Posted on 06/05/2007 9:08:25 AM PDT by oblomov
NEW YORK (AP) -- Billionaire investor Ron Burkle is interested in exploring a bid for Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, in conjunction with the union that represents Journal employees, the head of the union said Tuesday.
The union, the Independent Association of Publishers' Employees, had reached out to Burkle and other potential bidders after Dow Jones' controlling shareholders agreed to meet with Rupert Murdoch to consider his $5 billion bid for the company.
The union and many Journal employees, as well as a significant shareholder, Jim Ottaway Jr., remain fiercely opposed to Murdoch's bid, saying he might bend the Journal's coverage to suit his business interests.
(Excerpt) Read more at biz.yahoo.com ...
Translation: The Bancroft family wants more money from Murdoch and have asked Burkle to pretend an interest in purchasing.
Perhaps, but I think they’d really prefer Burkle.
Oh no, not that!
Even Freud admitted that “sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar.”
“Oh no, not that!”
You have not problem with media bending coverage to suit their business interests? This type of thing is not ideal in a democracy....it actually leans towards facism.
Another FOB (friend of Bill Klinton).
But I am reminded of something I recently read. I’m afraid my recollection is so hazy as to be quite useless, but just a few weeks ago (in the WSJ) there was a book review which featured a tidbit about someone (a major household name) who is a notable corporate executive (I forget who. Lee Iacocca??). Guy wanted a big raise from the Board of Directors. But he didn’t ask for a raise from the Board of Directors – that’s not how the game is played at that level.
Instead, he arranged to be invited by Bud Selig to a not-quite-private meeting at a restaurant. Rumors immediately flew that the Major Corporate Superstar was in line to become the next Baseball Commissioner. Well, the Board of Directors jumped in to action, begged the guy not to leave and offered a huge raise to the Executive.
He got exactly what he wanted. Didn’t have to negotiate. Didn’t even have to ask. All he did was ask Bud Selig to ask him out to dinner.
That’s how the game is played at the highest level.
The WSJ doesn't bend coverage to suit their business interests? LOL!
This type of thing is not ideal in a democracy....it actually leans towards facism.
You need to look up the definition of fascism.
The object of owning the Journal is not to make money but to control minds. A negative for a free trustworthy press. Gimme the guy who wants to own media to make money.
... The Independent Association of Publishers' Employees (IAPE), the union that represents more than 2,000 employees of Dow Jones & Company, has retained advisors to explore alternatives to the proposed News Corp bid for Dow jones & Company and its flagship publication, The Wall Street Journal. ...
Besides Burkle the unions also want to try to shakedown fellow traveler Warren Buffet. It shall be interesting to see if Buffet follows his own advice.
Reinsurance Abuses At End, Buffett Says
... Buffett also offered a grim outlook for the newspaper industry during a three-hour news conference a day after Berkshire's annual meeting, saying he sees no clear way for papers to stem recent circulation declines or turn Internet operations into highly-profitable enterprises. "The economics for newspapers are worse now than they used to, and the prospects are worse," said Buffett, a long-time director and large shareholder of The Washington Post Co.Buffett said declines in circulation result from readers turning to alternative sources , such as free Web sites and television. And he said owning the dominant news Web site in a region is not enough to guarantee sustained profitability for newspaper firms.
As an example, he cited Buffalo, where Berkshire owns the Buffalo News and Buffalo.com, which he described as the most popular news Web site in the city. "We've got the best position, but it isn't remotely like owning the paper 30 years ago."
Buffett said buying newspapers was once an excellent investment because the dominant paper in any city could count on steady advertising revenue and could raise ad rates, often as much as it wanted, every year. With circulation dropping, that is no longer the case, Buffett said. ...
WARREN WARNS PAPER CHASERS
... As long ago as my 1991 letter to shareholders, I nonetheless asserted that this insulated world was changing, writing that "the media businesses . . . will prove considerably less marvelous than I, the industry, or lenders thought would be the case only a few years ago." Some publishers took umbrage at both this remark and other warnings from me that followed. Newspaper properties, moreover, continued to sell as if they were indestructible slot machines. In fact, many intelligent newspaper executives who regularly chronicled and analyzed important worldwide events were either blind or indifferent to what was going on under their noses. Now, however, almost all newspaper owners realize that they are constantly losing ground in the battle for eyeballs. Simply put, if cable and satellite broadcasting, as well as the internet, had come along first, newspapers as we know them probably would never have existed.
There are (were) tons of people who got into the media business just to make money.
Now, what I may consider news or they think is news varies, and the old media may be dying, but there is still money to be made.
And for what its worth, I think Murdock's interest in the WSJ has more to do with the new financial channel he wants to start which could be very very lucrative with WSJ involvement.
Nothing like spending union and state government pension fund money to keep liberal icons alive to push their lies and spins.
This does not extend to multi-billion bids for companies, however.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/05/AR2007060502467_pf.html
Journalists Seek Murdoch Alternatives
Employees’ Union Implores Billionaires to Bid for Dow Jones
By Frank Ahrens
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 6, 2007; D01
The union that represents Wall Street Journal employees is working urgently to undercut Rupert Murdoch’s bid for the paper by trying to drum up interest from other potential buyers. So far, the union’s most hopeful prospect is a Southern California billionaire who is a two-time loser in bidding for newspaper companies over the past two years.
Steven Yount, president of the Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees, said his union has written letters to supermarket magnate and billionaire Ronald W. Burkle, Berkshire Hathaway chief executive Warren E. Buffett and several other rich people, hoping to entice them to bid on the Journal and its parent, Dow Jones.
It’s a strategy that could be described as ABBR (Any Billionaire But Rupert).
“I’m looking for really rich people who have a good conscience,” Yount said in an interview yesterday. “You look for someone who has one billion, two billion, three billion, four billion and might want to put that into a deal.”
The union has written a letter to its targeted group of billionaires. Yount would not say who is on the union’s list other than Burkle and Buffett.
Burkle immediately expressed interest and signed up his private-equity firm, Yucaipa, to advise the union on seeking rival suitors to Murdoch, the union said yesterday. A Yucaipa spokesman declined to comment.
snip
Mergers & Acquisitions
A Private Dow Jones?
Louis Hau 06.05.07, 5:58 PM ET
Could Dow Jones & Co. go the way of Tribune?
It would be an ironic fate for the company that shares its name with America’s leading stock market barometer, but the union that represents about 2,000 Dow Jones employees may try to take the company private.
The Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees has retained Ownership Associates of Cambridge, Mass., to organize a bid that would counter the $5 billion, $60-a-share offer News Corp. Chairman and Chief Executive Rupert Murdoch put on the table for the company (see: “Game Over?”).
IAPE and Ownership Associates have reached out to a short list of about 10 potential partners, including supermarket magnate Ron Burkle, who’s agreed to join the effort, and billionaire investor Warren Buffett, who hasn’t yet responded, according to IAPE President Steve Yount. Buffett said earlier that he wasn’t interested in Dow Jones.
One possible option would be to take the company private through an employee stock ownership plan, or ESOP, Yount said. Depending on how the ESOP were structured, it could accomplish three different objectives: remove Murdoch from the picture, keep the Bancroft family invested in the company and shield Dow Jones from the pressures of the public markets. The union has said it fears Murdoch would meddle in the journalism at the company.
But scrounging up enough financial might to counter Murdoch’s determination and considerable resources would appear to be an awfully tall order.
snip
IOW Yount desperately seeks a white knight tool.
Also known as a “Sugar Daddy.”
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