Oh, those lovable Los Angeles police. If they’re not sparking devastating citywide riots or bungling murder investigations, they’re trying to stifle free speech.
Earlier this month, Beverly Hills private equity firm Platinum Equity (oh so 90210, that name) bought my hometown San Diego Union-Tribune, a once-proud Pulitzer winner that was gutting its way toward bankruptcy, and was sure to go out of business without a bailout. It turns out that L.A.’s cops and firefighters have a pension system with $30 million invested with Platinum Equity, which the president of the 9,000-member Los Angeles Police Protective League (the league seems more focused on protecting police pensions than, say, helping police protect us) takes to mean that L.A. cops are partial owners of the newspaper. And they would like to “dismiss the Editorial Staff of the San Diego-Union Tribune,” please. [Letter]
OK, OK, the cops only mean the folks “who run the editorial pages,” not the entire editorial staff. Still, why do Los Angeles police officers want to play publisher at a paper 150 miles away? Because the Union-Trib‘s editorial page “is one of the most virulently anti-public safety employee pages of any newspapers in California, if not the country,” of course. “They consistently call for the wages and benefits of public employees, including police officers and firefighters, to be frozen and pension benefits to be drastically cut.” Apparently the police protective league missed the pension scandal that won San Diego the unfortunate nickname Enron by the Sea. Not to mention that the $30 million the cops plunked down with Platinum Equity (which claims to have $3.5 billion in private equity fund commitments) doesn’t exactly entitle it to demand mass firings. Can we say minority stakeholder?
Thankfully, the paper and its new owner have indicated that they won’t do anything (except maybe chuckle) at the police group’s demand. Good for you, U-T. I hope you survive.