Or don't waste your time and kill comments entirely.
Demonstrate the cost/benefit advantage of having to police these garbage piles and maybe I'll buy it. But I don't believe that most people read the Times or CBC or WaPo for the comment section. More likely they read those outlets despite them.
I agree with Vice. Leave the discussion to dedicated services like Reddit, HN, Twitter, Facebook, etc, and focus on core competencies: producing top notch content.