December 14, 2007
Church and state on the Journal masthead
Continuing my fascination with the Wall Street Journal and its takeover by Rupert Murdoch, I turned to the newspaper’s masthead this morning for a spot of Kremlinology.
The old US masthead, at the bottom of the second editorial page, featured Gordon Crovitz, the publisher, on the left side - the column reserved for editorial - and Peter McPherson and Richard Zannino, chairman and chief executive respectively of Dow Jones & Co, topping the business names on the right.
That was a clear enough division of church and state. So what would the post-takeover masthead look like, I wondered, after the fuss over whether Mr Murdoch will interfere in editorial matters?
The answer is: the masthead’s former strict division of left and right has been, ahem, superseded. Marcus Brauchli, the paper’s managing editor, is now at the top of the left-hand column with Clare Hart, executive vice-president of Dow Jones, at the top of the right-hand column.
But floating above both columns are now: Rupert Murdoch, chairman, Leslie Hinton, chief executive, and Robert Thomson, publisher. They are, by implication, the three kings of everything below. That answers that question.
Of course, none of this resolves the vexed issue of whether Dow Jones is the greatest brand in financial journalism.
