bookofjoe MoneyMaker™ — Three ways to instantly improve the Wall Street Journal

Talk about the Bizarro World, me offering Mr. Rupert Moneybags counsel on how to make more, but let's cut to the chase, shall we?

I read today's paper and baby, as Gertrude Stein said of her hometown, Oakland, California: there's no there there.

Mighty thin gruel, that.

Without further ado, then, here's what needs to happen yesterday to perk up the moribund rag, specifically the Weekend Journal feature section.

1) Bag the entire second page. Who cares about what five films Kim Cattrall considers her favorite romantic comedies? If Murdoch wants to lower the average age of his readers from the geriatric park set, stuff like this has got to disappear. It certainly doesn't warrant nearly half a page.

The Art report about jitters in the art market, rehashing the week's auction news, is tired.

And Picks Online, offering links to the paper's own art blog, is irrelevant to the reader holding the dead tree version.

2) Power Tables, which occupies a full quarter page — above the fold, no less — is from the days of Hedda Hopper and Walter Winchell.

Does anyone but those namechecked in the feature really give a hoot about which tables in restaurants masters of the universe prefer?

Give us a break, already.

3) Masterpiece: Anatomy of Classic, in which someone deconstructs a fairy tale or some such foolishness, is so out of place on the back page of the section, where it takes up nearly half the page — once again above the fold — that I can't even begin to imagine what the section editor was thinking.

Boring.

That was easy.

Didn't hurt a bit.

You know your newspaper's in trouble when even a brain-dead anesthesiologist (top) who's breathed way too much waste gas in improperly scavenged ORs over the years can improve things.