• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, June 18, 2007

Bringing out the best in business publishing takes money and a cool head for commerce.

General Electric isn't sitting around waiting for News Corp. and Rupert Murdoch to do whatever they intend to with Dow Jones & Co., with New Corp.'s supposed purchase of the company -- which has sent Wall Street Journal reporters running for cover in fear the dominant business daily would turn tabloid.

GE has now gotten into the game, making a bid with Pearson, the owner of the Financial Times, for a majority ownership in the big financial publishing company.  To allay reporters' fears, part of the proposed deal might give the Bancroft family as much as a 20% minority interest.

NBC may be suffering along with its cable news network MSNBC, but GE knows too well how to protect specific assets -- that of its ever-powerful and dominant cable financial news channel, CNBC.

Rupert Murdoch wants to use Dow Jones to compete with CNBC in launching a new cable business channel.

Pearson, as well, sees the threat. A Murdoch-re-invented Wall Street Journal would go after the Financial Times, as well as the business magazine The Economist, of which Pearson is a part owner.

All these years the Bancrofts took such great care to let The Wall Street Journal and its other publications have editorial freedom. So the GE offer, letting the family retain a sizable minority stake, might give them second thoughts about accepting a Murdoch bid -- even if the competing GE/Pearson offer comes in at price lower than Murdoch's offer at $60 a share.

Where does this leave those journalists? Still struggling -- perhaps.

A GE/Pearson bid would be very pricey, which could mean a possible streamlining of operations that could include eliminating some journalists because of possible overlap with the combined brand entities -- CNBC, Financial Times, Barron's, The Economist and The Wall Street Journal.

That's capitalism, though -- something WSJ reporters write about everyday. At least they'd have comfort in knowing their dear publication wouldn't be turned into a TMZ.com.

Still, it may not be a clear battle of tabloid vs. capitalism.  Free enterprise has its own scandalous nature. Employee layoffs can elevate emotions -- but have nothing to do with business.