Politico’s Shrinking Pains

Daily Caller ^ | June 22, 2012 | Vince Coglianese

[lbryce]

Politico’s got problems.

Huffington., The Huffington Post’s iPad-only magazine, is out with a new article today giving readers an inside look at the struggles of Politico — a Northern Virginia-based newspaper and website.

Here are the top 9 juiciest tidbits from the piece (because the tenth item would have been a little too inside baseball, kind of like Politico). If you want to read the whole thing, it’s 99 cents on the iPad.

1.) Politico’s “screw loose” reporters drink the Kool Aid

“Vandehei, who’s fond of saying that his most successful worker bees have a certain ‘screw loose,’ also embraced the idea that everybody at his politics-obsessed enterprise should just keep swallowing their Kool Aid. ‘We get flak for being a cult sometimes,’ Vandehei said, according to staffers present. ‘But you know what? We are a cult!’”

2.) Politico’s top editors, Jim Vandehei and John Harris, may not stick around much longer

The article regularly recites a rumor that Politico’s top newsmen might not stick it out until the 2016 election cycle.

“Having built a sizable and still-expanding newsroom of 225 editorial and business staffers, Politico has to size up new revenue streams and reshape the franchise in such a way that staffers speculate the company’s co-founders may not stick around a few years from now.”

[...]

Vandehei and Harris “may grow restless and depart if Politico Pro [a pricey subscription-based policy news service] — and a more trade-oriented news approach — come to dominate and define the enterprise.”

3.) Politico’s traffic is down from last year, and it’s an election year

In a trend first noted by The Daily Caller, Politico’s traffic has fallen behind its rivals in 2012, and has yet to even meet it’s 2011 high-water mark.

[lbryce]

FTA 5.) Politico staffers were not pleased Politico accused The New York Times and Washington Post of liberal bias/ On May 31, Politico argued in a report authored by Vandehei and Harris that The New York Times and The Washington Post were biased against Romney and in favor of Obama in their political coverage. “Some in the Politico newsroom weren’t happy with the piece. One staffer said it ‘went over extremely poorly’ with the rank-and-file and looked like top writers were simply ‘picking a fight unnecessarily’ with competitors.”

I remember several months ago many FReepers complaining about Politico's left-leaning coverage, talk of avoiding Politico altogether here at FR began to generate interest but it soon died down.Maybe it's time for the Moderators to take another look.

[2ndDivisionVet]

And here I thought Politico still ran their site out of Nancy Pelosi’s office.

[presently no screen name]

Maybe it's time for the Moderators to take another look

NO! You embrace their liberalism? Did you drink their kool aid or do you work for then?

also embraced the idea that everybody at his politics-obsessed enterprise should just keep swallowing their Kool Aid.

[lbryce]

Maybe it's time for the Moderators to take another look to ban the site from FR as they did a few months when FReeper anger began accumulating against Politico.

Do I have to spoon-feed posts for those with less than adequate IQ? That's actually a good idea. All of my posts will have a question posters must answer accurately or will spoon-feed my comments to avoid misunderstandings like the one in the previous post.

presently no screen name-Spoon feed question: Who's buried in Grant's Tomb? And not being able to come up with some simple screen name is also indicative of cognitive/comprehension problems. You might want to stick with Yahoo Answers to post stuff to.

[ChiMark]

Politico is still quoted by so -called conservatives on the talk show circuit.

Middle of the road pack loves Politico.

[Timber Rattler]

The GOP-E also uses Politico as a weapon of choice against Conservatives. Whenever a hack like Rove, Gillespie, or Rollins wants to launch an attack atgainst us, they run to Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei.

This was the most notable:

Next for GOP leaders: Stopping Sarah Palin

[presently no screen name]

Do I have to spoon-feed posts

No one is asking you to do ANYTHING! Get over yourself, dweb!