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THIS WEEK’S NEWS
== BLOG POSTINGS ==
1. “Cash for Commentary” is Business as Usual
2. No Shame
== SPIN OF THE DAY ==
1. And The Winner Is…
2. Chemical Industry Targets Historians
3. Who May I Say Is Calling?
4. Look Less Idiotic, for $25,000 per Month
5. Shill to the Stars and Stripes
6. The Stop Government Propaganda Act
7. Could Pundits Not Receiving Government Funds Please Stand Up?
8. Not Very Diplomatic, Are We?
9. Media and Democracy, OhMy!
10. How to Win through Spin
11. Media MIA on Iraq Deaths
12. Better Red Force than Red
13. Fight for Your Right to Advertise to Kids
14. Secret Marriage Contracts
----------------------------------------------------------------------
== BLOG POSTINGS ==
1. “CASH FOR COMMENTARY” IS
BUSINESS AS USUAL
by Sheldon Rampton Conservative commentators Armstrong Williams, Maggie
Gallagher and Michael McManus have been outed recently for taking
money under the table to endorse Bush administration programs. These cases
are only the
tip of a much bigger iceberg, as you can tell from looking at
the images I’m attaching here. I wrote about it three years ago in a
story that described the work of conservative direct marketer Bruce Eberle,
whose Omega
List Company specializes in raising money using mail and e-mail.
On a section of the
website that has subsequently been removed, Omega List was quite straightforward
about the fact that it pays conservative
commentators to endorse clients and their causes.
A series of web pages featured conservative radio show host Blanquita
Cullum explaining exactly
how the system works and how other radio hosts could
get in on the gravy. “You
do what you do best!” she said. “Get on the air and talk to
your listeners! Drive them to your website by conducting a daily survey
or a contest on the topic of your choosing.” Eberle’s “polling
wizard” software, installed on the site, would then capture the
names of respondents so that they could be hit up for money. “What
happens next is a cakewalk,” Cullum continued. “Omega will
call you with an opportunity to send an endorsement
e-mail to your list . . . and receive a royalty for lending your name
to a cause, organization
or product you believe in. . . . Omega gives you
their specialized software absolutely FREE and presents you with an opportunity
to earn an extra
$25,000 or more annually.”
For the rest of this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3225
2. NO SHAME
by Sheldon Rampton Thanks to PR Watch forums contributor “El Gringo” for
calling our attention to a really atrocious example of dishonest propaganda.
The graphic at right is by Linda Eddy, an artist for the website, IowaPresidentialWatch.com.
Owned by Roger Hughes, chairman of the Republican Party in Hamilton County,
Iowa, the website spent the recent U.S. presidential election calling Democratic
candidate John Kerry a habitual liar and comparing him to Nazi propagandist
Joseph Goebbels – which is awfully ironic in light of its own promotion
of a big lie.
The image you see
here might lead you to believe that the child in the picture has been
made “glad” and secure thanks to the U.S.
troop presence in Iraq. As “El Gringo” discovered, however,
Lindy Eddy doctored the photograph. The original photo, taken by a journalist,
depicted a young girl who had just received bullet wounds during a firefight
in which her mother was killed and her father was wounded. Eddy doctored
the photo by erasing the little girl’s own face (which carries the
listless expression you would expect from an injured child) and replacing
it with someone else’s face to make her look positively radiant
and adoring.
For the rest of this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3220
== SPIN OF THE DAY ==
1. AND THE WINNER
IS…
www.ethicalcorp.com/content.asp?ContentID=3423 A
new global business ranking – the Global
100 Most Sustainable Corporations – was
launched at the recent meeting in Davos, Switzerland
of the corporate friendly World Economic Forum.
Topping the list of “Sustainable Corporations” were
Toyota, Alcoa and BP. The companies have distinguished
themselves through their “ability to profit
from recognising new environmental and social markets,” the
list’s organizers said. Meanwhile down
the slope from WEF, the Public Eye on Davos conference,
which meets every year to provide a critique of
the neoliberal globalization promoted by WEF, awarded
its prize for “most blatant case of corporate
irresponsibility” to Nestle. The Swiss food
and beverages company was criticized for
labor conflicts in Colombia and for its aggressive
marketing
methods for baby food, which jeopardize breastfeeding.
SOURCE: Ethical Corporation, February 1, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3240
2. CHEMICAL INDUSTRY TARGETS HISTORIANS
www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050207&s=wiener In
an unprecedented move, the U.S. chemical
industry is attempting to discredit two historians
who have
detailed the industry’s efforts to hide links
between their products and cancer. “Attorneys
for Dow, Monsanto, Goodrich, Goodyear, Union Carbide
and others have subpoenaed and deposed five academics
who recommended that the University of California
Press publish the book Deceit and Denial – The
Deadly Politics of Industrial Pollution, by Gerald
Markowitz and David Rosner. The companies have
also recruited their own historian to argue that
Markowitz and Rosner have engaged in unethical
conduct,” Jon Wiener writes in the Nation. “The
reasons for the companies’ actions are not
hard to find: They face potentially massive
liability claims on the order of the tobacco litigation
if
cancer is linked to vinyl chloride-based
consumer products such as hairspray. The stakes
are high
also for publishers of controversial books,
and for historians who write them, because when
authors
are charged with ethical violations and manuscript
readers are subpoenaed, that has a chilling
effect. The stakes are highest for the public,
because
this dispute centers on access to information
about cancer-causing chemicals in consumer products.”
SOURCE: The Nation, February 7, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3239
3. WHO MAY I SAY IS CALLING?
thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/012605/news.html “Automated
callers are phoning seniors in at least a dozen
Republican congressional districts across the country
telling them their representative favors ‘privatizing
Social Security,’” reports the Hill.
The calls are targeting “Republican members
with high concentrations of senior citizens … in
potentially close districts.” They warn of
a two trillion dollar cost to taxpayers and decreased
retiree benefits, saying Social Security “should
be in a lock box, not a Wall Street slot machine.” No
group has claimed responsibility for the
calls. The calls give a toll-free number for the
U.S.
Capitol switchboard used by the American
Federation of Teachers, but the group denied involvement
and
disconnected the number.
SOURCE: The Hill, January 27, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3238
4. LOOK LESS IDIOTIC, FOR $25,000 PER MONTH
adage.com/news.cms?newsId=42453 Declaring “a
new milestone for the commercialization of blogs,” AdAge.com
reports that Sony Consumer Electronics e-Solutions
Group is paying $25,000 a month to be the exclusive
sponsor of LifeHacker, a new weblog published by
Gawker Media “about the software of personal
gadgetry.” Gawker blog readers are considered “prime
influencers” or “connectors” on
technology issues. “What Sony is paying for
is reducing their odds that they look idiotic and
increasing their odds that they hit a home run,” explained
Blogads.com founder Henry Copeland. But “ads
can cheapen and compromise a blog,” warned
Carat Interactive’s media director John Cate.
SOURCE: AdAge.com, January 31, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3236
5. SHILL TO THE STARS AND STRIPES
news.independent.co.uk/media/story.jsp?story=606162 The
Independent profiles secretive PR executive
John Rendon, whose firm often works for the U.S.
government
and military. “In 2001 he won a contract
to handle the PR aspects of U.S. military strikes
in Afghanistan. … The following year the
Pentagon hired the Rendon Group to assist its own
propaganda agency, the Office of Strategic Information,
which was later publicly disbanded amid claims
it would engage in ‘black’ propaganda.
In June 2003 Rendon reportedly went to work for
the joint chiefs of staff, providing ‘strategic
communications counsel, media analysis and consultation
support services.’” His success with
the last task was “impressive,” notes
the paper, since “two-thirds of Americans
thought Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11
attacks.”
SOURCE: Independent, January 31, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3235
6. THE STOP GOVERNMENT PROPAGANDA ACT
www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000778976 “In
response to continued revelations of government-funded ‘journalism’ – ranging
from the purported video news releases put out
by the drug czar’s office and the Department
of Health and Human Services to the recently uncovered
payments to columnists Armstrong Williams and Maggie
Gallagher, who flacked administration programs – Sens.
Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Frank R. Lautenberg
(D-N.J.) will introduce a bill, The Stop Government
Propaganda Act, in the Senate next week,” reports
Brian Orloff.
SOURCE: Editor and Publisher, January 27, 2004
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3221
7. COULD PUNDITS NOT RECEIVING GOVERNMENT FUNDS PLEASE STAND UP?
www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/01/27/mcmanus/index_np.html “One
day after President Bush ordered his Cabinet secretaries
to stop hiring commentators to help promote administration
initiatives, and one day after the second high-profile
conservative pundit was found to be on the federal
payroll, a third embarrassing hire has emerged,” reports
Salon. “Michael McManus, a marriage advocate
whose syndicated column, ‘Ethics & Religion,’ appears
in 50 newspapers, was hired as a subcontractor
by the Department of Health and Human Services
to foster a Bush-approved marriage initiative.” Like
Maggie Gallagher, McManus “championed the
plan in his columns without disclosing to readers
he was being paid to help it succeed.” McManus
was paid $10,000 through the Lewin Group, a health
care consultancy, for trainings and presentations.
An HHS official said, “We live in a complicated
world and people wear many different hats. … The
line has become increasingly blurred between who’s
a member of the media and who is not.”
SOURCE: Salon, January 27, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3219
8. NOT VERY DIPLOMATIC, ARE WE?
www.odwyerpr.com/members/0126diplo.htm “There
is near universal agreement that public diplomacy
is broken and something must be done and done quickly
to fix it,” states a new report from the
Public Diplomacy Council. The Council suggests
establishing a U.S. Agency for Public Diplomacy
within the State Department, quadrupling the federal
public diplomacy budget to $4 billion, and increasing
overseas staff three-fold. Their report also “ridicules
recent initiatives such as the creation of Radio
Sawa to beam American pop songs to the Middle East.” While
young people are “the future decision makers,” the
report calls for “substantive news and feature
programming,” to Middle Eastern youth, elites
and current decision-makers.
SOURCE: O’Dwyer’s PR Daily (reg. req’d.),
January 26, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3218
9. MEDIA AND DEMOCRACY, OHMY!
english.ohmynews.com/ArticleView/article_view.asp?menu=A11100&no=208300&rel_no=1&back_url= At
a recent conference, the publisher of South
Korea’s
OhmyNews described “the collaboration between
Korean citizens and the online newspaper. … Eight
hours before the start of voting, another candidate
who had been supporting [reform candidate Roh Moo
Myun], withdrew from the campaign. The conservative
newspaper … was quick to call Korean voters
to follow this example and withdraw their support
for Roh.” However, “the online community
of Korean netizens who were backing Roh sprang
into action.” OhmyNews covered their actions,
becoming “the epicenter of reform-minded
citizens.” Instead of such dynamic coverage,
U.S. media “was filled with negative campaign
ads” in the months before the U.S. elections.
SOURCE: OhmyNews, January 26, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3217
10. HOW TO WIN THROUGH SPIN
www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-01-26-williams-usat_x.htm The
Bush administration “spent $250 million on
public relations contracts during its first term,
compared with $128 million spent for President
Clinton between 1997 and 2000,” including
$88 million in fiscal year 2004, according to a
report by the Democratic staff of the House Government
Reform Committee. “While not all public relations
spending is illegal or inappropriate, this rapid
rise in public relations contracts at a time of
growing budget deficits raises questions,” stated
the report. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid
Services spent the most on PR over the past
four years, $94 million, and the largest recipient
of
government PR contracts was Ketchum, at $97
million.
SOURCE: USA Today, January 26, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3216
11. MEDIA MIA ON IRAQ DEATHS
chronicle.com/temp/email.php?id=6g87s8d900q52bjppa5m3h7noo5ikert In
October 2004, “a study was published in The
Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal,
concluding that about 100,000 civilians had been
killed in Iraq since it was invaded” in March
2003. “Public-health professionals have uniformly
praised the paper for its correct methods and notable
results,” but “many American newspapers
and television news programs ignored the study
or buried reports about it far from the top headlines.” The
timing of the paper’s publication, days before
the U.S. election, “opened the study to charges
of political propaganda.” The study’s
lead author “blames the American news media
for being embedded not only with the military but
also with the military point of view,” but
also faults himself for not managing the
media better.
SOURCE: The Chronicle of Higher Education, January 27, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3215
12. BETTER RED FORCE THAN RED
online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB110659463047134233,00.html China’s
Communist Youth League has a new partner: the New
York advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide.
In an “unlikely marketing joint venture” called
Red Force, “programs organized by the 70
million-member league are coaching young people
in today’s paramount ideology: capitalism. … At
a Beijing session last month, Ogilvy staff taught
the entire two-day seminar, beginning with a lecture
on communication and personality style, as well
as an overview of mantras of Ogilvy corporate culture: ‘Deliver
your brand to the last mile,’ repeated Ogilvy
executive Jeffrey Wu.” Hong Kong Disneyland
hired Red Force “to hold six storytelling
sessions with children in southern China,” in
preparation for China’s first theme park.
SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, January 25, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3214
13. FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT TO ADVERTISE TO KIDS
online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB110670405534136181,00.html?mod=home_whats_news_us The “top
three advertisers of packaged-foods to children,” General
Mills, Kellogg and Kraft Foods, along with the
Grocery Manufacturers of America and several advertising
associations, “have created a lobbying group
to defend the right to advertise to kids.” The
new group, the Alliance for American Advertising,
states, “There is not a correlation between
advertising trends and recent childhood obesity
trends.” The Alliance hopes to avoid federal
regulation, using tactics that echo “earlier
efforts by the tobacco and alcohol industries.” In
other food news, a “U.S. appeals court ruled
that McDonald’s must face a suit by New York
teenagers” who blame the fast food giant
for their obesity and health problems.
SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, January 26, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3213
14. SECRET MARRIAGE CONTRACTS
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36545-2005Jan25.html Syndicated
columnist and Institute for Marriage and
Public Policy president Maggie Gallagher received
$41,500
from the Bush administration in 2002 and
2003, to promote Bush’s $300 million initiative
encouraging poor couples to marry. Although Gallagher
repeatedly praised the initiative in her columns
and during interviews and television appearances,
she never mentioned receiving government funds.
After being questioned by the Washington Post,
Gallagher filed a column saying she “had
no special obligation to disclose this information” but
would have done so anyway, “if I had remembered.” One
contract with the Department of Health and Human
Services was for conducting briefings, writing
brochures and ghostwriting articles for officials.
Another with the Justice Department was for writing
a report titled “Can Government Strengthen
Marriage?” President Bush reacted by ordering
his Cabinet secretaries not to hire commentators,
saying, “Our agenda ought to be able to stand
on its own two feet.”
SOURCE: Washington Post, January 26, 2005
For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
www.prwatch.org/node/3212
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