Journal employees are worried:
Journalists are also facing two futures they never expected when they signed on to jobs they saw more as a mission, not a business — the uncertainty of what Mr. Murdoch would do as an owner, or the uncertainty of a suddenly harsh advertising climate that could lead to deep job cuts.
“There’s a real culture of passion for the truth, for shining lights in dark places and making the mysterious understood,” said a reporter, one of dozens of people interviewed at The Journal and Dow Jones, nearly all of whom asked for anonymity, fearing a backlash from the current regime or the next one.
Frankly, I'm of the very strong opinion that anybody--journalist or otherwise--who speaks in sentences like "there’s a real culture of passion for the truth, for shining lights in dark places and making the mysterious understood" very much ought to be canned.
More seriously, I actually do have some sympathy for the reporters at the Wall Street Journal. But I also think those reporters probably should have realized at the beginning of their careers that they were accepting jobs at the Wall Street Journal, that the Journal's owners would very likely adhere to the market ethos that underpins their paper's editorial line, and that, with an editorial line that conservative, potential future buyers would probably think of the newspaper not as a "shining light in dark places," but as an ideological home and a profit-maker. Now that it's actuall happening, well that sucks for them, but most of them have been holding fort for this for a long time now. And they ought not seem so surprised.
Yup. Exactly the same thing at The New Republic. Any journalist that thinks that the strong ideological/party views of the owners/managers of a media voice won't directly (or ultimately) affect what kinds of stories and emphasis are published, is probably not competent to distinguish fact from fiction.
Posted by: JimPortlandOR | July 19, 2007 at 10:37 AM
Just because the WSJ has a conservative editorial board doesn't mean that its journalists are a coven of like-minded ideologue hacks.
In fact, the WSJ won 2 pulitzers in 2007 - including the pulitzer for public service - for covering scandals and corruption in big business.
according to the Pulitzer page:
[the Public Service Award was] Awarded to The Wall Street Journal for its creative and comprehensive probe into backdated stock options for business executives that triggered investigations, the ouster of top officials and widespread change in corporate America.
It's perfectly fair to disagree with the WSJ's editorial stance, but their reporting is top-notch.
The WSJ is not, and has never been, Fox News. I think it's perfectly justified that their reporters are concerned that with a Murdoch takeover they will suffer a tabloidization of sorts.
Posted by: jmc | July 19, 2007 at 11:02 AM
jmc: You are correct on the general excellent reporting by the WSJ staff. Surely, however, it must have been obvious to them that the editorial position (often counter-factual from the WSJ's own reporting) was a danger signal - an IED waiting to happen. In struggles for truth and freedom versus rights of ownership, ultimately the owners prevail.
Media consolidation by buy-outs of (protective) family owned newspapers didn't start this year - it's hard to think of one case where this hasn't happened over the post WWII years.
Posted by: JimPortlandOR | July 19, 2007 at 11:16 AM