Reply #20: Who funds and runs the Politico?

[FrenchieCat]

Who funds and runs the Politico?
(Updated below - Update II - Update III - Update IV)

In the middle of an article by The Politico's Mike Allen regarding last night's GOP presidential debate, one finds this paragraph:

She was escorted out of the hall by Frederick J. Ryan Jr., chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Foundation, and president and CEO of The Politico.
So the President and CEO of The Politico, Frederick Ryan, is also the Board Chairman for the Reagan Library. And that makes sense, because Ryan is a long-time, hard-core Reaganite. From a November 1987 Press Release:
Appointment of Frederick J. Ryan, Jr., as Assistant to the President

So the President and CEO of The Politico worked in multiple positions in the Reagan White House, and was continuously promoted until he rose to the level of Assistant to the President. And his close connection to the Reagan family and the Reagan presidency continues through today.

Are we supposed to treat this fact as irrelevant or something when assessing what The Politico is and what type of political coverage it churns out? There is nothing wrong per se with hard-core political operatives running a news organization. Long-time Republican strategist Roger Ailes oversees Fox News, of course. But it seems rather self-evident that a news organization run by someone with such clear-cut political biases ought to have a hard time holding itself out as some sort of politically unbiased source of news.

The Politico's biggest boosters are Matt Drudge and George W. Bush, and it is run by a Reagan loyalist. At the very least, those facts are worth considering. Given that Editor-in-Chief John Harris has repeatedly vowed to be more "transparent" in how they conduct themselves, shouldn't we have some understanding of the role played by Ryan, and what his connection is to "Allbritton Communications," whose "deep pockets" are (partially? fully?) financing The Politico?

This is the first I've heard about what seems rather clearly to be the obviously significant relationship between Ryan and The Politico. Anyone with more information on these matters, please email me or leave such information in comments. The Politico is rapidly becoming one of the most prominent and influential national media organizations, and its odiousness has seemed for some time to be generated by more than just the standard dysfunction in our national press corps.

UPDATE: The Politico's primary (perhaps sole) funding source is the Allbritton Company, of which Frederick Ryan is an employee. The Allbritton family's leader, Joe, was CEO of Riggs Bank when Riggs pleaded guilty to a series of illegal financial transactions with right-wing Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and his brutal military that took place throughout the 1990s and into 2001.

Although Allbritton himself was never charged with knowledge of those illegal transactions, he maintained what appears to be a close personal and business relationship with the right-wing dictator (h/t Jonathan Schwarz):

When Joe L. Allbritton was chief executive of Riggs Bank, he received personal gifts from Augusto Pinochet and wanted the former Chilean dictator to visit the Allbritton horse farm in Virginia, according to drafts of letters from 1996 and 1997.

The drafts were found in the bank's investigation of the relationship between Allbritton and Pinochet, whose government murdered or tortured an estimated 3,000 political opponents over 17 years. . . .

The two draft letters and memos do not show that Allbritton was aware of any illegal actions by the bank or its officers, but they indicate that Allbritton had a personal relationship with Pinochet and knew details of his business dealings at Riggs, according to sources who have read the documents. . . .

Since July, Riggs's internal investigators have discovered that Pinochet's relationship to Riggs was both deeper and longer than previously known, according to sources familiar with their findings. Since the July Senate hearing, Riggs has found photographs of Allbritton and Pinochet together and internal correspondence and letters to Pinochet and senior Chilean military officials that indicate Allbritton was personally involved in courting the former dictator as a Riggs client. . . .

"I am also grateful for our thriving personal friendship which you have demonstrated through your gracious hospitality and stalwart support of the Riggs," Allbritton wrote in a draft dated November 1997, a year when Riggs was expanding its relationship with both Pinochet and the Chilean military. "I thank you for the marvelous gifts to both Barbie and myself, including the history books which I found fascinating."

"Barbie" is Allbritton's wife, Barbara, who was a director of Riggs Bank until early 2004,when she and her husband resigned as directors.

In the 1996 draft, Allbritton expressed his "profound thanks" for a reception Pinochet threw for Allbritton at a Chilean military academy where the men watched an equestrian demonstration by cadets. In his draft, Allbritton invited Pinochet and his wife, Lucia, to the Allbritton horse farm in Middleburg, Va. Allbritton also thanked Pinochet for "the superb cuff links you presented to me."

According to this account, it is Joseph Allbritton's 37-year-old son, Robert, who is financing The Politico. And the presence of his father obviously looms large:
http://j2k.naver.com/j2k.php/japanese/www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/05/04/politico_funding/index.html