Rhetoric degree, yes; hard news, apparently a no-no

Have you read the prospectus for the next editor in chief of Thomson Reuters? It's a flabby portentous document, full of corporate-speak guff about innovative vision, etc and mentions repeatedly bean counting and "business and financial news". Where is the candidate's encounter with real news, the pulse stirring stuff that's been the lifeblood of Reuters? About general news, history's first draft, nothing. Not. A. Word. But a university degree in rhetoric, that will do. We are set to see another donkey leading the lions of Reuter journalists. And so it goes: the decline and fall of a great news agency. ■