Today is his last entry at White House Watch.
A class act as always, in his last column, Dan honors those who told the truth during the Bush era, or as much of the truth as could be ascertained, and those journalists who do so now in the Obama era.
Drop by that link to send a message.
Froomkin's viewpoint is not clouded by ideology.
He aims his sharp analytical skills at the Obama administration in the same way he did with the Bush/Cheney gang.
Froomkin was a rarity at the Washington Post. He has a moral center, which that old newspaper has lost. Right up to the very end, Froomkin continued to link to articles explicating the connection between the White House and torture, and to all of the other great issues of the early 21st century.
That contrasts with the WP's editorial pages which are cheerleaders for torture and the invasion and occupation of other people's countries.
In a commencement speech, WaPo publisher Katharine Weymouth told journalism students: "I think the greatest mistake we made in our fat years was to get away from our customers. We forgot that, at the end of the day, we are only as good as the people who read us and we must put together packages of news and information that they are interested in."
With those words, she was deceiving herself and those students. Or, she did not mean what she said.
Thousands of readers have written to her newspaper asking her to continue Froomkin in his role as a contract writer without medical or other benefits. She refused to reconsider.
Many readers, like myself, have pointed out that we visit her newspaper specifically to read Froomkin's column, and stay also to read the news. Froomkin's fans are not neocons and that's why we do not hang around to read the neocon editorial pages headed by the narrow-minded Fred Hiatt.
Editorial pages always represent the views of publishers.
Katharine Weymouth neglected to tell the journalism students that her newspaper is so narrow in focus, it will not continue to publish someone who is a consistent critic of the United States torturing human beings, and holding them in prisons without trial or with kangaroo trials. She didn't tell the students her newspaper does not champion civil liberties.
These are the kind of stories to which Froomkin linked, and this is the reason he was fired by the Washington Post, defender of US foreign policy even when it is immoral and based on criminal behavior that violates the Geneva Accords.
Civilized people opposed to torture and the invasion and occupation of other people's countries do not admire the Washington Post editorial pages but we respected that newspaper for being big enough to entertain opposing viewpoints. The Washington Post is no longer big enough to host viewpoints at odds with its strict neocon viewpoint, and its readership will shrink as a result.
The Post employs a few great writers on staff. Dana Priest's name comes to mind but, on the whole, most of the great investigative reporters and writers have left. And so too, Froomkin leaves, and an important viewpoint is silenced at that news outlet. Today, WaPo's Big Tent becomes a whole lot smaller.
As Glenn Greenwald asks The Washington Post fires its best columnist. Why?
Even WP ombudsman Andrew Alexander couldn't get answers from anyone in the newsroom and only from WaPo's public relations flak and then Fred Hiatt, "whose stable of contributors includes Froomkin."
Barry Sussman was an editor at the Washington Post for 22 years. The link is to his take on Hiatt firing Froomkin.
I shed no tears for Froomkin because he is talented and will survive. E-mail him at froomkin@gmail.com to add yourself to his mailing list and to find out what is to be his next gig.
Drop by White House Watch. to say good bye to what's left of the small tent.