Lenny Says Hello
By Trevor Cole


To: All National Post employees
Re: Cost-cutting measures
From: You know who (and my Dad)

Hello. Let me formally introduce ourself. I (and my Dad) am your new owner. It is a great pleasure to be addressing you newspaper people in Toronto from my (and my Dad's) Winnipeg office, where we own 100% of The National Post. Please consider this the beginning of a great new era for a great newspaper, one in which 100% of the ownership-type control belongs to one big Winnipeg-based company, of which I (and my Dad) am in charge.

You may have heard that while I (and my Dad) have little experience in owning newspapers, we take cost control very seriously. If so, that is good reporting. Well done. Today, it is my (and so on) unique pleasure to discuss the measures by which the spending patterns of this newspaper will be altered to fit those consistent with good business practice. As in: Stay away from the money; it is our money not yours; stop spending our money; you can only spend money when we say so, and we won't; and other very clear and understandable phrases first coined by the Thomson family. I (etc.) understand that for you, who have been living in a multi-coloured fantasy world where you not only get to spend money but chew it like sunflower seeds, this will take some adjustment. But remember that the people at The Globe and Mail have many years of experience not spending money. They are really good at it. Are you going to let them beat you? Where is your competitive spirit?

Here follow the details of the cost-cutting program to be implemented immediately by everyone, everywhere, all at once.

1. Take your hands off the money. This is very important. You can have your hands on the desk beside the money, but not on it. You may, in future, be allowed to brush against the money on rare occasions, but that has not been decided. Until then, you can have no contact with the money.

2. Stop thinking about the money. It is gone. Forget about it. Regard it as you would an old girlfriend — you loved being with her, you hung out in fancy places, you thought you'd be together forever, and then she dumped you. And now you hate her, and you want nothing to do with her. You're that upset with her.

3. Don't answer questions about the money. Other people, including freelancers and shareholders with an eye on our debt, will ask you about the money. Say you don't know anything, because you don't; we're not telling you. It is better that way.

4. Remember that while you will not be associating with the money, you will of necessity perform tasks that sometimes require money. Ink and paper, for instance, are very expensive. This is why we like television, because the air is essentially valueless. Until we devise a newspaper made of something valueless (lawn cuttings? Canadian citizenships? Keep thinking), use of ink and paper should be kept to an absolute minimum. The Globe and Mail has a motto: "The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures." This has something to do with integrity of purpose. Your motto will have to do with not spending money on ink and paper. Here it is: "Just enough for the really important news, and a couple of columns." Everyone here likes it.

4a. Our editorial interference will have nothing to do with ideology and everything to do with the money. As it happens, we have learned that Conservative writers are highly verbose and write very long columns using lots of costly ink and paper (see item 4). From now on, therefore, we will use only Liberal columnists, who generally have less to say.

5. Convergence is all about getting the most bang for the money. The next time you come up with a really good story, look in the mirror. If you are not as good looking as Kevin Newman, give the story to him and he will read it. Your story, read on the air by a good-looking man, will have much more impact than if you wrote about it, and we will save on the ink and paper. Bonus.

Finally, Post people, let me (and my Dad) leave you with this. Just because I am a young and inexperienced CEO who some people consider bland and ineffectual, do not think that you can ignore these directives. If you average my age and personality with those of (my Dad), you get one super-cranky middle-aged guy. My advice: Do not mess with him.

Or his money.