Armstrong Williams gets the axe

We have discussed the Armstrong Williams pay for shill story here and Jazz covered it here. Well now Editor and Publisher reports that Tribune Media Services has given him the axe.

NEW YORK Tribune Media Services (TMS) tonight terminated its contract with columnist Armstrong Williams, effective immediately. But Williams told E&P that he plans to continue his feature via self-syndication.

TMS' action came after USA Today reported this morning that Williams had accepted $240,000 from the Bush administration to promote the No Child Left Behind education-reform law on his TV and radio shows. E&P subsequently reported that Williams had also written about NCLB in his newspaper column at least four times last year.

In their statement TMS states the obvious:

"[A]ccepting compensation in any form from an entity that serves as a subject of his weekly newspaper columns creates, at the very least, the appearance of a conflict of interest. Under these circumstances, readers may well ask themselves if the views expressed in his columns are his own, or whether they have been purchased by a third party."

Yes indeed, we will now have to question all pundits shilling for this administration. Oh wait! I was already doing that.