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The changes have been anything but conservative at Canada's unabashedly right-wing national daily. After months of speculation that CanWest Global Communications Corp. was set to fold its perennially money-losing National Post, the paper was granted a reprieve. Ken Whyte, editor-in-chief, and Martin Newland, his deputy--the duo behind the Post's cheeky mixture of agenda-driven news, pointed commentary and unapologetic fluff, have left to pursue unspecified "opportunities." Leonard Asper, CanWest chief executive, announced a three-year plan to make the paper profitable and appointed his older brother David to oversee the flagship. Matthew Fraser, a media commentator and journalism professor with no previous management experience, was named editor-in-chief. More and more Post reporters have been showing up on TV screens, and the content of the chain's daily papers across the country has become increasingly standardized--a trend that seems sure to intensify as the company struggles to get out from under a $3.6-billion debt load.

Discusses how the author's husband is starting up a national newspaper in Canada. The party he threw in celebration of the launch; How she believes every journalist dreams of starting a newspaper; Her criticism of the homogeneity of the Canadian media; How starting a newspaper can become a compulsion.