Washingtonian Editor Garrett Graff has fallen out of the good graces of local writers after suggesting that Washington doesn’t have voting rights because it doesn’t have more esteemed elected officials. This came after a Saturday voting rights rally at the White House.

Graff (pictured here at left) wrote on Twitter: “Congress might be more willing to give DC more rights if DC elected people who seemed more worthy of power.”

This incited DCist’s Martin Austermuhle (pictured here at far right) to go after him on his blog and to question him, which, in turn, WaPo ran on its online opinion pages Thursday. “That’s ridiculous,” he wrote Graff. “How many other states have scandals worse than DC, but still maintain rights denied to DC? … So we need to be better than everyone to get the same as everyone? C’mon.”

This is when Washington City Paper’s Managing Editor Mike Madden (above left) jumped into the fray, calling Graff’s comments “a strangely undemocratic impulse.” WCP gave Graff a chance to comment at length in which he walked back and explained (and explained) his previous assertion. Madden’s ultimate response? A crack on Washingtonian‘s content.