[T]he papers could serve as a broader platform for the Kochs’ laissez-faire ideas. The Los Angeles Times is the fourth-largest paper in the country, and The Tribune is No. 9, and others are in several battleground states, including two of the largest newspapers in Florida, The Orlando Sentinel and The Sun Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale. A deal could include Hoy, the second-largest Spanish-language daily newspaper, which speaks to the pivotal Hispanic demographic....The Tribune Company is worth $623 million, but Koch Industries takes in $115 billion a year. So the Kochs don't need this media business to make money. They would, apparently, be doing this to get their message out. Is this fair to L.A.?
A Democratic political operative who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he admired how over decades the brothers have assembled a complex political infrastructure that supports their agenda. A media company seems like a logical next step.
This person said, “If they get some bad press that Darth Vader is buying Tribune, they don’t care.”
“It’s a frightening scenario when a free press is actually a bought and paid-for press and it can happen on both sides,” said Ellen Miller, executive director of the Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan watchdog group.Let's talk about what freedom means in this context. The newspaper businesses are privately owned and the newspapers themselves are objects of commerce in a free market. Anyone is free to start a newspaper business. L.A. is a liberal place, with lots of people who've made lots of money in the entertainment business, which is also a form of expression accomplished through privately owned businesses. News media and entertainment media operate in the commercial marketplace and the marketplace of ideas.
What is the frightening scenario? That so much money is involved that some speakers are far more powerful than others? But isn't that gigantic power needed to counterbalance the most powerful speaker of all, the government? And unlike the government, news and entertainment media can't make us consume their product. Or am I just saying laissez-faire things because the devious Koch brothers have insinuated their ideas into my innocent, pliable little brain.
By the way, speaking of brothers and frightening scenarios, what percentage of Americans think the Koch brothers are worse than the Tsarnaev brothers? I can't answer that, having lived in Madison, Wisconsin too long. I'll just share this old video, shot by Meade on April 4, 2011, with street performers in top hats portraying the Koch brothers as puppeteers manipulating Governor Scott Walker:
"Come along, Scottie!"
ADDED: "You're right, I did lose a million dollars last year. I expect to lose a million dollars this year. I expect to lose a million dollars next year...."
Posts
70 comments:
What is the frightening scenario?
Why, some people might get to hear the other side of the political conversation! That alone is enough to give liberals the vapors.
>>The Tribune Company is worth $623 million, but Koch Industries takes in $115 billion a year.<<
Presumably you're referring the sales revenue and not profits; the commodities business has extremely thin margins. Cargill, Inc. is significantly larger than Koch Industries and yet they manage to stay out of the news.
The news business should hope a bidding war breaks out, with rich people vying for platforms to spout their political beliefs from.
It's not like advertisers and subscribers alone can support their business models and plush salaries!
"Presumably you're referring the sales revenue and not profits; the commodities business has extremely thin margins."
Right. If the numbers don't compare properly -- and I agree they don't -- the problem originates in the presentation in the linked article in the NYT.
It would be helpful to have a comparable number.
What is the deal with Wisconsonites and protesting?
Other Midwesterners are much happier and more content.
Althouse: ...the problem originates in the presentation in the linked article in the NYT.
Yes, the NYT. A news company controlled by a politically motivated family.
Clearly this is a bad thing!
Does this mean they're going to cut The Washington Post loose?
I hope so.
And John Kass will have a job for awhile.
It's not about the numbers. The Koch brothers can always use a tax write-off against their taxable income. What this undoubtedly means is the Koch brothers are playing hardball with progressives who took great glee in mispronouncing their names with childish references to genitalia and their Alinsky tactics to demonize a fine company. I hope it goes through. The other large companies (Comcast, etc.) who are exercising their political muscle seem to be getting a pass. I applaud the Koch Brothers for helping to turn the tide. Note to progressives, be careful what you ask for because you may be awakening a "sleeping giant." The tide may be turning against you and a reminder, the Islamist radicals eat their own.
Why did it take deep pocket conservatives this long to figure out that the only way to buck the liberal monopoly on "news" is to buy a slew of papers? Well, better late than never.
If the Koch brothers are astute business men, why would they want to buy a business that hemorrhages red ink?
"What is the deal with Wisconsonites and protesting?"
Simultaneously with all this political stuff, Madison is a big party and college sports place. I think the number of people that "demonstrate" in the nonpolitical mode -- partying & sports -- is much larger than the political crowd.
Considering how cold it is much of the year, you have to give us a lot of credit for all this outdoor expression of emotion in many dimensions.
Even though I never engage in political demonstrations and very rarely go to any kind of party or sports event, I love Madison for being a distinctive place with a real and vivid culture. It's not just another city/town. I like the specificity in this era of generic places.
"If the Koch brothers are astute business men, why would they want to buy a business that hemorrhages red ink?"
They think it would be fun to run a newspaper.
In time the Koch brothers might manage to moderate the editorial pages of these newspapers somewhat, but the daily newsstream printed will still come from the AP, UPI, Reuters, Agence France, McClatchy, etc.
Ann Althouse said...
"If the Koch brothers are astute business men, why would they want to buy a business that hemorrhages red ink?"
They think it would be fun to run a newspaper.
More than that. The Kochs have always supported political and philosophical enterprises that advocate their own views. If there was a cost to that (to them), they might well accept it. Or they might work to make it profitable (Omigod).
Can someone tell me how to pronounce 'Koch' correctly?
I read all my news.
Thank you.
Ann Althouse said...
"If the Koch brothers are astute business men, why would they want to buy a business that hemorrhages red ink?"
They think it would be fun to run a newspaper.
4/21/13, 8:02 AM
___________________________________
It would be more fun to run a TV network.
Madison, Wisconsin: different and distinct as Oberlin, Ohio, Ann Arbor, Michigan, Missoula, Montana. Ithaca, New York and last and worst, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
"Can someone tell me how to pronounce 'Koch' correctly?"
Not the sexy way. Not the mayor of NYC way. The soda way.
Does that mean we would finally get to see the video of Obama talking about his friendship with Rashid Khalidi?
I hope the Koch brothers DO buy the LA Times and slant every bloody article against the liberal establishment.
"Not the sexy way. Not the mayor of NYC way. The soda way."
Hooked on phonics! Makes me laugh cause that's precisely how I remember it, too.
Pants, it's pronounced "Coke".
The fact that nobody can find any instances of their deviousness is all the evidence you need of how horribly devious they truly are.
Does that mean we would finally get to see the video of Obama talking about his friendship with Rashid Khalidi?
Mary Beth: That would be delicious!
It might be part of the Koch calculation.
Sauce.
Goose.
Gander.
I have a question: If Boston had to be shut down to capture the two terrorists and everyone kept indoors, what was Obama and Michelle doing there before they were caught?
Did Obama’s unnecessary visit to Boston on Thursday morning divert police assets resulting inadvertently in the death of MIT campus police officer, Sean Collier that same evening?
"If the Koch brothers are astute business men, why would they want to buy a business that hemorrhages red ink?"
Althouse. "They think it would be fun to run a newspaper."
A. Conservatives do not fantasize about buying businesses for fun
B. they buy thrm to make money
C. These assets have been notoriously poorly run
D. The brothers can run them better
E. As someone said about Fox News: they discovered a niche market, half the country.
The simplest explanation is the Koch brothers had a thing for Margaret Pynchon.
And after all . . . who didn't?
Honestly, tell me THIS doesn't give you a boner!
Those devious m*f*ers, doing exactly what the left has done for 70 years!
A drop in the bucket, now that 99% of universities are monasteries for training left liberal acolytes.
It's a good idea, maybe 20 years too late.
What is the frightening scenario?
That they would be exposed to facts and thoughts contrary to their worldview.
Pogo listening to Prager?
Oberlin has a model for the country of sustainable development ... wait a minute, I have to recover the letter, the wording has a progressive buzz that normal people can't reproduce
".. a deeper look at Oberlin and how the college and surrounding communities are embarking on an amazing sustainability project that has the potential to become a model for the country.."
I assume the community is being held intellectual hostage, like kids in Sunday school.
The Kochs understand business. Newspapers, or news in general is not about selling news, but providing advertisers a base of customers. Look around the Nation and see the number of news papers that had Democrat, of Republican in their names. News papers have always been owned by entities that desired to push a political agenda. They proudly proclaimed their agenda from their masthead. ie the Times Democrat of Davenport IA.
As far as the news being written by the various new agencies, one, the editors still pick which news to print from those sources. Two, those news agencies are losing subscriber news papers at an alarming rate.
Also remember that Glenn Beck tried to buy Al Gores Current TV, and he declined and sold for a lower offer from Al Jeezera. Funny I dont remember the left fainting over loss of freedom then.
Conservatives need to do more of this. Maybe they can buy the Comedy Chanel and get Stewart and Colbert to flop on their politics, they are both entertainers. Their 'principles' are for sale.
It's "coke."
I worked for AFP in Florida -- freelance and briefly. I can't say I was happy to see their attempts to absorb the efforts of Tea Party activists and claim them for their own.
It was ham fisted. I don't think the intention was more nefarious than that, though. I think they were used to doing things in a top-down way, unsurprisingly, and they seemed actually naive about the way you work with bottom-up activists. Which is what you get with the Tea Party, all accusations of astroturfing aside, as they are utterly untrue.
I think all parties could and will work better together the next time, so long as AFP learns some lessons about being a partner at the table, not the ones who dictate down.
So I am very much looking forward to this foray into journalism. If journalists are the big independent thinkers they claim to be,then they won't let themselves get roped into becoming corporate mouthpieces, right? Aren't they supposed to have superpowers of virtue?
And if journalists and their readers really desire a completely different forum, once the Kochs are done carving the opening lines of Atlas Shrugged into the foyer of the LAT building, well, there are scores of new and inexpensive ways they can achieve that now, thanks to the internet.
So the Kochs may do for the journalism industry precisely what journalists have been whinging for for years: blow it open and free from its current "corporate" constraints. It could be a fascinating object lesson for all parties involved: left-wing/MSM journalists get to test their commitment to the very principles they like to blazon on tee-shirts and coffee mugs, while the Kochs can again test the limits of libertarian ideology in the only place it really matters -- in practice (this was the first thing they abandoned in political organizing, so it will be doubly interesting to see if they can apply such principles more effectively to journalism).
And, delightfully, the lefty journos will sink or swim based directly on whether they can compete in a free market. So long as the FCC doesn't carry out their plan to nationalize the entire journalism industry with govmint subsidies (this is serious) before the Kochs can get started, the newspaper industry in LA and elsewhere is ablout to become a giant test kitchen (or petri dish), and the outcome may very well be a healthier and more vibrant fourth estate.
"“It’s a frightening scenario when a free press is actually a bought and paid-for press and it can happen on both sides,” said Ellen Miller, executive director of the Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan watchdog group."
Nonpartisan my ass.
Where was Dear Ellen when AlGore was buying up media properties?
Ann Althouse said...
"If the Koch brothers are astute business men, why would they want to buy a business that hemorrhages red ink?"
They think it would be fun to run a newspaper.
They will also likely find a way to make money doing so.
Deuce said:
Did Obama’s unnecessary visit to Boston on Thursday morning divert police assets resulting inadvertently in the death of MIT campus police officer, Sean Collier that same evening?
I have a friend who works for the Boston Fire Dept. He says the Obama visit consumed a large amount of official resources. He believes the visit did hinder the investigation. Judging by all the confusion about the Wednesday courthouse press conference, Boston officials seemed to be in disarray.
I don't know what the protocol is for a presidential appearance in a city in the midst of an ongoing manhunt for terrorists. It would have made sense for Obama to make his speech from Washington, though I understand the motivation for going to Boston.
Who cares how the brothers pronounce their name? After they're herded into the gulag, they'll be called by the numbers tattooed on their forearms.
It would be helpful to have a comparable number.
Yes it would be. The problem is that Koch (unlike Cargill) is a privately held company and is notoriously circumspect about their profits. So we simply don't know what the balance sheet looks like. But they apparently make a buttload of money.
"Althouse. "They think it would be fun to run a newspaper." A. Conservatives do not fantasize about buying businesses for fun B. they buy thrm to make money.."
Michael. It's an allusion. Try Googling it.
And try not reinforcing the myth that conservatives are no fun at all.
The Sunlight Foundation is a Soros entity, invented and piad for by Soros to try to control the narrative on free speech.
Tres postmodern.
Funny how it wasn't frightening when the Knight family (Miami Herald) bought the Philadelphia Inquire and the Daily News or when the Sulzbergers bought the Baaston Globe.
But I do hope they do it, and a half dozen more.
I'm with Insta on this, the only way to take back the country is take back the culture and the media, along with education and the churches is where you start.
Wait, it's pronounced 'Coke'? Ann said it was pronounced "the soda way". I thought that meant it rhymes with 'Scotch', as in Koch 'n' Soda?
>>Why did it take deep pocket conservatives this long to figure out that the only way to buck the liberal monopoly on "news" is to buy a slew of papers? Well, better late than never. <<
Because the news business is a money losing proposition (no one has figured out how to make a paywall work). Fortunately for the likes of the Kochs, the downturn in the business is enabling them to possibly pick up assets on the cheap.
Freder Frederson said...
... The problem is that Koch (unlike Cargill) is a privately held company and is notoriously circumspect about their profits. So we simply don't know what the balance sheet looks like. But they apparently make a buttload of money.
4/21/13, 8:54 AM
Cargill is a private company; the largest in the U.S. When I worked there employees owned about 14 percent through an ESOP, and the rest was owned by the Cargill and MacMillan heirs (approx 90 people).
The reason both Koch and Cargill publish their revenue numbers is because they have to disclose to bondholders but neither ever publish their bottom lines.
Where was the wailing and gnashing of teeth when the venerable Newsweek was fully consumed by the liberal horde?
Freder Frederson said...
Yes it would be. The problem is that Koch (unlike Cargill) is a privately held company
Cargill is private?
That would be news to Cargill
Cargill is an international producer and marketer of food, agricultural, financial and industrial products and services. Founded in 1865, our privately held company employs 142,000 people in 65 countries.
Instance 2,877 where you've posted a silly, easily debunked lie.
Why do you comment here?
These are all very leftwing newsrags. If they were allowed to fall into the hands of the evil debbils, the left would go nuts.
I look for the Tribune Co to pull a "Newsweek" of some sort, and sell out to another leftie for a dollar or something to keep it out of rightwing hands.
And to echo others above, the Sunlight Foundation is no such thing. A quick look at their site showed nothing but leftists on their staff and board - not a single person on the right.
Herein lies one of the big problems with the "unbiased", "objective" "news" media. All the leftist think tanks, non-profits and fake 501(c)(3)s are touted on the daily "news" and fishwraps as "non-partisan", "mainstream" and "public interest" only; even the Southern Poverty Law(sic) Center, MediaMatters and the Center for American Progress, et al, ad nauseum. And there are literally thousands of them, far outnumbering those on the other end of the political spectrum.
(See Discover the Networks for in-depth documentation of most of them, and the individuals on the left who run them and contribute to them.)
Any of the groups on the right, if quoted or consulted at all, are clearly identified as conservative, rightwing or worse. And the low information voters that still buy into the "unbiased" BS line of these media eat it up.
Althouse.
"Michael. It's an allusion. Try Googling it."
The Althouse blog is like my Finnegans Wake seminar!!!!
Nothing is as it seems.
Althouse". And try not reinforcing the myth that conservatives are no fun at all."
Myth! Allusion! Finnegans Wake indeed.
Because conservatives require schooling by academic Obama voters on the topic of humor. What is not a myth is that lefties are humorless as well as clueless and that marinading in grim Madison can give one some very wrong ideas.
Marinating.
Michael
It's OK that you didn't get it. It happens. Shake it off.
We used to subscribe to the L.A. Times years ago, but when we found that even the comics section and the sports section were being taken over by liberal bias we cancelled. Now we get people at the door and phone calls selling subscriptions, which we politely turn down.
My wife and I went to the L.A. Times Festival of Books yesterday on the USC campus. Vastly dominated by left leaning authors. Quite a few Muslim groups recruiting from their booths, which my wife observed was awkward timing on their part. We watched Molly Ringwald read an excerpt from her new book, but got bored and left in mid-reading. We got the impression that we might be the only conservative people in the whole joint.
The highlight for me was meeting Lani Hall Alpert, of Brasil '66 fame and the wife of Herb Alpert. One of my favorite groups of all time, and she was one of my first schoolboy crushes.
Hasbro can introduce a new "Koch Brother" piece for Monopoly.
They think it would be fun to run a newspaper.
Howard Schultz thought it would be fun to run the Seattle Supersonics.
Sam Zell is a smart guy, too.
So the Kochs may do for the journalism industry precisely what journalists have been whinging for for years: blow it open and free from its current "corporate" constraints.
Who knows, they might even attract some actual shoe-leather journos to the craft to replace the current crop of political-hacks-with-bylines.
It's not "can" happen on both sides, it's "does" happen on both sides. Newspapers or other media companies are ideological and they always have been. The way we get "balanced" information is by having some of each.
This is third or fourth hand information (a writer I know has a friend who) but a guy is just about hired at (IIRC, may have been) the Chicago Trib, or at least he thinks its going really well, and he sends them "oh, and here's some of what I wrote for (I think it was) PJ Media," and the next he hears is "We're sorry but you really won't fit in here," and he lost the job.
Because... conservatives aren't creative, right? That's why they don't work in journalism or television or Hollywood, right?
And someone is supposed to feel like the Koch brothers buying these newspapers is a sad thing?
In time the Koch brothers might manage to moderate the editorial pages of these newspapers somewhat, but the daily newsstream printed will still come from the AP, UPI, Reuters, Agence France, McClatchy, etc.
UPI nowadays is just a brand owned by the Moonies.
Oh, no! If the lefties begin to lose their stranglehold on the legacy newspapers, God only knows what might be next. Universities? K-12? Hollywood? NBC? CNN?
It's a business deal. After it has been run through bankruptcy and shed much of its debt, it will have a clean balance sheet and generate positive cash flow.
It's not clear to me they will monkey around with editorial content to any great extent, although they are far more ideologically driven than most, so who knows. Most of Sam Zell's political donations have been to Republicans, but he didn't change the editorial direction of the papers much.
Warren Buffett (through Berkshire Hathaway) has been buying small market newspapers in recent years. He is a high profile Democrat, but as a way to demonstrate he was buying the papers for economic reasons and not partisan ones, he mentioned in this year's annual letter that of the 12 newspapers he bought last year, 10 of them endorsed Romney for president. While Brian Roberts contributes mostly to Democrats and endorsed Obama in 2008, he supported GWB in '04, so he's probably not especially ideological/partisan. Yet he's allowed MSNBC to turn into the propaganda arm of the Democrat party after acquiring NBC Universal. Going further back, William Paley was a staunch Republican, but he surrounded himself with Democrats as he was building CBS.
I think the lesson is that people often buy these properties based on economic value, and then they let the editors provide the editorial content the subscribers demand so they can sell ad space.
Speaking as a libertarian, if the LA Times switched from "public relations mouthpiece for the California Democratic Party" to "public relations mouthpiece for private sector libertarians", I'd be pleased. :)
Koch Industries was the largest privately held US corporation till 2006, when it was surpassed by Cargill. To put it in perspective, Koch would be ranked about 15th in the Fortune 500 if traded publicly.
Since Koch is not publically traded, they trashcan all governmental inquiries not legally required by law.
This might give lefties nightmares, but everyone of you have Koch products in your home and workplace.
Ann said:
Michael. It's an allusion. Try Googling it.
If Socrates were alive today, his most common answer would be "Google it"
Libertarian, not conservative. "Things liberals don't like" really can't be rolled into one box called conservatives.
Oh Noooooooooo! Dissenting voices to My Completely Correct Point Of View! The Horror, The horror...
Post a Comment