Wall Street Journal vs. Newscorp
Written: Mar 04 '08
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Pros: Good news, fun features
Cons: editorials, lack of comics
The Bottom Line: Good newspaper, just take the editorials with a heap of salt
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| factotum's Full Review: Wall Street Journal |
The Wall Street Journal is in its 120th year of publishing and first under the ownership of Rupert Murdoch's Newscorp. The Journal publishes a mix of straight news, financial data, opinion and lifestyle reporting. All of these aspects of the paper are worth looking at individually, so that is what we will do.
The Wall Street Journal's reporting of news and business affairs is exemplary. They have won numerous Pulitzer Prizes, and deservedly so. Their detailed reporting is thorough and unbiased, while the summary columns (one business related and one dedicated to national/world events) that line the left hand side of the front page are essential reading, providing a succinct snapshot of what's going on in the world right now.
The Journal's news section has always operated independently of the editorial department. One hopes this will continue under Murdoch, but it seems quite contrary to the template followed by other Newscorp media. It is probably an understatement to say that the editorial bias of the paper is conservative; I would it describe it as evangelically capitalist in orientation. The editorials are the most annoying thing about the paper to me. While I'm open to reasoned and well-supported arguments from anywhere on the political spectrum, too much of what I read in the Journal's opinion pages seems to ignore or distort inconvenient facts and to wallow in personal invective. (You can of course find that in plenty of left publications, too, and I find it just as tiresome there) To their credit, the Journal does publish some dissenting opinions (I remember, for example, one by Hans Blix in the run up to the Iraq War), and these are worth reading when they appear. The letter page also features some rebuttals to WSJ editorials, though it does seem to me that the debate in the section is no longer as lively as it was prior to the takeover. I have no stats to back this up, it is just my impression as a regular, longstanding reader. Anyway, I usually just glance at the editorials to see if one looks like it may be worth my time. Mostly it seems like they aren't.
For statistical information about the markets, the Journal is the paper of record. A lot of this information can be found online, but the WSJ lays it out conveniently in print for those who want it that way. If you ever need to know, say, the closing price of a particular stock on a particular day, all you have to do is go to the library and look at the Wall Street Journal published on the subsequent day.
The Personal Journal section was first published in 2002 and I find it a welcome addition. There are personal finance tips, reviews of books, movies, and the arts, travel stories and the like. My favorite columns are the wine and sports columns that appear ever Friday, and the "How's Your Drink" section that appears on Saturday's. The Journal covers all kind of music and is one of the few American papers that covers opera with any kind of seriousness.
Even if you, like myself, do not play the market (the Daily Racing Form meets my investment needs more closely), the Journal is still a good paper to read because of its fine reporting. Over the last decade it has added more leisure features, which are welcome from my perspective. So far, my worst fears about the Rupert Murdoch era of the Wall Street Journal have not been realized. There is still a firm wall between the news and the editorial department, hopefully this will continue.
Recommended:
Yes
Describe the newspaper's political views: It is conservative
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Epinions.com ID:
factotum
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 - Top 1000 |
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Member: Edward Kane
Location: Long Beach, CA
Reviews written: 405
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