Posted on 05/02/2013 2:54:27 PM PDT by onyx
Threats by members of the Los Angeles City Council to use the city’s pension funds to penalize investors if they sell the Los Angeles Times to Charles and David Koch could be illegal and unconstitutional, experts say.
A proposal by councilman Bill Rosendahl would allow the city to yank investments by the city’s three pension funds in the Tribune Co., which owns the Times, if the company opts to sell the paper to someone who does not uphold “the highest terms of professional and objective journalism.”
Rumors that libertarian industrialists Charles and David Koch might buy the paper spurred him to propose the motion, Rosendahl told the Times. He did not respond to a request for comment.
“Frankly what I hear about the Koch brothers, if it’s true, it’s the end of journalism,’’ Rosendahl told the paper.
The Koch Brothers are reportedly considering purchasing the Tribune Co., which owns the Times, though they are also said to be uninterested in the company’s other media properties, which include 23 local television stations, a national cable network, and other newspapers.
“We cannot support the sale of the Times to entities who Times readers would view as a political transaction first and foremost, turning L.A.’s metropolitan daily into an ideological mouthpiece whose commitment to empirical journalism would be unproven at best,” Rosendahl wrote.
Legal experts say Rosendahl’s political motivations in directing the city’s pension funds could run afoul of the Kochs’ First Amendment rights.
A Koch spokesperson declined to comment on the issue.
“The government generally can’t discriminate against government contractors based on the content or viewpoint of the contractors’ speech,” University of California Los Angeles law professor Eugene Volokh said in an email to the Washington Free Beacon.
(Excerpt) Read more at freebeacon.com ...
LOL.
I think you have it nailed!
As long they keep Antenna TV I am happy
I love old reruns LOL!
Typical lefties: first they politicize everything, then they complain about it being politicized. I’d like to have the concession making strawmen for the Council’s loonies. It’d be a very active business.
Never happen. They're wise investors.
” They could buy it and shut it down. Just to piss them off!”
Out of the petty cash box : )
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