Even I blanched slightly when McClatchy VP Howard Weaver kicked off a post –

I believe I’d fire any reporter who wasted a chance to question Gov. Sarah Palin by asking a single question about pregnancies, DUIs or thuggish boyfriends.

In the course of responding to a flaming phalanx of anonymous comments, Weaver revealed that Palin’s local paper, the Anchorage Daily News, had known about the rumours of Governor’s daughter’s pregnancy – but had chosen to ignore it. (Confirmed today in E&P‘s i/v with the ADN editor: “We did not think it was news we were inclined to pursue. I don’t see that it had much relevance to her tenure as governor…”)

Prompting another anonymous intervention:

Hey Howard, papers are getting their butts kicked because their bosses think their publications are too high-and-mighty to ask character questions or go after gossip.

For goodness sake, your papers got beat by the National Enquirer on the John Edwards affair. Now you’re getting pounded by the blogs on Palin news that your Anchorage paper chose to ignore.

Howard, the public wants to read this stuff. And they have a right to know.

And another, this time from a McClatchy reporter:

[A]s one poster pointed out, the prurient and sleazy (my words, not his) are what seems to drive readers’ interest these days…

As responsible journalists, we’re no longer the gatekeepers of information. But God knows we still need to attract readers and (let’s say it together) drive Internet traffic.

It wasn’t just that anonymous hack who’d been stirred by the firing threat. Today Weaver answered that comment in another post.

I had a helpful, productive email exchange last night with Mark Seibel and other editors at the bureau who were explaining why their staffers took issue with my post.

He added:

We are not likely to get many substantive chances to question this woman, and I don’t want them squandered. … There are plethora of infinitely more more important questions to ask and things to learn about Sarah Palin, matters of genuine national interest and security. Do you – or anybody you know complaining about this – question that prioritization?

Beyond the jaw-dropping admission, two points here for corporate bloggers btw:

• One, hats off to Howard. Not many execs are willing to play punchbag online.
• Second. Not everything is read as you intended it to be meant. You knew that. So are you prepared to handle a debate on issues you didn’t think you were raising?

And the reaction?

How would you like a publisher making a similar casual statement about firing editors? Really funny, ha?

And the inevitable:

With McClatchy going into the tank financially, why don’t you stop wasting time writing this blog and get to work trying to fix the problem your newspapers confront?