When a political scandal explodes in France, there's a good chance it's Wednesday. That's the day satirical newspaper Le Canard Enchainé hits newsstands, reports NPR.
The fiercely independent weekly, known for its incisive and derisive reporting and more than its share of scoops and bombshells, turns 100 this year.
Despite the economic downturn, changing media landscape and a print press crisis, Le Canard Enchainé continues to do well. Remarkably, it takes no advertising and has only a bare-bones webpage that often just summarizes what's on the print front page. Yet it turns a profit on the 400,000 copies it sells each week.
"My first reaction when I see something scandalous is to be indignant. My second is to laugh. That's more difficult, but it's more effective," said Maurice Marechal, who founded the paper in 1916, the bloodiest year of World War I.
The weekly was founded to push back against two imposing forces in France at the time: the military and the church, says media consultant Jean-Marc Illouz.
"The military was running the war and the clerical world was ruling consciences," he says.
Erik Emptaz, a current editor at the paper, says that during the war, "the official propaganda was that German bullets would pass right through your skin and wouldn't even hurt you."
Emptaz says the staff recently found a letter from a soldier writing from the trenches. At that time, Le Canard Enchainé was censored and white spots blanked out the forbidden news.
"This soldier said there was more to read in the blank spaces of Le Canard Enchainé than in a whole page of Le Matin, which was the official newspaper at the time," says Emptaz, laughing.
Emptaz attributes his paper's long, steady success to two things: its independence and its humor.