I'm not under that impression, and I sought out the WaPo article itself prior to writing my comment. I am in general an opponent of modifying primary source ma

I'm not under that impression, and I sought out the WaPo article itself prior to writing my comment. I am in general an opponent of modifying primary source material, which is what the WaPo article has become. If these papers want to bash Tom Cotton they are more than welcome to do so, but they should leave the paper trail intact so that people can see the unadulterated trajectory of the discourse and evaluate it accordingly. Journalists should not afford themselves the privilege of retroactively editing past writings in order to stay on the right side of the zeitgeist. In my mind, even with a note explaining the change, altering the paper trail of the discourse is worse than simply leaving the article intact with no added commentary. The difference between this and published editions of books is that you don't eradicate past printings of a book when you release a new edition, but when you update a website you typically supplant the prior state. I don't want to get too fanciful, but imagine buying a copy of Mein Kampf or Uncle Tom's Cabin and finding that the foreword describes significant textual modifications made in light of subsequent social awareness.