As Washington Post staffers reached the deadline to decide whether they would take buyouts, newsroom sources confirmed that WaPo Executive editor Leonard Downie will retire no later than inauguration day, 2009. An announcement could come as early as today.

Former International Tribune editor David Ignatius and post managing editor Phil Bennett are the leading inside candidates to succeed Downie, who has been paper's top editor since 1991, when he succeeded Ben Bradlee.

Many of Bennett's colleagues described him as "moody," and he may have suffered from backing Susan Glasser to become the assistant managing editor for national news. Glasser was pushed out of that job last month at the behest of Katharine Weymouth, the new Post publisher who is also searching for Downie's successor. Glasser's personality was described as "toxic," and she was widely viewed as a failure on the national desk.

Ignatius was popular as editor of the International Herald Tribune, but as a columnist he has been away from the Post newsroom for several years.

Former managing edtior Steve Coll, who some people believe left the paper partly because Downie was unwilling to retire, told Politico that he had met recently with Weymouth, but he does not consider himself a candidate to become executive editor. New York Times Washington bureau chief Dean Baquet has also denied that he is a candidate. Newsweek editor Jon Meacham and Marcus Brauchli, who just resigned as managing editor of the Wall Street Journal, are also under consideration.

At least two Post AME's have taken the buyout-art director Michael Keegan and Style editor Deb Heard, though Heard will stay on until December. As Radar reported yesterday, political columnist David Broder has also taken the buyout, although he will continue as a contract employee. The Post is hoping that between 60 and 90 staffers will take early retirement, and it appears that at least that number have accepted the buyout offer, which was more generous than the retirement packages offered earlier this year by the New York Times. The Times was forced to lay off some reporters and editors after not enough staffers accepted the proffered buyouts.

UPDATE: Twenty-five minutes after this was posted, Downie responded to our earlier e-mail asking, "Are you planning to retire by January 20th?" with a terse "No."