“If you want to tell people what they should want, become a professor. But if you’re in the newspaper business — and I emphasize the word business — then you have to respond to what your customer wants.”
“It’s the deal from hell. And it will continue to be the deal from hell until we turn it around.”
“We’re not interested in trial by torture, not interested in dying by a thousand cuts.”
“We’re looking at some of the worst advertising numbers in the history of the world.”
“I think that because newspapers have historically been monopolies, I think they’ve been insulated from reality. I, you know, am in the position where I’m going to have to, ‘deliver reality.’”
“Am I the only person in this room who really wants to win? We are in crisis mode. The days of the newspaper being some kind of a holy monopoly are over.”
“This is the first unit of Tribune that I’ve talked to that doesn’t generate any revenue. So all of you are overhead.”
“Three guys in a garage create YouTube, and we’ve got 800 people in Chicago who don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground! … You chronicle what we’ve done in 60 days, and I promise you the next 60 days will be even more tumultuous.”
“H—, I put $315 million into this thing, and we’re on the hook for $13 billion — the least I ought to get is my name on the company’s stationery.”
“I’m much better looking, clearly more agile, and I think whoever played me was singing off key.”
“If we succeed it will be because of heroes in the field who lead a grassroots sea change.”
“We’ve got the muscle and we’ve got to use it.”
“The news business is something worse than horrible. If that’s the future, we don’t have much of a future.”
“That’s like comparing leprosy to cancer.”
“My job is to throw grenades … and I’ve thrown my share of grenades.”
“I can’t explain why. I just have enormous self-confidence.”
“It seems like an awful lot of journalism that’s being written is not being read.”
“This business has been eroding before your eyes and you’re worried about my language? … Everything I said was with an intent to get everybody to get off their [behinds] and understand this is a crisis. We’ve got to save this business. We’ve got to make this work. And we’ve got to prioritize what we get all pushed out of shape about. … If we keep operating the way we’ve been operating, there is no future.”
“I’m not disrespecting anybody. I’m trying to make everybody uncomfortable.”
“Extremism in the pursuit of opportunity is not a vice.”
“You may not like me or the way I say things, but I’m thrilled and delighted that for the first time, you may actually have an opinion about your CEO.”
“So, who’s in charge here anyway? Well, I am. And I am not an absentee owner. Neither should you be.”
“Some of my best friends go to gentlemen’s clubs. … Everyone likes pussy. It’s un-American not to like pussy.”
“Do I need a committee, meeting and another consultant to change that policy? Oh, that’s right, I’m in charge now. What policy?”
“Fuck you.”
“I’m sorry but you’re giving me the classic, what I would call, journalistic arrogance by deciding that puppies don’t count… . What I’m interested in is how can we generate additional interest in our products and additional revenue so we can make our product better and better and hopefully we get to the point where our revenue is so significant that we can do puppies and Iraq.”
“I do not see how a member of the Fourth Estate, dedicated to protecting the First Amendment, can censor what its own employees and partners can see.”
“Government scares the hell out of me.”