Why Murdoch should not be given control of The Wall Street Journal

Tim Rutten of the Los Angeles Times writes Saturday about the reasons why News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch should not be allowed to purchase Dow Jones & Co., the parent of The Wall Street Journal.

Rutten wrote, “Rupert Murdoch should not be given control of Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal for a number of compelling reasons. First of all, whatever his assurances to the contrary, the man has a demonstrated history of intervening in his journalistic and publishing enterprises in ways calculated to serve his other business interests. From his attempted suppression of former Hong Kong Gov. Chris Patten’s memoirs to his oft-reported intervention in other publishing operations he controls to soft-pedal critical reporting on China, Murdoch has used his publications to curry favor and, more important, avoid giving offense to Beijing because he has extensive investments in China and hopes to make far more from its titanic market.

“Imagine a man with that sort of predilection controlling this country’s leading purveyor of news and statistics on finance, markets and investing. Then consider that you and your family rely on that information to responsibly invest the money in your 401(k). The first overarching public question is whether we want the nation’s — indeed, the world’s — single most important source of financial news in the hands of an owner, like Murdoch, who has a documented history not simply of meddling with his publications but also of meddling for his own financial gain.

“That brings us to Murdoch’s baleful and equally demonstrable influence on American journalism, since heaving his rapacious carcass onto our shores as a full-time resident. The late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan used to decry the unthinking tolerance of destructive and heretofore aberrant social and moral behavior because he said it produced what he liked to call ‘the mainstreaming of deviance.'” Because of Murdoch’s Fox News and its success in the ratings, we now accept the blending of news and opinion, of name-calling and unapologetic partisanship, as just another cable television ratings ploy.”

Read more here.