When the Dow Sales

Dow Jones & Company has received an unsolicited takeover offer (estimated around $5 Billion) by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation.

Dow Jones sound familiar to you? It should. The Dow Jones Industrial Index has long been considered THE gauge to determine the state of the stock market. Dow Jones & Company publishes the Wall Street Journal, a daily publication with an international circulation. The Wall Street Journal has remained a highly respected source of news, in spite of the public's growing distrust in most major new outlets.

News Corp is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, controlling many media outlets, including FOX. See a complete list of News Corp assets here. Almost 70% of the company's sales come from its US businesses, yet in 1999, The Economist reported that News Corp Investments had made £1.4 billion ($2.1 billion) in PROFITS over the previous 11 years but had paid no net corporation tax.

Rupert Murdoch, who has a long history of using his media holdings to promote the political and financial policies he supports, has made it clear he expected The Wall Street Journal to come under his editorial control if the sale was to go through.

It is hardly as though the Bancrofts, the family who controls Dow Jones & Company, are suffering financially. The sale would merely propel them into another level of filthy, stinking rich.

I am certain we were taught in Civics that the Federal Government had regulations in place to prevent monopolies, yet here we have two media giants about to come under control of one man. Is it really a good idea to allow one individual to control that big of a piece of the public opinion pie?

Read the New York Times coverage of this story here.