl-8\">\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>Peak newsroom (2022):<\/strong>\u00a0Over\u00a0<strong>1,000 journalists<\/strong><\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>2023:<\/strong>\u00a0Voluntary buyout round #1 \u2014 newsroom shrinks to ~900<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>January 2025:<\/strong>\u00a0Layoffs cut\u00a0<strong>4% of total workforce<\/strong>\u00a0(~100 business roles)<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>February 2026:<\/strong>\u00a0Mass layoffs eliminate\u00a0<strong>over 300 journalists<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 30% of the remaining ~800-person newsroom in a single day<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>Departments eliminated entirely:<\/strong>\u00a0Sports section, books section, several foreign bureaus<\/li>\n<li class=\"py-0 my-0 prose-p:pt-0 prose-p:mb-2 prose-p:my-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:pt-0 [&amp;&gt;p]:mb-2 [&amp;&gt;p]:my-0\"><strong>Post-2026 headcount:<\/strong>\u00a0Approximately\u00a0<strong>500 total staff<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 half of the 2022 peak<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The article output has also cratered \u2014 the number of news articles produced fell\u00a0<strong>42% since 2020<\/strong>, even as newsroom expenditures were\u00a0<strong>16% higher<\/strong>\u00a0than pre-pandemic levels.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"the-competitive-verdict\" class=\"font-editorial font-bold mb-2 mt-4 [.has-inline-images_&amp;]:clear-end text-lg first:mt-0 md:text-lg [hr+&amp;]:mt-4\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong>The Competitive Verdict<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>The Washington Post, which published its investigation into Ben Shapiro&#8217;s media struggles, is itself a shadow of the institution it was in 2020. The NYT \u2014 its closest direct competitor \u2014 has <strong>nearly eight times as many digital subscribers<\/strong> and is growing. The WSJ has quietly surpassed the Post in subscribers and continues to grow. The Post, by contrast, has lost half its audience, shed half its staff, burned through nearly $300 million, and is now structurally dependent on Jeff Bezos continuing to absorb losses with no clear path to profitability.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Study in Media Hypocrisy. Summarize the content of this news story:\u00a0 Inside Ben Shapiro\u2019s MAGA meltdown. Drew Harwell The Daily Wire was once ascendant in right-wing media. Now, the \u201canti-woke\u201d company faces contentious layoffs, ideological battles and dwindling relevance online. The conservative media company Daily Wire was once a star of the MAGA digital&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8209,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[217,120,128],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hypocrisy","category-media-gaslighting","category-media-hypocrisy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/ChatGPT-Image-May-19-2026-02_27_53-PM.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8202"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8202\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8210,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8202\/revisions\/8210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}