A Diversity of Opinion

Add in Book World's Michael Dirda, and the full count is 44 men, 17 women. Minorities: eight out of 61. All the minority columnists, with the exception of Zakaria, are black.

When you look at the columnists who write more than once a week in the news pages -- Wise, Wilbon, Boswell, Pearlstein, Kelly, Barr, Fisher, Roberts, Argetsinger, Hax and de Moraes, it's seven men to four women, with only one -- Wilbon -- minority. But those numbers show a split between news and Style; news needs the diversity.

Washingtonpost.com uses most Post columnists plus Latina columnist Marcela Sanchez, who writes in both English and Spanish, and Jabari Asim, Book World deputy editor, who is black. The Web site also has diversity on PostGlobal and On Faith, great new additions, and a blog by Post business writer Annys Shin.

From a count earlier this year, The Post has about 660 journalists, about 41 percent of whom are women and about 23 percent minorities, said Deputy Managing Editor Milton Coleman. Several women are assistant managing editors -- Susan Glasser, National; Deborah Heard, Style; Shirley Carswell, planning and administration; Sandra Sugawara, Business; and Jill Dutt, weekend editions.

Sugawara is Asian American; Carswell, Heard and Coleman are black. Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, assistant managing editor for sports, and Don Podesta, assistant managing editor for copy desks, are Hispanic.

So how could The Post increase diversity as the staff and space for stories got smaller? It wouldn't be easy, but here are some thoughts. On the op-ed pages, don't run all the columnists all the time. Create some space for new voices. In Close to Home, make a point of seeking out more women and minorities. Outlook can also bring in more such voices.

The Metro section needs a female columnist, and it also needs a columnist attuned to the region's burgeoning Latino communities. A Latino columnist could appear in the Extras since they are oriented toward counties and neighborhoods. Not all new voices have to be on the staff; they could be regular contributors. Metro's new Page Three could be used to bring in more female and minority voices.

The point is not to toss excellent white male columnists; the point is to add more and lively voices to The Post.

Deborah Howell can be reached at 202-334-7582 or atombudsman@washpost.com.