The family of billionaire Sheldon Adelson bought the most widely-read newspaper in Nevada, the Review-Journal. They then tried to conceal this act. These are my posts, as I’ve followed and tried to make sense of the story. In order from Dec. 11. New items added to the bottom.
It started with a Facebook post, and it just kept going. If you read them in order you will be caught up with all the important plot twists. I also tried to include the key links as the story metastasized. Got a correction or a suggestion? Please put it in the comments.
December 11 at 4:53pm
Last night something strange came across my screen. I think it qualifies as a mystery. The news: the Las Vegas Review-Journal, largest newspaper in the state, was sold to… well, that’s the odd part. The buyer was described as a Delaware company backed by “undisclosed financial backers with expertise in the media industry.”
Undisclosed? Weird.
The name of the company purchasing the newspaper, News + Media Capital Group LLC — about which no one knows anything — is similar to the name of the company selling the newspaper, New Media Investment Group. So similar that it seems chosen to induce confusion.
(See story here, press release here.)
All this is highly unusual. Who would buy a major newspaper and not want anyone to know? What would be the possible reasons? Last night on Twitter I asked the Review-Journal: Will your newsroom be investigating the mystery of who owns you?
@reviewjournal @romenesko Will the Review-Journal be investigating the mystery of who owns it?
— Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) December 11, 2015
Today I got my answer. I received an email from a reporter at the Review-Journal, asking if I wanted to comment on “the ethics of a newspaper trying to operate without knowing who owns it.” Among the intriguing facts the reporter relayed to me: the price was $28 million more than the sale price when the same newspaper was sold in March 2015. But the newspaper’s financial fortunes had only worsened since then, a key fact.
Why is this important? Because a publicly-traded company like New Media Investment Group (holding company for Gatehouse Media) cannot legally diss an offer like that. Or let’s say: no wise corporate lawyer would advise it.
Yes! I did want to comment. Here is what I told the reporter:
It’s possible [this] has happened before but nothing comes to mind that would be comparable. As I said last night on Twitter: “Will the Review-Journal be investigating the mystery of who owns it?” and this “takes news from anonymous sources to a whole new level.”
One of the first thoughts I had was: Nevada is an early primary state. The Review-Journal is the largest newspaper in the state. Was it sold to a player in that event, or people who want to be players? That slightly conspiratorial thought may be way off base. Of course there is no way to know as long as the ownership remains hidden. That’s the point.
The simple fact that we don’t know who the owners are, that it was not announced when the transaction was announced— this in itself breeds suspicion. Because why the secrecy if it’s a normal transaction? What kind of newspaper owner doesn’t want anyone to know? Ego buyers have the opposite incentive: they want everyone to know.
Journalists already have problems with generating enough trust to operate. This just adds to it.
So now you get to see what kind of story comes out of this. I will post the link if the report ever appears. (It did.) Clearly, the journalists at the Review-Journal are as perplexed by this mystery buyer as I am. 
December 12 at 11:46am
The incredible story of a major newspaper in an early primary state that now has a mystery owner continues. The publisher is refusing to tell the staff who bought the paper. The journalists are writing articles expressing their own helplessness. And no one knows what is going on, except the people who refuse to talk for reasons they refuse to reveal.
Yesterday I gave you the background in my first post. The gist: The Las Vegas Review Journal was sold this week for a weirdly inflated price to a company whose backers remained “undisclosed.” It’s the largest newspaper in the state. Nevada is an early primary state: fourth-in-the-nation. After I talked about the strangeness of this transaction on Twitter, a reporter there contacted me for a story he was doing about it. That story is now out. It includes this astounding passage:
News + Media manager Michael Schroeder has declined to disclose the company’s investors, as has Las Vegas Review-Journal Publisher Jason Taylor.
In discussions with employees, Taylor has said only that News + Media has multiple owner/investors, that some are from Las Vegas, and that in face-to-face meetings he has been assured that the group will not meddle in the newspaper’s editorial content.
Amazing… Boss, who owns us? ‘I am not going to tell you. Just go about your business. You don’t need to know.’
Here is the quote they used from me:
The timing of the transaction might also raise a question about the new owners’ possible political motivations.
“One of the first thoughts I had was: Nevada is an early primary state. The Review-Journal is the largest newspaper in the state. Was it sold to a player in that event, or people who want to be players?,” asked media critic and New York University professor Jay Rosen. “That slightly conspiratorial thought may be way off base. Of course, there is no way to know as long as the ownership remains hidden. That’s the point.”
On Twitter Saturday, The Review-Journal’s state capital reporter, Sean Whaley, wrote: “I am just going to say it. I am personally offended & embarrassed that whoever bought the RJ does not have the guts to say so.”
Anyone who can shed light on the mystery is welcome to try.
UPDATE: It gets better: The journalists at the Review Journal are clearly in a power struggle now over how this will be reported on. “The publisher of the Las Vegas Review-Journal removed quotes from a Thursday night article about the newspaper’s sale that questioned its new owner’s decision to remain anonymous, according to a newsroom source.” This is the part that was taken out:
Schroeder said News + Media does not own his newspapers or any other publications. When asked, he would not disclose the company’s investors.
“They want you to focus on your jobs … don’t worry about who they are,” Schroeder said.
Review-Journal Editor Michael Hengel noted the lack of disclosure.
“The questions that were not answered Thursday are 1) Who is behind the new company, and 2) What are their expectations?” Hengel said.
Focus on your jobs. Don’t worry about who they are. Wow.
UPDATE, DEC. 13. Today on CNN’s Reliable Sources Jon Ralston, an extremely well-connected reporter in Nevada, speculated that one possibility was Sheldon Adelson, who is known to have an interest in buying a newspaper in the US, said Ralston. Adelson— billionaire, Republican mega-donor, pro-Israel extremist — already owns one paper in Israel. Ralston also said (on Twitter) “The RJ’s owners will have to reveal themselves eventually. Too much pressure. Ridiculous for them to think they can be invisible.” Here’s the clip.
December 16 at 4:06pm
Fortune magazine, citing multiple sources but not saying who they are, reports that Sheldon Adelson is, in fact, the mystery owner of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. See: Yes, Sheldon Adelson Bought The Las Vegas Review-Journal.
5:20 pm. Obviously, the Review-Journal has been digging too. They may have been close to naming Adelson and may be annoyed that Fortune went with anonymous sources. Pressure to go public grows for new Review-Journal owners.
8:46 pm Games: “‘I have no personal interest’ in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson said Tuesday night, in his first public comments about the mysterious sale of Nevada’s biggest newspaper.” CNN: Sheldon Adelson responds to speculation he bought Las Vegas paper.
10:54 pm. It’s starting to come out now. Review-Journal: Adelson son-in-law orchestrated family’s purchase of Las Vegas Review-Journal
December 17 at 11:01am
Last night was a good night for the journalism tribe. The journalists at the Las Vegas Review-Journal did their jobs, and found out who bought the paper. Their colleagues around the country were watching and cheered them on. Killer quote: “No matter who owns the Review-Journal, they don’t own us.” See: How the Las Vegas Review-Journal broke news about its own sale.
This is an important addition to the story. Adelson overpaid by about 3X for the Review-Journal, says industry analyst Ken Doctor. See: The new breed of newspaper mogul? On Adelson’s purchase of the Review-Journal.
UPDATE: After the revelation by others, the Adelson family published a statement in the print edition of the Review-Journal. The key parts read:
It was always our intention to publicly announce our ownership of the R-J.
This week, with each of the Republican candidates for president and the national media descending on Las Vegas for the year’s final debate, we did not want an announcement to distract from the important role Nevada continues to play in the 2016 presidential election.
Our motivation for purchasing the R-J is simple. We believe in this community and want to help make Las Vegas an even greater place to live. We believe deeply that a strong and effective daily newspaper plays a critical role in keeping our state apprised of the important news and issues we face on a daily basis.
The management team from New Media, which is currently running the R-J, will continue to oversee the operations of the publication. The family wants a journalism product that is second-to-none and will continue to invest in the paper to achieve this goal.
See: Ending Mystery, Adelson Family Says It Bought The ‘Las Vegas Review-Journal’
December 18 at 5:53pm
Incredible developments today in the ‘Sheldon Adelson buys a newspaper’ story, as the journalists at the newspaper he bought keep reporting on him— and themselves. In today’s episode they tell of a team of reporters suddenly and inexplicably ordered to stop what they were doing and instead monitor and scrutinize the work of three judges.
“One of the three judges observed was District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez, whose current caseload includes Jacobs v. Sands, a long-running wrongful termination lawsuit filed against Adelson and his company, Las Vegas Sands Corp., by Steven Jacobs, who ran Sands’ operations in Macau.
“The case has attracted global media attention because of Jacobs’ contention in court filings that he was fired for trying to break the company’s links to Chinese organized crime triads, and allegations that Adelson turned a blind eye to prostitution and other illegal activities in his resorts there.”
The reporters did as they were told, but no story ever appeared. However a story did appear in an obscure Connecticut newspaper, owned by the same guy who served as the cutout figure (I believe that is the correct term) in the corporate filings surrounding the mystery sale: Michael Schroeder. They write:
On Nov. 30, the New Britain Herald, a tiny Connecticut newspaper not affiliated with GateHouse, published an article critical of the performance of courts that specialize in business disputes. It singled out Judge Gonzalez with scathing criticism of her “inconsistent and even contradictory” handling of the Adelson case and another lawsuit involving Wynn Resorts Ltd…
The Adelson and Wynn cases were the only specific examples cited at length in the story. Two other judges were mentioned, but the critique of Gonzalez’s courtroom proceedings consumed more than a quarter of the 1,900-word article.
The article’s author was identified as Edward Clarkin, whose byline is found only one other time in the archives of the Connecticut newspaper, on a review of a Polish restaurant.
Attempts to locate Clarkin have been unsuccessful.
It goes on from there. See: Judge in Adelson lawsuit subject to unusual scrutiny amid Review-Journal sale.
December 20 at 2:48pm
“You can be assured that if the Adelsons attempt to skew coverage, by ordering some stories covered and others killed or watered down, the Review-Journal’s editors and reporters will fight it. How can you be sure? One way is to look at how we covered the secrecy surrounding the newspaper’s sale. We dug in. We refused to stand down. We will fight for your trust. Every. Single. Day. Even if our former owners and current operators don’t want us to.”
The journalists at the Review-Journal will not quit. That quote is from a front page editorial headlined: “We will continue to fight for your trust every day.”
Incredible. They are on their way to a Pulitzer Prize in public service, but that’s the least of it. They said to themselves: It won’t be worth working here if we don’t do this, so we may as well do this. Everyone in? And by making that decision they created tremendous power for themselves. Fight on, R-J.
See: EDITORIAL: Review-Journal will fight to keep your trust every day.
December 22 at 10:06pm
Huge news in the running story of zillionaire Sheldon Adelson’s purchase of the largest newspaper in the state of Nevada, the Review-Journal. Tonight came word that the editor has resigned. This is an ominous sign. I thought it would be the publisher. That the editor is gone is worse.
“Mike Hengel, who’s been with the Review-Journal since 2010, according to his LinkedIn profile, stunned his staff Tuesday evening when he informed them he has accepted a buyout offer. A source who was present at the meeting told POLITICO that Hengel said he didn’t believe he’d last long under the new ownership and therefore decided to consider a severance option. He told employees that the new ownership arrangement ‘had the makings of an adversarial relationship,’ according to the source.” See: Review-Journal editor steps down amid ‘makings of an adversarial relationship’
Because the Adelson forces seem ready to exert control over the Review-Journal and silence dissent, now is a good time for me to say what I heard. A team of investigative reporters similar to the Spotlight team at the BostonGlobe was to be hired at Review Journal. (It was announced here, Nov. 19.) But I was told that the journalists in the Review Journal newsroom did not know who is doing the hiring for this investigative team.
I do not know more than that, and it’s possible that this will turn out to be a minor or meaningless fact. Or there may be an innocent explanation. But since the hammer seems to be coming down, I felt I should tell you what I know. If my information is incorrect or misleading I will let you know.
UPDATE: A message from the new owners about the future of the Las Vegas Review-Journal This statement was released after news broke about Mike Hengel resigning. Key parts:
…we pledge to publish a newspaper that is fair, unbiased and accurate. We decided to buy the Review-Journal to help create a better newspaper — a forward thinking newspaper that is worthy of our Las Vegas community. This journalism will be supported by new investments in services such as enhanced fact checking and a Reader Advocate or Ombudsperson to respond to reader concerns.
Third, we regard ourselves as stewards of this essential community institution, and we promise that the Review-Journal will serve the people of Las Vegas for many years to come. In particular, we will deepen the newspaper’s involvement with the community and invest what is necessary to ensure that the R-J is reporting news in the ways our community expects.
These are the three principles that will guide our ownership of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. How will this all work over the coming weeks and months? The professionals at New Media, who are now managing the R-J as well as running more than 125 other daily newspapers nationwide, will continue to oversee all operations. Mike Hengel, the paper’s current editor, accepted a voluntary buyout offer from the R-J’s prior owners, an offer that was also made to other qualified employees.
December 23 at 5:14pm
Another amazing turn in the ‘Sheldon buys himself a newspaper’ story that I have been following for you. In this episode we discover that the top editor, who resigned yesterday, learned that he took a buyout from an editorial in his own newspaper announcing that he… took a buyout! Before that he didn’t know. I mean, why not just place on his desk a severed horse’s head? The story is in the LA Times, which considers Vegas sort of in its backyard. See: Vegas newspaper stands up to its newly unveiled owner, casino giant Sheldon Adelson.
UPDATE: The Hartford Courant picks up the portion of the story that unfolded in its backyard. Mystery Surrounds Newspaper’s Relationship To Las Vegas Casino Mogul Sheldon Adelson’s Legal Fight. The Courant reporter reveals that several people quoted in the mystery article that appeared in the Bristol Press about judges in Las Vegas never talked to the author, Edward Clarkin. Clarkin himself cannot be found, as the Review Journal revealed earlier. Even the editors of the Bristol press don’t know who he is, the Courant reported:
Jim Smith, who served as executive editor of the Herald and the Bristol Press at the time Clarkin’s first byline appeared, said he also can’t shed light on Clarkin’s identity, or how the business-court story came to be, or why the New Britain Herald was so interested in Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez. Smith said he recently reached out to Schroeder, who simply replied: “Stay tuned.”
“It’s a mystery,” Smith said. “It’s a fascinating mystery. It really is.”
UPDATE: Christine Stuart pretty much solved one of the elements of the mystery. The author whom no one could find, Edward Clarkin, is probably the “cutout” figure in the original purchase of the Review-Journal, Michael Schroeder of Connecticut, an agent for the Adelson forces. Either that or Schroeder created the pen name that he assigned to another writer. As Stuart of CT News Junkie reports on Facebook: “Michael Schroeder’s middle name: Edward. Mother’s maiden: Clarkin.” See: How A Connecticut Journalist Broke A Key Part Of The Bizarre Las Vegas Newspaper Story (Dec. 29)
December 24 at 12:37pm
In today’s episode of ‘Sheldon buys a newspaper, journalists fight back’ we have a man of principle, Steve Majerus-Collins, who quits in disgust because the owner of the newspaper he works for in Connecticut is in league with Adelson and doing the billionaire’s bidding while deceiving the press and his own employees about it. From his moving letter:
I have no idea how my wife and I will get by. We have two kids in college, two collies, a mortgage and dreams of travel and adventure that now look more distant than ever.
“But here’s what I know: I can’t teach young people how to be ethical, upstanding reporters while working for a man like Michael Schroeder. I can’t take his money. I can’t do his bidding. I have to stand up for what is right even if the cost is so daunting that at this moment it scares the hell out of me.
A flurry of other action on this story today:
The Review-Journal hired a political fixer and crisis management dude who worked for Clinton and Gore among other clients: Mark Fabiani.
This piece appeared on Sheldon Adelson’s newspaper in Israel and how it’s run.
And Michael Schroder, the Adelson flunkie and cutout figure who tried to keep the billionaire’s ownership secret (while telling the Review-Journal staff not to worry about who owns them) would not confirm his mother’s maiden name to journalists from the newspaper he “manages.” That’s right.
December 25 at 7:00pm
In today’s episode of the Adelson newspaper follies we learn that Sheldon’s flunky and cutout figure Michael Schroeder — described by an employee who quit yesterday (Steve Majerus-Collins) as “guilty of journalistic misconduct of epic proportions” in that he “used the pages of my newspaper, secretly, to further the political agenda of his master out in Las Vegas” — has purchased another paper to add to his toy collection.
The tiny Block Island Times will now belong to Schroeder personally. The comic touch was provided by the statement that the sellers issued.
“We are confident that the new owner, Michael Schroeder, has the vision, resources and experience to take the helm,” the statement said. “We are pleased that his wife, Janet, will also play a role in the day-to-day management. They offer decades of business experience. Most importantly, they exhibit in their employment and volunteer work, a commitment to the community and its betterment.”
I might have added, “he would make an excellent bag man.” (Definition of the term bag man here.)
December 26 at 5:25pm
For today’s episode of the Adelson newspaper follies we bring in a guest commenter, Josh Marshall, editor of Talking Points Memo, who wrote about the whole sad story yesterday. Says Josh:
“I have an obvious interest in journalism and the journalistic profession. Perhaps not much less obviously I have a taste for scandals that are not merely outrageous but are baroque in their complexity and rise above mere bad acts to reach the more sublime human qualities like impulsiveness, greed that goes beyond mere greed, hasty efforts to cover up wrongdoing which take on a level of comedy that could never emerge from conscious design. Here is where we are getting to the level of scandal as art. And this is why Michael Schroeder is really the star of this whole show for my money.”
I agree. Schroeder the cutout turns the interest dial up to 11. Read Josh’s entire piece:
And I have to add: I have the same taste for the baroque element in a running scandal. In fact, I learned the iterative technique I have been using in this series of posts from… Josh Marshall, during the US Attorneys Scandal in 2007, for which he won the George K. Polk Award. I remember how he would always have something to read each day. If there was no new information he would use the opportunity to reflect and summarize. Very effective means of engagement.
UPDATE: Reporter Who Resigned Over Adelson Subterfuge Gets $5,000 Award.
December 27 at 11:50am
Our series — Adelson tries to corrupt the press, journalists fight back — continues today with a piece by Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist John L. Smith. Like Josh Marshall yesterday, Smith focuses on the hilarious and disturbing figure of Michael Schroeder, the Adelson flunky who told the Review-Journal newsroom just to do their jobs and not worry about who bought their newspaper for 3 times market value. Smith writes:
“Schroeder’s journalistic puppetry in preparing an inaccurate story about business courts meant primarily to smear District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez, who happens to preside over a bruising ongoing litigation involving Adelson, sends a disturbing message to the staff and readers alike. The story, published in Schroeder’s New Britain newspaper, raises serious questions: Not about Gonzalez’s competence, but about Schroeder’s veracity.
“Under the byline ‘Edward Clarkin,’ almost certainly a Schroeder alter ego, the piece contains an inaccurate appraisal of the judge and sections that appear to have been lifted without proper attribution, or created from whole cloth. The Hartford Courant reported the article contained ‘several passages that are nearly identical to work that previously appeared in other publications.’
“Ill-conceived, poorly executed. Nice job, Hemingway. To call the story ham-handed does a disservice to ham.”
There have been several indications that journalists around the country continue to dig into this story. I’m waiting for someone to start asking questions and getting answers about Gatehouse Media’s role in this spectacle. This is a company that apparently sent investigative teams after Adelson’s target before the billionaire’s purchase of any assets. What’s up with that?
December 28 at 12:14pm
Two items for today’s update in the ‘Adelson buys a newspaper, journalists fight back’ story. First, I am going to be on the radio talking about it. Remember radio?
Today at 1:00 pm EST I will be on the Colin McEnroe Show on WNPR, public radio in Connecticut, along with Steve Majerus-Collins, who on Christmas eve quit his job as a reporter for the Bristol Press, owned by Adelson flunky and cutout figure Michael Schroeder. Quit on principle, I should add.
“I have learned with horror that my boss shoveled a story into my newspaper – a terrible, plagiarized piece of garbage about the court system – and then stuck his own fake byline on it,” he wrote. “I admit I never saw the piece until recently, but when I did, I knew it had Mr. Schroeder’s fingerprints all over it. Yet when enterprising reporters asked my boss about it, he claimed to know nothing or told them he had no comment.”
I don’t know what Colin McEnroe has in mind for this discussion but it should be interesting to hear from Steve. Here’s the preview, with an audio link so you can listen to a recording of the show.
UPDATE: One thing new I learned from the show. Steve Collins said that Michael Schroeder had a backer when he bought the Bristol Press. He didn’t make the purchase with his own money. The host asked him: who? Steve didn’t know and said no one in the newsroom knew. This detail, which I had missed, was reported Dec. 15 by the Review Journal.
The other item I have for you comes from the New York Times article today about the whole sad story, which more or less repeats what others have reported. But there was one part so deliciously absurd that I cannot let it escape without comment.
You see, the Adelson forces earlier decided that they were losing control of the story. So they hired a semi-famous fixer and crisis management expert to handle national press interest, which keeps growing. His name is Mark Fabiani. He’s worked for the Clintons, Al Gore, and the owner of the San Diego Chargers, among others. No doubt he’s earning hundreds of thousands of dollars for this gig. So here’s what the Times reported:
“To deal with the fallout from its Review-Journal purchase, the Adelsons have hired Mark Fabiani, a crisis communications specialist who worked in the Clinton White House and for the cyclist Lance Armstrong. Mr. Fabiani did not respond to inquiries about whether the issue of Nevada judges came up during sales talks.”
Did you catch that? He did not respond! To the freakin’ New York Times! That’s crisis management? The clever application of Mark Fabiani’s “no comment” skills? I bet it cost Adelson 15 grand just for that. Heck, I could do it for a lot less— say, $10,000 for every phone call unreturned. I have three phones (home, cell, office) from which I could ignore reporters’ calls, so I think I am more than qualified to do what Fabiani does.
Surreal.
Dec. 29 at 4:21pm
In today’s episode of ‘the Adelson forces buy a newspaper,’ we learn that the Nevada Gaming authorities, state regulators for the gambling industry, are keeping a close eye on the purchase of the Review-Journal. We also learn that Sheldon Adelson himself denies owning any portion of the newspaper or even wanting to. It was his children’s idea, he says. All this in the latest report from the Review-Journal itself.
“We are watching all of these developments very closely,” a state official said. “Of course, it’s incumbent upon all gaming license holders to avoid actions that go against the morals, good order and general welfare of the people of the state of Nevada, and to avoid doing anything that reflects or tends to reflect discredit on the state.
“I’m sure Mr. Adelson and his team are doing their utmost to do that.”
Me too!
Speaking of morals, Adelson told the Macau Daily Times that “his children” bought the Review-Journal and he has “no financial interest” in the newspaper.
“I don’t have anything to do with it,” Adelson said. “My money that the children have with which to buy the newspaper is their inheritance. I don’t want to spend money on a newspaper.”
Meanwhile, in yesterday’s radio discussion on WNPR in Connecticut, James Wright, deputy editor of the Review-Journal, said “we’re not sure who’s in charge.” Things happen — including changes made in stories after they leave the newsroom — “at whose behest we don’t know,” said Wright.
“Strings gets pulled but at this point we are often unaware whether it’s something that Gatehouse wants to do, whether it’s something the Adelson family wants to do, or whether its somebody within this daisy chain of ownership and managers who may be taking it upon themselves to overreact to something that they think someone wants to do.” That’s pretty chilling. (Listen here.)
It’s clear to me that Gatehouse Media has to be the focus of some serious inquiry by fellow journalists now. The company is becoming an engine of opacity in this story and since it is a news company that is both a curiosity, and a problem.
Dec. 30 at 10:29am
Today’s update in the ‘Adelson forces buy a newspaper’ story focuses on a player that has gotten too little attention: GateHouse Media, a resurrected chain of newspapers (it went bankrupt in 2013) that used to own the Review-Journal. Bear with me as I explain:
On December 10th the announcement was made that GateHouse had sold the Las Vegas Review Journal to a shell company called News + Media Capital Group LLC. It then cooperated in concealing the true nature of this transaction from public scrutiny. (First dark cloud.)
GateHouse was retained by the Adelson family to continue to operate the newspaper, but since then strange things have happened to various articles the Review-Journal newsroom has prepared about the sale and suspicious circumstances surrounding it. The work of the journalists in Las Vegas gets changed before it is published, but no one in the newsroom knows why, or how, or by whom. As deputy editor James Wright said Monday on WNPR’s Colin McEnroe show:
“Strings gets pulled but at this point we are often unaware whether it’s something that Gatehouse wants to do, whether it’s something the Adelson family wants to do, or whether its somebody within this daisy chain of ownership and managers who may be taking it upon themselves…” (Second dark cloud.)
This is why I have called GateHouse an engine of opacity in this story, which is troublesome for a newspaper company that counts 125 dailies among its holdings. Yesterday, a journalist who works for a GateHouse publication, Kris Olson, posted this on my Facebook page. I thought it pretty compelling so I am highlighting his words:
I could go on at length about this subject, but as a former and future Gatehouse employee (Gatehouse has an agreement to buy the paper I currently work for in the new year), I should probably hold my fire to some degree. But I do hope Gatehouse realizes the impact of being an ‘engine of opacity,’ as you aptly put it, has on the morale of the journalists it employs. Go to gatehousenewsroom.com, and you’ll see a lot of high-minded talk about ethics in and among discussion of the company’s editorial strategy. But you can’t just talk the talk. You have to walk the walk. After all, the whole reason someone hired a lot of us, I presume, is that we have well-honed B.S. detectors (as the Review-Journal staff and others have proven time and again over the past couple of weeks). Those of us who have stuck with the profession through no pay raises, unpaid furloughs, reduced staffs, etc., etc., really need to at least cling to the idea that our bosses, on some level, get it. That they don’t wear the black hats. Steve Collins was left with no other choice but to conclude that his boss indeed didn’t get it, and indeed wears a black hat. I’ll echo many others who have lauded his brave, principled decision. As of now, I feel like Gatehouse employees are sort of in limbo. I’m not 100-percent convinced that they are in Collins’ position, but I’m not 100-percent convinced that they aren’t. But I do feel pretty strongly that Gatehouse can’t just hope this will blow over. They hired us for our long memories, too. (Third dark cloud.)
Gatehouse Media is the one who ordered R-J journalists to investigate three Nevada judges, one of whom turned out to be the presiding judge in a lawsuit against Sheldon Adelson’s company. When asked about it by reporters, Michael Reed, CEO of New Media Investment Corp., the parent company of GateHouse Media, declined all comment on whether Adelson was involved. That was a real confidence builder!
Reed said the effort was part of a “multistate, multinewsroom” investigative effort initiated by GateHouse. Really? What was this project all about? Reed said he did not know who started it or who approved it. Weird. Big investigative efforts are launched but nobody at this company knows why, or who gave the order.
“I don’t know why you’re trying to create a story where there isn’t one,” Reed told an R-J reporter. “I would be focusing on the positive, not the negative.” An incredible —and threatening — statement for a news company executive to make to a journalist pursuing a legitimate story. (Fourth dark cloud.)
Then there’s this from GateHouse CEO Kirk Davis when the sale was announced:
The Review-Journal and other Nevada newspapers are the first outlets GateHouse will manage for a company other than New Media Investment.
“We look at this as a possible new business model,” said Davis, who told Review-Journal employees he hoped the management agreement would be long-term.
Uh… really? A new business model? You mean there are other billionaires out there who want to pay three times market value for one of GateHouse’s newspapers, and then hire the company back to run them? Does that sound remotely plausible? (Fifth dark cloud.)
I hope you see what I mean by an engine of opacity. Its time for GateHouse to come under national scrutiny for its role in this lurid, comic and credibility-crushing affair.
* * *
Photo credit: ‘Mystery man without car,’ Jana-Sophie Lauer, Creative Commons License.