When will this whole Washingtonpost.com comment chat thing jump the shark?

Today's largely boring "panel" offered little in the way of insight, a lot in the way of well-placed frustration/anger from executive editor Jim Brady, and a few snarky comments that themselves bordered on uncivil. A sample exchange:

Columbus Ohio: I think Atrios sums this up pretty well: "Nothing like convening a panel to discuss how to deal with internet comments which consists of someone who doesn't allow them, someone who doesn't get any because nobody gives a sh** what he writes, and someone who deletes them and clearly exaggerates the reasons why."

Jim Brady: Yeah, that's a terrific analysis. So the point is that the only people qualified to discuss comments on articles are people who allow comments and delete nothing? That would be one heck of a discussion. As for clearly exaggerating, I saw that "analysis." It was of a cached page of one of the two problematic posts, and as I have mentioned a number of times, didn't have any of the posts that we'd removed. If you want to act as it that's proof of clear exaggeration, I think you lose some credibility when you talk about the press and its burden of proof. If The Post had used that burden of proof to show that Abramoff directed money to Democrats, you'd rightfully be all over them.