The multi-million dollar Politico publication, funded by the GOP-leaning Allbritton Communications company, has successfully squashed another competitor via back door bullying. In effect, the publication, well-known for its lack of diversity and conservative leanings, has bullied a small Hispanic upstart publication into changing its name, or to face a mighty lawsuit.

“Not content with taking stories that Hispanic journalists have already published and passing them off as exclusive, and THEN sending e-mails to Hispanic journalists [who had already broken the stories]…it seems that The Politico now also claims they own the Spanish language…,” according to RedBloguera.net.

The blog notes that the “Politico has forced La Política, an online newsletter dedicated to Hispanic political topics, to change its name because with all their millions they apparently can’t handle the existence of an online magazine that covers topics they completely ignore… even if their name is in Spanish…”

Insiders familiar with the situation say that Jim Vandehei, a top editor at the publication, played a large role in bullying La Política into changing its name to Candidito USA — or face a million dollar legal fight. Sources say, too, that Vandehei’s wife, Autumn Hanna Vandehei, a former Tom Delay staffer, likely played a role in the dealings. In Washington circles, Hanna Vandehei is well-known for opposing diversity initiatives.

In 2000, Vandehei was forced by his former employer The Wall Street Journal to stop covering Delay’s office due to complaints that his relationship with Hanna Vandehei was creating conservative bias in his reporting.

Evidence of the new allegations are available in PDF form.

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The FCC banned the common ownership of a TV station and a newspaper in the same local market in 1975, but that hasn’t stopped Allbritton Communications from running both The Politico newspaper, along with local stations WJLA and NewsChannel 8. According to Broadcast Newsroom, “a top Allbritton executive” has “told FCC officials that the WJLA-Politico combination fell outside the rule because The Politico is a ’specialized’ newspaper ‘currently published three days per week’ while the FCC rule pertained to ‘newspapers of general circulation.’” Interesting argument, but will it hold water? Could the newspaper side of the publication soon cease? We’ll learn more at an FCC meeting on Dec. 18.

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The Politico’s gosssip gal Anne Schroeder, rumored to be the publication’s “reporter of the month,” blatantly copied three items that were published long ago on Big Head DC in her newspaper column today. One on Deborah Jeane Palfrey’s redesigned Web site, one on a sighting of Washingtonian Dave Chappelle and one on the Bobby Boswell affair!

Sheesh, if we had the millions upon millions of dollars gone in to supporting the Politico thus far, we’d be looking for our own scoops, Anne.

Oh, wait. We are looking for our own scoops (sans the millions). And you should, too.

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Wonkette likes to use that silly “gossip” moniker, but this morning they simply rehash a fun WaPo Reliable Source brief about the Allbritton family’s purchase of a swank gazillion dollar Georgetown mansion. Pathetic. Shouldn’t Wonkette be finding new gossip to report? Like Gawker does  in NYC?

Speaking of the Reliable Source column, Amy Argetsinger and Roxanne Roberts, its authors , appeared on Tucker Carlson’s MSNBC show on Friday (supplanting Carlson’s usual dirt-mongers Jeff Dufour and Patrick Gavin from the DC Examiner), and, boy did they look cute. Amy in a pretty pink blouse and Rox in a sleek black sweater.

Apparently, Amy had been super hyper mode all last week thanks to her reporting on director David Lynch’s recent visit to DC (ironically, to talk about his new meditation book). Rox had to tell Tucker that he was actually getting a much more “mellow version of Amy” than she’s been dealing with lately. Everybody’s jittery all of a sudden — we don’t get it! 

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