The Nation
13 August 2007 Issue
That American journalism is facing so many crises simultaneously has the effect of immobilizing a concerted response to any of them. From the Administration's war on the press, to the relentless attention lavished on Paris and Britney, to the domination of "serious" punditocracy discourse by friends and acolytes of the discredited Bill Kristol, to the way the upstart blogosphere has all but destroyed the prestige and authority of so many of the "wise men" with aggressive fact-checking and relentless questioning, to the fact that young people are more likely to be killed by terrorists than to buy a daily newspaper subscription or turn on the evening news-there are more problems than any one person can hope to address. Meanwhile, corporate owners are demanding 20 percent profit margins every year, thereby forcing cuts in coverage and diminishing the product, giving people even less reason to read or tune in. All one can really do is press on and hope for a miracle.
Rupert Murdoch might profitably be viewed as the Frankenstein monster of this multifaceted identity crisis. Take a look at his flagship American publication: the New York Post. It's dumb, celebrity-obsessed, spineless, corrupt, unreliable and reactionary, and even with all its pandering, it still manages to lose, by its own estimation, $30 million to $50 million a year.
It's not just the Post that Murdoch operates as a de facto nonprofit. The Times of London lost $89 million in 2004, and according to a News Corp. executive quoted in a recent Wall Street Journal article, even the Australian "doesn't consistently make money." Murdoch doesn't care. Newspapers make up just 14 percent of News Corp.'s operating income. What they cost in cash, they more than make up for in political and propaganda value. Examine any Murdoch newspaper-or book publishing or network news operation for that matter-and you will find any number of clear, inarguable abrogations of journalistic principles in the service of the immediate interests of Murdoch's corporate empire. Sometimes they curry favor with, or put pressure on, local politicians. Sometimes they manufacture "grassroots" support for some company-owned enterprise or Murdoch-friendly politician. Whatever actual news the media properties report is almost beside the point. When news values and business interests clash, business wins. When Murdoch's right-wing ideology and his business clash, business wins. Business always wins. Hence, Murdoch's editors and producers will sometimes find themselves forced to slant the news on behalf of center-left politicians like Tony Blair or Hillary Clinton. It's not that Murdoch is open-minded; it's that he's single-minded.
The genius of Murdoch's propaganda network is that by aping real news organizations, he helps himself to all kinds of tax breaks and constitutional privileges unavailable to nonmedia moguls, to say nothing of effects on elections and popular opinion. That he devalues the privileges and responsibilities of the press in America matters little to Murdoch, who appears to care nothing for traditional notions of respectability and treats journalists as no more important than the people who use his newspapers to wrap fish and chips. But it is rather shocking that so many people who care about the future of journalism remain silent or sanguine about his impact on one of democracy's most important professions. The news pages in the Wall Street Journal are about the smartest and bravest of any newspaper in America. Some people, like Dow Jones CEO Richard Zannino, enjoy stock holdings that offer roughly 20 million good reasons to believe that such journalism can continue unimpeded within the Murdoch empire. But the rest of us might as well believe in Peter Pan.
For nonconservatives the Dow Jones dance of death with Rupert Murdoch presents an additional complication. For all the-deserved-praise being heaped on the paper's news pages of late, its editorial pages already operate with Murdoch-like sleaze. News staffers frequently wake up to find their reporting attacked and undermined by the editorial page ideologues. When speaking anonymously, Journal reporters have been known to say things like "To have [editorial page editor] Paul Gigot as our captain is bullshit. It's not for real," and "They're wrong all the time. They lack credibility to the point that the emperor has no clothes." And yet without the power and prestige of the newspaper in which these edit page opinions come wrapped, they would be taken no more seriously than, say, the latest ravings of Rush Limbaugh or David Horowitz.
Alas, this very quality makes the edit page a perfect fit for the Murdoch modus operandi, so it comes as no surprise that Murdoch says he loves it-or that Fox News scooped up its taxpayer-funded talking-heads program, which failed so miserably to find an audience when Bush Administration operatives foisted it on PBS. The silver lining of this takeover is that when Murdoch destroys the credibility of the Journal-as he must if it is to fit in with his business plan-he will be removing the primary pillar of the editorial page's influence as well. In this regard his ownership is a kind of poisoned chalice.
The editors of The New Republic argue that the Murdoch takeover of Dow Jones comes at a "pivotal moment for liberals-a time to dial back their relentless hostility to newspapers and start crusading for them." It's a lot to ask of liberals to "crusade" on behalf of an enterprise whose editorial pages routinely call them cowards, traitors and criminals. Liberals would like nothing better than to take up the cause of the media's crucial role in rooting out corruption and speaking truth to power. To do so, however, we need media that take those responsibilities seriously. And given the MSM's performance on Whitewater, the Clinton impeachment crisis, the 2000 election, Florida and almost every major Bush Administration undertaking, that's an awfully tough case to make. If a Murdoch-owned and -operated Wall Street Journal clarifies matters, so much the better. Sometimes when God closes a door, He opens a window.
News Corp. to Buy Dow Jones for $5.6 Billion
By Robert MacMillan and Kenneth Li
Reuters
Wednesday 01 August 2007
News Corp. said on Wednesday that it would buy Dow Jones & Co Inc. for $5.6 billion, adding the Wall Street Journal to its worldwide media empire and ending a century of family ownership of one of the top U.S. business news sources.
The hard-fought deal after long negotiations and intense wrangling among members of Dow Jones's controlling shareholder, the Bancroft family, helps News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch achieve his decades-long dream of running the venerable financial daily.
The Journal and other Dow Jones properties also add to Murdoch's sprawling media empire - from the Fox television stations and MySpace online social network to the Times of London and HarperCollins Publishers - and would aid the launch of a Fox business channel later this year.
In a joint statement, Dow Jones and News Corp. said Bancroft family members holding about 37 percent of Dow Jones's voting power agreed to support the deal.
That level of support represents more than half of the 64 percent voting shares held by the family.
Dow Jones shareholders still must approve the buyout, an outcome that analysts have said is all but guaranteed, given the 65 percent premium Murdoch offered.
Dow Jones, which competes with Reuters Group Plc, also owns the Barron's financial weekly, the MarketWatch.com financial news Web site and Dow Jones Newswires.
Other News Corp. properties include the "American Idol" singing talent show on the Fox Network, and British tabloid newspaper The Sun, which features photographs of topless women on its "Page 3."
Merger Agreement
Under the terms of the agreement, which has been approved by the boards of both the companies, Dow Jones shareholders will receive $60 in cash for each share of common stock or Class B common stock that they own, the companies said.
Dow Jones reported in its most recent financial filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it had 85.4 million shares outstanding on a diluted, weighted average basis, valuing the deal at about $5.1 billion.
It ended the second quarter with $392 million in debt, according to the filing. The companies did not provide detail about how they calculated the deal value.
One Bancroft family member or another "mutually acceptable person" will be appointed to the News Corp. board, the companies said.
They also agreed on a five-member committee to oversee the editorial independence of Dow Jones's news operations.
The members include retired Associated Press Chief Executive Louis Boccardi, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab co-founder Nicholas Negroponte, former Tribune Publishing President Jack Fuller, former Washington State Congresswoman Jennifer Dunn and former Detroit News editorial page editor Thomas Bray.
Bray also is a writer for Dow Jones's OpinionJournal.com. The Journal reported that he will serve as chairman of the committee.
Dow Jones was also discussing a plan to have News Corp. cover the legal fees incurred by the Bancroft family, amounting to at least $30 million, a source familiar with the matter said on Tuesday.
The acquisition is expected to close in the fourth quarter, the companies said.
Newspaper Family
The Bancrofts are among a group of venerable newspaper families that includes the Sulzberger clan, who run The New York Times Co., and the Chandlers, who cashed out of Tribune Co. earlier this year.
Unlike their peers, the Bancrofts refrained from interfering with the Journal's news operations. But that remoteness amid sweeping changes in the way people get their news due to the Internet led to criticism that the family was neglecting the company.
In selling to Murdoch, the Bancrofts pass Dow Jones to a another media dynasty. Murdoch, who built News Corp from two Australian papers, also controls his global media empire and sees its future some day in the hands of his children.
The family initially rejected 76-year-old mogul's bid over fears that he would tarnish the Journal's image and use Dow Jones's news operations to further his business interests. Many Journal reporters and some other Dow Jones employees also opposed the deal and sought to attract other buyers.
"It's a bad thing for Dow Jones and American journalism," said former Dow Jones board member and executive Jim Ottaway Jr., whose family controls 7 percent of Dow Jones voting shares.
"It's a sad thing that the 105-year family tradition of protecting Dow Jones's independence as a public trust will end," he said in a statement.
In the end, the rich offer proved too attractive for many family members to resist, and it all but eliminated the possibility of competing proposals.
-------
No comments:
Post a Comment