So the debt-laden Tribune Company, owner of the LA Times and Chicago Tribune, went bankrupt; that's not a surprise, the newspaper business is in dire straights and this company has been in trouble for years. But the details here are fascinating. The Tribune took on most of its debt recently, in a transaction taking the company private put forward by billionaire conservative Sam Zell, who is widely known in media reform circles as one of the single worst influences on media policy in the country.
The FCC actually tried to block this transaction on the grounds that taking the Tribune private would require them to relax cross-ownership requirements. Zell's contempt for journalism in general and his employees is legendary, with one clip online showing Zell cursing out a journalist employee asking him a question at a public forum. This extended to financial self-dealing, with Zell financing most of the deal by borrowing against the employee pension and stock ownership program. He himself only put $315 million into the total $8.5 billion deal.
The Teamsters, Common Cause, and the Media Access Project all argued that the sale of the Tribune would damage local communities, and with Zell's overleveraged strategy combined with immediate layoffs, they were right. But the FCC ignored their points and allowed Zell to proceed anyway. The question is why, and the answer, as usual in DC, is a mixture of influence peddling and social ties.
Last year, Emanuel and Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., wrote to the Federal Communications Commission, urging the agency to act quickly on the sale of Tribune Co. to real-estate magnate Sam Zell. The lawmakers said the FCC shouldn't allow its review of its media- ownership rules to delay completion of the transaction.
Both Dick Durbin and Rahm Emanuel received substantial donations from the predominantly right-wing Zell, with Emanuel having an especially close set of ties. Zell gave to him for his contested 2002 primary slot, after Emanuel had just finished his stint as a Chicago investment banker. Their social worlds are so close that Emanuel actually attended the strongly pro-Israel school that Zell built. None of this is to allege some sort of conspiracy, as local media barons tend to have a great amount of power everywhere. In fact, the story, while fetid, is only different because Zell combined several forms of acceptable legal corruption in one set of egregious moves.
Much to his credit, Obama stayed out of Zell's orbit. Zell was a huge McCain donor and blamed Obama and Clinton for the sour economy. That month, of course, in the throes of a debt-laden company, Zell still found time to throw himself an 800 person birthday party in a 'tented fantasyland' with the Eagles providing the entertainment.
So while there is a lot of hand-wringing at the newspaper business dying, there's almost no focus on how egregiously mismanaged and corrupt these companies often are. The New York Times (and until its sale the Wall Street Journal) were framed as 'family dynasties' akin to public trusts, though how nepotistic control of powerful for-profit media corporations is some sort of public trust is a mystery. Local newspaper publishers often have strong public policy preferences, such as ending inheritance taxes, and they use their newspapers to pursue them. Zell's horrific legal theft from his employees, his unseemly political influence with high-level Democrats and Republicans, his financial gamesmanship, and his general contempt for the product itself are just particularly obvious.
I am confused. The media seems to be unveiling Straight Talk John McCain fairly aggressively, with the snippy exchange between McCain and Elizabeth Bumiller being the flash point.
I heard Ana Marie Cox on Reliable Sources this morning talking about McCain's temper and what it's like to be on the bus, and suggesting that McCain is much worse than he was to Bumiller on a regular basis, and that Bumiller was only shocked because she's new to the McCain bus. "He's a cranky old man" is what she said exactly, I believe. And another participant in the roundtable said something along the lines of 'well he got caught in a lie'. What exactly is going on? Why isn't the punditocracy 100% in love with Saint McCain?
Maybe it's just not fun anymore. It's well-known that McCain will call up and scream at various individuals if they displease him; I know that board members of Common Cause get a standard McCain shout-a-thon if they criticize him in the press. He screams at Senators several times a week, and it's pretty clear that he blows up at reporters fairly regularly. So maybe it just sucks on the bus right now.
Still, this doesn't explain why the press isn't venerating him as they usually do. It's not that they are doing a good job, they aren't, as they aren't covering his career as a politician. McCain has a long history of policy-making on various Senate committees, including being the chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, which regulates the media. This is interesting information the press could research, but hasn't. And you haven't heard much of anything about the decisions he made as Committee Chair, or his fights and alliances with Abramoff in the Indian Affairs Committee.
It's all fascinating stuff you won't hear about. That you won't hear about it is not a surprise, as the National Association of Broadcasters is one of the most powerful lobbies in DC, dispensing Public Service Announcements to various charities in return for them vouching for NAB priorities. And so, for example, you get the Red Cross and Toys for Tots advocating against local radio caps at town hall meetings. That's not even considering the lobbying power brought to bear by the industrial conglomerates who own these media companies, which include defense contractors, entertainment companies (the copyright cartel), cable, financial services, and well, you get the point. The press has its own agenda; did you know that the New York Times is being fought over like a piece of meat in a hedge fund battle and that billionaire real estate mogul Sam Zell owns the LA Times and the Chicago Tribune, carved out a special deal for himself at the FCC, and is shuttering DC reporting staff?
That the media is a special interest organized around maintaining certain policy preferences seems quite plausible as an explanation of its behavior. While reporters don't write their stories with these biases in mind, the 'star system' where Tim Russert is on top both economically and exposure-wise reinforces them every day. All of this is to say that I just don't understand why it is that the press is turning its bitchy claws a bit towards McCain. He's going to be good to them, better than the Democrats anyway. Does he really look like that much of a loser? He must.
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