Dem
47
GOP
53
Patrick Soon-Shiong, billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times, has not clothed himself in glory in the last month. First, he eighty-sixed the paper's endorsement of Kamala Harris, in the name of "fairness." Then, he doubled down on that, and said that in order to make the newspaper's editorial board more "representative," he planned to hire CNN's token right-winger, Scott Jennings.
These billionaires always think they are smarter than the rest of us. And, in their specific domains, maybe that's true. But in this domain, Soon-Shiong isn't fooling anyone. First, Jennings does not offer a "conservative" perspective. He is a mouthpiece for the MAGA Movement, and the things he says on CNN are misleading or downright dishonest, more often than not. Second, editorial boards work as democracies. If you take the five (current) members of the board, all of whom wanted to endorse Harris, and you add Jennings, then you get... a 5-1 vote for Harris, or for whatever other "left-wing" perspective the board has.
Soon-Shiong is not trying to be more "fair," and we also doubt that he's trying to get his own personal politics into the newspaper. No, this is all about kissing the rear end of exactly one person, a rear end that will soon be positioned right behind the Resolute desk. That's the only reason to scotch the endorsement and it's the only reason to hire the most famous non-Fox Trump mouthpiece. If all Soon-Shiong wanted was a right-wing perspective, there are plenty of people like that who have actual ties to California, like Lanhee Chen, or soon-to-be-former Rep. Michelle Steel (who just conceded yesterday).
Anyhow, in an effort to put his spin out there, Soon-Shiong agreed to sit for an interview with Oliver Darcy, who used to be CNN's media guy, but who now works for himself as an independent blogger. The good thing about not having a bunch of suits above you in the hierarchy is that you don't have to worry about whose toes you step on. And so, Darcy brought the thunder. It's probably best to let Darcy himself explain how things went down, after Soon-Shiong raved about how "respectful" and "thoughtful" Jennings is:
Whether or not you believe Jennings is respectful to his fellow panelists (and that is very debatable) is beside the point. The problem with Jennings is that his commentary is, at its core, dishonest. He may not outright blurt out lies, but he isn't being truthful, either. His entire career hinges on defending a politician who subjects the populace to an endless stream of lies and conspiracy theories. Honest people are not in the line of work of defending dishonest people—especially when they are in such important positions of power.
It was when I attempted to broach this topic with Soon-Shiong that our conversation grew combative. He told me it was merely my "opinion" that Trump lies more than other politicians. I pushed back, noting that the depths of his dishonesty have been well-documented by fact-based news organizations. Soon-Shiong didn't apparently appreciate that. He scolded me for making "a statement."
"If you want to talk about Donald Trump, that's not the conversation I started with," the billionaire said, clearly annoyed.
Trying to steady the ship, I explained to him that I was only mentioning Trump because he had invited one of the president-elect's staunchest defenders to be on his new editorial board. I wanted to ask him how he grapples with the fact that defending Trump at every turn requires a person to engage in a high level of deceit. And, to be clear, defending Trump is primarily what Jennings gets paid to do. But when I told Soon-Shiong this, he accused me of harboring "bias" and added, "This is really what I think is the matter with the country."
Not long thereafter, Soon-Shiong took his ball and went home. That is to say, he insulted Darcy a few times, and then slammed down the phone and ended the interview.
When Soon-Shiong acquired the paper a few years back, it was because it was in trouble. Daily circulation is down to 200,000, while the website has about 500,000 subscribers. The greater Los Angeles metro area has about 13 million people, so that's not a great clearance rate, especially since many of those website subscribers are not Angelenos. Needless to say, Soon-Shiong's phony posturing isn't going to help the paper or its reputation. It's also not going to help Soon-Shiong's reputation, as he is now on the Los Angeles villains list. He probably doesn't care about sacrificing his newspaper on the altar of his biotech interests, since the latter is where his real money comes from. However, he may discover that in L.A., once your reputation is in tatters, all of your business interests are affected. Put another way, the city has run more than one unpopular rich guy out of town. (Z)