The <em>Wall Street Journal</em> as the <em>National Enquirer</em> of Business Journalism

Last Thursday, the Wall Street Journal ran a front-page story on James Cayne, CEO of Bear Stearns, that -- in its snarky reliance on the tabloid tools of innuendo, unattributed reporting and unbalanced, agenda-heavy journalism -- should answer the question of whether the newspaper will be different in the Murdoch era.

It already is.

The story attempts to portray Mr. Cayne as dangerously out of touch and uninvolved during the July sub-meltdown, and the collapse of two Bear Stearns hedge funds.

Why is this a front-page story? There's nothing new -- other than the sensationalist allegations of pot smoking. The other factoids relating to Mr. Cayne's golfing and bridge playing in the heat of the crisis had already been reported elsewhere.

But that's the way tabloid journalism works. You take facts that have been published, add in some sexy new (and denied) allegations, weave them together into a sensationalist narrative -- in this case, the CEO fiddling while Rome burns -- and voila, you've got yourself hot, front-pager.

What's telling is that all the positive quotes -- and there are a bunch of them, to be fair -- are disclosed. And all the negative ones are unattributed. When you can't get one person to speak on the record about the bad stuff, any responsible journalist should reconsider the story.

Consider these weasels and caveats sprinkled toxically through the piece:

• "Attendees say.."

• "...according to someone who was there..."

• "...associates say..."

• "Friends say..."

• "On July 12th, chatting with visitors over lunch..."

• "On another occasion, he told a visitor..."

• "...participants say."

• "...according to people familiar with the calls..."

• "Mr. Cayne had left, say two people who were there with him..."

Beyond these unsubstantiated allegations is the invidious comparison between Mr. Cayne's purportedly disengaged management style, and that of other CEOs of sub-prime plagued companies. The Journal story apotheosizes Mr. Dimon of J.P. Morgan Chase, Mr. Fuld of Lehman and Mr. Blankfein of Goldman Sachs for their personal involvement last summer -- without pointing out that the damage had been done months and years earlier, and that the noise from those august institutions was that of billions of barn doors being closed.

The Journal even noted the massive personal sacrifice of Mr. Blankfein who "cancelled plans to spend the last two weeks of August at his beach house, missing a chance to spend time with his sons before they headed to college."

Cue the violins.

What the Journal also fails to point out is that Mr. Cayne may very well have a different management style than his peers. Can it be that he'd rather portray an image of coolness and confidence in the midst of relative chaos, as opposed to the PR-tuned micro-management of Blankfein et.al? That he saw no need for that kind of gestural bullshit?

Disclosure notice: I own a few hundred shares of Bear Stearns. And frankly, as a shareholder, I'd rather have a CEO who has a team he can trust in place, and who doesn't need to be chained to his desk.

I wonder if the Journal's Kate Kelly just doesn't like Mr. Cayne, period. His macho cigar and golf lifestyle probably isn't hip enough for her. I'm sure that if he had taken time out from the sub-prime mess to ground himself with some yoga and breathing exercises, had lit some aromatherapy candles in his office to relieve the stress, and decamped to a monastery for some chanting, Ms. Kelly would be celebrating Mr. Cayne for his progressivity, wisdom and perspective in the midst of chaos.

Meanwhile, as the Journal does note, "Bear's travails of late have taken a back seat to those of competitors like Merrill Lynch, where a write-down of $8.4 billion cost chief executive Stan O'Neal his job."

And that was written before Chuck Prince lost his gig, too.

To which I say: pass me a Cohiba.