David Geffen’s name has been getting tossed around as a possible owner for the beleaguered Los Angeles Times. Geffen’s one qualifier for ownership is the fortune he’s amassed and the fact that he lives in the area. But using that logic why not Donald Sterling?

Anyone who has ever worked with Geffen, let alone been caught in his crosshairs, understands what a scary thought it would be to have him own the LA Times. Pull-no-punches Kim Masters lays it out in Slate:

Is life under the Tribune Co. so nightmarish that Geffen seems like a dream? Both of them should know what Geffen can be like.

I’ve heard from multiple sources in L.A., including an editor at the Times, that Geffen told a Timesman that were he to succeed in buying the paper, his first order of business would be firing a reporter in the business section who had crossed him. If Geffen has that on his to-do list—much less at the top—he is the wrong man at the wrong Times.

Geffen is famously vindictive.

That’s not even getting to his screw-the-public, untruthfulness that have been associated with his ownership of beach front property in Malibu.

If you are still unsure, there is an extremely good biography on him available at Amazon.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 29th, 2006 at 12:18 pm by Insider and is filed under Los Angeles Times. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.