That’s what Ben Schwartz is hoping for, as he surveys the plummeting share price of the Tribune Company.

Not mentioned in the following Tribco coverage of its own demise, of course, is its cheating the American people out of nearly a billion dollars in taxes, inflating its newspapers’ circulation nationwide, and building the ugliest baboon statue in the city of Chicago (left), apparently in a bid to top the downtown Picasso (right). Anyway, even Tribco investors have had enough, calling today for a total break-up of the company. Hopefully this will set the Cubs free once and for all. Sez the Trib itself of its failed plot to monopolize American media :

Tribune had sought to build a stable of major newspapers — including the Times, Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun — to work in tandem with its television and Internet holdings. It also owns the Chicago Cubs baseball team.

Part of the strategy, the letter said, anticipated changes in U.S. Media regulations that would allow media companies to own multiple radio and TV stations, as well as print publications, in the same market. But an effort to relax those regulations has languished in a legal battle.