The reality of newspaper death throes is settling in, even for the die—hards, and various desperate measures are being contemplated. In the left wing Editor & Publisher, Joe Mathewson contemplates a variety of special legislative measures which he thinks might enable the industry to survive courtesy of tax breaks and other governmental favors.

Of course, none of the solutions he imagines would address the fundamental technological, strategic, and demographic issues sending the industry into oblivion. The "former Wall Street Journal writer, banker, and corporate lawyer" can't "readically re—think" quite that far.

And Mathewson takes it for granted that the obsolete technology somehow deserves special status over more robust competitors.

Pathetic.

Thomas Lifson  12 08 05