WSJ: Stop Using Hacking Scandal to 'Assail' Us

Those at the Wall Street Journal—and "thousands of other journalists"—don’t deserve to be implicated in a mess caused by a single British tabloid, write the editors of the Journal, whose own publisher, Les Hinton, recently stepped down amid the phone hacking scandal. In a lengthy defense of their paper they begin with Hinton, arguing that he brought the Journal back to profitability in tough economic times, displayed sound ethical judgment, and invested in journalists.

The Journal goes on to compare News Corp's ownership to that of the Bancrofts', writing that the family's "appetite for dividends meant that little cash remained to invest in journalism. We shudder to think what the Journal would look like today without the sale to News Corp." And yet other publications “want their readers to believe, based on no evidence, that the tabloid excesses of one publication somehow tarnish thousands of other News Corp journalists across the world. We trust that readers can see through the commercial and ideological motives of our competitor-critics. The Schadenfreude is so thick you can't cut it with a chainsaw." Click to read the Journal's entire defense. (More News of the World stories.)