The nasty blot at the end of Steiger's career

BusinessWeek’s Jon Fine writes that the decision by Wall Street Journal managing editor Paul Steiger to hold the story that the Journal’s parent company, Dow Jones & Co., had received a $5 billion takeover offer from News Corp. will end up being a “nasty blot” at the end of his career. It was announced last month that Steiger will step down as ME next week.

Fine wrote, “I can understand, even if I don’t particularly agree, why Steiger might decide his corporate role at Dow Jones in this case superseded his job as the paper’s top journalist. What I have a harder time understanding is that several other top editors—who have less lofty corporate roles within the company—knew about the memo, also. But no one, from Steiger on down, managed to issue a well-timed whisper or two.

“In general former WSJ deputy managing editor Barney Calame gets no love in this space, since I’ve spent the last 18 months struggling through his excruciatingly-by-the-book-and-extraordinarily-tedious ombudsman columns in the New York Times. But I’ve got to think: Had the Murdoch memo made its way into his hands, would he have kept it from the newsroom?

“No way.

“The newsroom of the Journal is in a uniquely uncomfortable spot right now. They have to cover an ongoing deal process that involves their company, as many within their ranks are openly agitating against it. One key Murdoch rep has made it clear that perhaps some reporters there should be, uhm, on notice for nothing more than having done their jobs in the past.”

Read moer here.