Lee Enterprises – One Born Every Minute
Lee Enterprises, who bought my hometown newspaper the St. Louis Post Dispatch for over a billion dollars now faces delisting from the New York Stock Exchange because their share price has been below a dollar for over 30 days. Lee’s total market capitalization right now is less than 20 million dollars.
First, congratulations to the Pulitzer family for their amazing timing. Considering that the whole Lee chain of newspapers can now be bought for a years worth of interest on the STLPD’s purchase price I think we can all applaud the acumen shown by these good folk. Clearly the Pulitzers were tired of the newspaper business, and part of me is glad they found a sucker.
The part of me that is glad they found a sucker is the part that is sick and tired of not getting the newspaper. I have been a fairly loyal subscriber for years. Once, I took the paper daily and weekend paper. Getting up in the morning, sliding the wrapper off and drinking a cup of coffee while reading the happenings of the last 24 hours was a uniquely rewarding experience. I felt all grown-up.
Unfortunately I lost faith in the “news” part of newspaper. Listening to a number of sources, it rapidly dawned on me that reporters are less interested in telling me the news than in telling me a story. “Balanced reporting” frequently turned out to simply be the publication of opposing sets of statements without regard to the actually, factual, truthfulness of those statements. The right kind of liars had equal weight with those who spoke the truth. I began to see a pattern where only the “correct” kind of story got told and that from the “correct” perspective.
The last straw came with the inclusion of “Rise Up”, a insert/publication that sought to “have a conversation about race”. Inserted into the already thin weekend paper, it was little more than middle-school level blather about everyone getting along, overcoming our differences and other piffle. Nothing about overcoming being an idiot.
I am weary of “conversations” in the bloody newspaper. I would like to know who did what, what happened, where it happened, why it happened and how does it affect me. I am open to any variation of these themes but I would like a presentation of the facts, the whole facts and nothing but the facts in a readable, punchy style. That they have the money and interest to distribute “RiseUp” but not invest in hard-bitten, cynical “if your momma says she loves you, check with at least two sources” reporters said it all. We canceled our subscription and now I just read the comics online.
Lee could have called me and asked if the newspaper was worth buying. I would have told them hell no. The product is crap, and I don’t have time or inclination to try to figure out what the reporters or editors have failed to ask or failed to say either out of laziness, ignorance, a lack of curiosity or for my own good.
