Comments Policy

Readers are welcome to comment on selected articles.

At the discretion of the editor and publisher, some articles or categories of articles will not be open for comments.

We use the Disqus commenting platform.

Removal of comments

Some comments will be removed solely at the discretion of our staff. You have a First Amendment right to public expression, but it does not extend to this website, which is a private, commercial enterprise. We pay the bills, we make the rules.

Comments are likely to be removed under these circumstances:

  1. We are committed to accurate and responsible journalism. We cannot allow comments containing misinformation, rumors or claims of fact that our reporting staff has not independently verified. Likewise, if we have chosen to exclude sensitive information from a story, we will also exclude any comment that introduces this information.

    If you think you have worthwhile information to add to a story, contact us.

  2. We will not allow: unlawful, threatening, abusive, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable expression.

  3. Insults and name-calling are not allowed. Commenters are expected to discuss news and public issues in a civil manner. Attacks on other commenters, individuals or groups will not be tolerated. This prohibition covers, but is not limited to, sexual, ethnic, racial or religious slurs.

  4. We will not tolerate potentially libelous or defamatory comments, or comments that expose us or others to legal liability. This includes the posting of copyrighted material you do not own or have legal permission to republish.

  5. We do not want comments that are unrelated to the article under which they appear. (Do not use the space beneath article X to start a discussion about topic Y.)

  6. We do not permit commercial content, including selling, advertising or reviewing goods or services. This prohibition covers spam of all varieties.

We reserve the right to permanently block any user who violates these rules.

There are other rules for using our site, and we urge you to read our full Terms of Use and Privacy Policy pages.

We will not routinely notify users whose comment is removed, or users whom we ban, but if you think you deserve reconsideration, contact us.