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THIS WEEK'S NEWS

1. Downtime
2. U.S.A. Youth Marketing
3. Flacks with PACs
4. The Return of Karen Ryan
5. Baghdad Confidential
6. Cable TV's Secret Channels of Influence
7. See No Evil Reporters, Hear No Evil Reports
8. Exporting U.S. Spin Down Under
9. Begging to Praise the War
10. Anti-Feminist Group Hired to Train Iraqi Women
11. PR Job in Iraq: Benefits Include Bodyguard
12. Bloggers Shape the Post-Debate Debate
13. Edelman Starts Blogging
14. Accidental Full Disclosure by the FCC
15. Planting Seeds of Acceptance for GMOs
16. Bottom Line Environmental Protection
17. Political Jihad and the American Blog
18. Whistleblowers on Trial: Does Not Refute
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1. DOWNTIME If you visited the PR Watch website or the Disinfopedia on Tuesday, you may have noticed some problems. The good news is that the problems stem from increased usage of our website, forcing us to upgrade to a higher-capacity server. We've now made the upgrade, and hopefully the problems will not recur.
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit: www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1097643603

2. U.S.A. YOUTH MARKETING
prweek.com/news/news_story.cfm?ID=224245&site=3 “The U.S. Department of State is taking another stab at putting private-sector marketing smarts to work for America and its image problem,” reports PR Week. Mike Holtzman, a partner at the Brown Lloyd James PR firm, was hired “to help plot a new course for U.S. public diplomacy.” Holtzman is expected to “move away from government-branded initiatives and toward youth-oriented cultural campaigns.” He's suggested “a center … [to] coordinate sporting events, cultural and educational exchange, technological and medical training, and other activities aimed at engaging ordinary people – particularly the young – in more dialogue and interaction.” It's seen as a major move away from Charlotte Beers' “Shared Values” ad campaign.
SOURCE: PR Week (sub. req'd.), October 11, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097467202
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3. FLACKS WITH PACS
prweek.com/news/news_story.cfm?ID=224404&site=3 Believing that “political contributions help with all sorts of clients, not just those for which the firm does public affairs work,” Qorvis Communications recently set up its own political action committee. Other PR firms with federal PACs include Burson-Marsteller, Hill & Knowlton and Fleishman-Hillard. The Center for Responsive Politics' database lists which candidates Burson-Marsteller (37% Democrats, 58% Republicans), Hill & Knowlton (48% Dems, 52% Reps) and Fleishman-Hillard (47% Dems, 53% Reps) have supported. Qorvis also contributes to candidates from both major parties; “that balance is important,” said their managing director.
SOURCE: PR Week (sub. req'd.), October 11, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097467201
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4. THE RETURN OF KAREN RYAN
www.boston.com/news/politics/advertising/articles/2004/10/11/bush_ad_appears_to_be_news_story/ The Education Department promoted the No Child Left Behind law with a video news release featuring “reporter” Karen Ryan. The VNR, which “comes across as a news story but fails to make clear the reporter involved was paid with taxpayer money,” is similar to the Health and Human Services Department's Medicare VNRs, which were found to be “propaganda in violation of federal law” by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office. The VNR and rankings for newspaper and reporter coverage of No Child Left Behind were part of a $700,000 contract with the Ketchum PR firm. The Education Department said it stopped using “narration-styled” VNRs after the Medicare ruling.
SOURCE: Associated Press, October 11, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097467200
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5. BAGHDAD CONFIDENTIAL
journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2004/10/08/e_fassihi.html “Can a journalist be too truthful?” That's a question that some media pundits are asking after Farnaz Fassihi, the Wall Street Journal's Middle East correspondent, sent a private email to friends with an unusually candid description of the deteriorating U.S. control over Iraq and the dangers of doing her job there. A copy of her email began circulating on the internet. “One could argue that Iraq is already lost beyond salvation,” she wrote. “For those of us on the ground it's hard to imagine what if any thing could† salvage it from its violent downward spiral. The genie of terrorism, chaos and mayhem has been unleashed onto this country as a result of American mistakes and it can't be put back into a bottle.” Shortly after the email became public, Los Angeles Times reporter Tim Rutten spoke with two Wall Street Journal reporters, who told him that the paper has responded by forbidding Fassihi to write about Iraq for the paper until after the election, “presumably because unauthorized publication of her private correspondence somehow called into question the fairness of her journalism” — even though other journalists in Iraq privately share her assessment. Journalism professor Jay Rosen has reviewed the subsequent pundit fuss and asks the obvious question: “Why can't reporters on the ground occasionally speak to the 'public' like this one occasionally spoke to her friends?”
SOURCE: PressThink, October 8, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097208003
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6. CABLE TV'S SECRET CHANNELS OF INFLUENCE
www.publicintegrity.org/telecom/report.aspx?aid=395&sid=200 If cable TV subscribers paid for just the channels they watch (”a la carte”), instead of paying a flat fee for channel packages, it would “jeopardize an economic model that has helped the industry maintain huge profits.” The Center for Public Integrity reports on “a highly sophisticated lobbying campaign” by the cable industry to build anti-a la carte “astroturf.” Some of the “seemingly disinterested third parties” opposing a la carte have received large donations and other benefits from cable companies. Time Warner lobbyist Leslie Harris worked “closely with Oxygen Media” to “organize over 30 prominent women's organizations”; civil rights groups and lawmakers have also taken anti-a la carte positions.
SOURCE: The Center for Public Integrity, October 8, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097208002
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7. SEE NO EVIL REPORTERS, HEAR NO EVIL REPORTS
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16131-2004Oct7.html Having “held the fewest solo news conferences of any president since records were kept” – 15 so far – may be hurting George Bush in the debates. Presidential rhetoric specialist Wayne Fields said, “If you don't talk to the press and deal with audiences with some degree of skepticism, you can't build understanding so people have confidence in you in hard times.” The “Ask President Bush” forums “are tightly managed by the Bush-Cheney campaign, with the president calling mainly on people sitting in sections filled with his most loyal supporters.” While Senator John Kerry's campaign events are “notably less scripted,” Kerry has also been criticized for ignoring the media.
SOURCE: Washington Post, October 8, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097208001
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8. EXPORTING U.S. SPIN DOWN UNDER
www.csmonitor.com/2004/1008/p06s01-woap.html Australia's October 9 national election might sound familiar to Americans — the two major party candidates are running neck and neck, Iraq is a major issue, and U.S. political consultants are shaping the campaigns. “Campaign operatives from across the spectrum of Australian politics head to Washington every year to learn how to manage budgets, articulate messages, and develop poll-driven communication strategies. Even Prime Minister John Howard, who is seeking reelection as head of the conservative Liberal Party, has sent his son to work on the Bush campaign in the hopes of picking up trade secrets. The two main parties here have also imported American consultants to advise on everything from developing public policy to fundraising.”
SOURCE: Christian Science Monitor, October 8, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097208000
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9. BEGGING TO PRAISE THE WAR
www.usni.org/proceedings/Articles04/PRO10lacey.htm Jim Lacey, a correspondent who has written for Time Magazine and the National Review, says he “had an agenda that correlated exactly with the military's” but still couldn't get the military to answer his journalistic queries, even though he was desperately trying to write pro-war puff pieces. “If given the right access, I told them, I probably could get the cover of a major newsweekly several times over the course of a couple of months. In addition, I had several national opinion magazines lined up that would publish all I could send them. I also was in conversations with producers of a network TV news magazine, and they were interested in doing a piece along the same positive lines.” But even so, “I still found virtually my every attempt to get information from public affairs officers (PAOs) to be akin to getting water from a stone. Many times I sat looking at the phone in disbelief at some answer or non-answer a PAO had given me. … Sometimes, I had to sit back and count off the reasons I should not just start writing mean little articles about the military.” He has some advice, though, for ways the military can improve things. For starters, “assign a captain/lieutenant to each of the major media organizations. I like to use the term 'reverse embed.'” Also, “The military would also do well to look into funding various media operations,” even though it might “give the appearance of a state-controlled media.”
SOURCE: Proceedings of the Naval Institute, October 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097182624
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10. ANTI-FEMINIST GROUP HIRED TO TRAIN IRAQI WOMEN
www.feminist.org/news/newsbyte/printnews.asp?id=8669 The Feminist Majority Foundation has objected to the U.S. Department of State's decision to award part of a $10 million grant to an anti-feminist group, the Independent Women's Forum for “leadership training, democracy education and coalition building assistance” to women in Iraq. The IWF, which was created initially to defend Clarence Thomas against charges of sexual harassment during his U.S. Supreme Court nomination hearings, says that its mission is to counter “the dangerous influence of radical feminism.î It will be working in Iraq with the American Islamic Conference and the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a think tank with neoconservative ties.
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097100880
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11. PR JOB IN IRAQ: BENEFITS INCLUDE BODYGUARD
career.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=2522 MarketingSherpa, a weblog for PR professionals, has posted a job announcement from the NettResults PR firm, which operates throughout the Middle East as well as in Africa, Asia and East Europe. The company is seeking someone to “serve as one of the three key contact for the Multi-National Corps – Iraq (MNC-I) media team promoting development and aid news/events in-country to the Iraqi population. … Ideal candidate speaks Arabic and has 8-10 yrs exper. in press office/media relations operations in a PR agency, for the government or armed forces. We offer: Full lodgings/offices, armored protection, life insurance.”
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097081395
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12. BLOGGERS SHAPE THE POST-DEBATE DEBATE
www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/markosmoulitsas/story/0,15139,1320053,00.html Markos Moulitsas of the Daily Kos weblog has written an insightful article about how bloggers helped turn the perception of first election debate in favor of John Kerry. “Bloggers, thinktanks, the Kerry campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) all worked to fact-check Bush and point out his bizarre behaviour,” he writes. “The flow of information flowed two ways, as the party establishment and allied organisations worked hand-in-hand with the blogs to gather ammunition, then blast it out to the world. The DNC and bloggers also urged readers and supporters to swamp online polls after the debate, and they did. Hours after the debate, just about every online poll gave Kerry huge victories in the debate.”
SOURCE: Guardian (UK), October 5, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097080352
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13. EDELMAN STARTS BLOGGING
www.edelman.com/speak_up/blog/ Richard Edelman, CEO of the Edelman PR firm, has started his own weblog. He hasn't had a lot to say yet, but stay tuned…
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097079858
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14. ACCIDENTAL FULL DISCLOSURE BY THE FCC
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9726-2004Oct5.html “A trade association that represents competitors of the large regional telephone companies” had their lobbying plan “published by mistake on the Federal Communications Commission's Web site.” The Association for Local Telecommunication Services's (ALTS) lobbying plan “starkly criticized the policy positions of FCC members and lawmakers and described the need for the association to hire, for $120,000 a year, a 'heavyweight Republican [lobbyist] that can navigate between the FCC chairman and the White House.'” The plan also said “ALTS has 'helped' with five fundraising events” for Congressional telecommunications policy committee members, but “needed to raise even more money for lawmakers.” ALTS's president, who authored the plan, resigned, saying, “I wish that I had been more vigilant, either being more precise or not writing anything at all.”
SOURCE: Washington Post, October 6, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097035201
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15. PLANTING SEEDS OF ACCEPTANCE FOR GMOS
www.iht.com/articles/542151.html “U.S. companies like Monsanto, which invested heavily in [genetically modified crops], suffered huge losses when Europe balked. As part of a public relations effort, the U.S. State Department enlisted a Vatican academy last month as a co-sponsor of a conference in Rome, 'Feeding a Hungry World: The Moral Imperative of Biotechnology.'” (This although a United Nations report found “clear evidence that the problems of the poor are being neglected” by the biotech industry.) “In response to such pressure, the European Union has relaxed legal restrictions on genetically modified foods.” A Syngenta spokesperson said European consumers' rejection of GMOs is “not based on facts” but “is a political, cultural and media-driven decision.”
SOURCE: International Herald Tribune, October 6, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1097035200
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16. BOTTOM LINE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/9831730.htm The controversial head of an obscure agency in the White House is a “lightening rod” for criticism of Bush administration regulatory actions. John D. Graham runs the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and is “known as a stickler for the bottom line,” the Seattle Times' Alex Fryer writes. “Through rigorous analysis, Graham wants to create 'smart' regulation that protects the environment at lower cost. But it is a process fraught with subjectivity. While it's relatively simple to document how environmental regulation hurts businesses, the value of pristine forests, clean lakes and species protection can't be expressed in dollars. As a result, the ratio between costs and benefits often appears skewed. And when it comes to actually writing regulation, OIRA has a record of adopting language proposed by industry lobbyists, not environmentalists.”
SOURCE: Seattle Times, October 4, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1096862405
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17. POLITICAL JIHAD AND THE AMERICAN BLOG
journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2004/10/04/satullo_view.html Journalism professor Jay Rosen has written another of his characteristically long-winded but thoughtful ruminations on the fallout from the Dan Rather memo affair and what it means for the long-running battle between conservatives and the “liberal media,” as well as for the more recent contest between traditional media and online bloggers. He particularly recommends (and annotates) a commentary by the Philadelphia Inquirer's Chris Satullo. (Warning: registration required.)
SOURCE: PressThink, October 4, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1096862404
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18. WHISTLEBLOWERS ON TRIAL: DOES NOT REFUTE
www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/politics/03whistle.html Dozens of cases – including that of the chief Medicare actuary, who was threatened with dismissal “if he provided data to Congress showing the cost of the new Medicare law” – have motivated Congress “to increase protections for federal employees who expose fraud, waste and wrongdoing.” But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which hears whistleblower cases, “often assumes that a federal agency acted properly unless an employee offers 'irrefragable proof to the contrary'.” New legislation (opposed by the Bush administration) would change the “irrefragable” – or impossible to refute – standard to “protect the disclosure of information that a whistleblower 'reasonably believes' to be evidence of government illegality or misconduct.”
SOURCE: New York Times, October 3, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at: www.prwatch.org/spin/October_2004.html#1096776000
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