Mark Lacter has been following the afternoon's developments on Sam Zell preparing to seek bankruptcy protection as soon as this week, if he can't renegotiate the loans that allowed him to take over and hold on to Tribune. Links and observations at LA Biz Observed from the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Chicago Tribune.

Meanwhile: The L.A. Times website has put up just a Reuters story, referencing the WSJ.

Singleton owning the Times?: In the WSJ's Heard on the Street column, Martin Peers writes that it makes sense for Tribune to sell off its newspapers with the Los Angeles Times joining a merger of Dean Singleton's Media News Group with the Orange County Register, forming a Southern California news monolith. "Publishers need to accept that newspaper ad revenue -- print and online are down 15% in the first nine months, according to the Newspaper Association of America -- isn't going to bounce back fully from the recession," he writes.

More Lacter: Mark did a great job with Larry Mantle on KPCC Friday drawing together the disparate evidence that points to a severe economic crunch coming in Southern California. Audio