VNRs are one of the most deceptive and widely-used PR tactics. Concerns have repeatedly been raised about the undisclosed use of VNRs, by the U.S. Congress and the Government Accountability Office, in the case of government-funded VNRs; and by the Federal Communications Commission, the Radio-Television News Directors Association, and tens of thousands of concerned citizens, with regard to all VNRs. Yet, there was very little publicly-available information about VNR usage by television stations. The Center for Media and Democracy has endeavored, with its two reports, to inform the ongoing VNR debate.
When television stations are granted free use of the public airwaves, they promise to serve the "public interest, convenience and necessity," as mandated by the Communications Act of 1934. They also promise to obey FCC regulations, which include sponsorship identification requirements. However, the status quo appears to be no disclosure, as the New York Times reported in March 2005, with regard to government-funded VNRs; and as CMD's two reports attest, with privately-funded VNRs.
As television remains the number one news source in the U.S., we think undisclosed VNRs are an important issue. Not only that, but we've repeatedly documented wrong, misleading, and highly biased PR being falsely presented as news, because of VNRs. In the case of prescription drugs, VNRs have resulted in "news" segments that are less balanced than ads put out to promote the same products could be, under FDA rules.
I assume you are referring to WDTN-2's [http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2006/11/16/ddn111706nathan.html apparent firing] of Howard Nathan, who presented [https://www.prwatch.org/fakenews2/vnr52 a VNR] tracked in our new report. Based on the information that has been made public, I would say that his firing was an extreme and unfortunate reaction on the part of the station. But CMD is not responsible for that reaction.
I cannot understand this quest to "expose" users of the VNR. What you are actually doing is causing fine journalists to be FIRED for an innocent mistake. Many of those targeted by your "report" did nothing more than pick something interesting off a feed and revoice it. How can this be helping news consumers? Do you people stop to think about the impact of your ridiculous inquisitions? How can you justify this? Don't we have bigger problems in this world than a 20-year-old producer trying to fill his show? I hope you can sleep at night knowing the pain you've caused to innocent people who are just trying to do a good job. Please turn your talents to something important, and please think about the impact of these nasty, smarmy "reports". Shame on you. You are creeps.
The method used is good for other questions, but in this case, it led to a very low count. There were cases where entire families were killed and no one left to report their deaths.
Thomas Love
>From: Tom Zimmerman
>To: Ed Cohen
>Subject: Re: Heads up
>Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 08:42:12 -0800 (PST)
>
>Ed, thanks for the alert. I'll be sure that everyone that needs to be is aware of this. Your diligence is very helpful.
> Tom
>
>Ed Cohen wrote:
> I met a plump woman in South Portland High School who drives a station wagon
>full of Vote No on 1 propaganda. She is middle age, I guess, and owns a
>501.c.3 provider contracting business. I do not remember her name, but she
>lives in Westbrook.
>
>In conversation, she told me that she is the producer of THE REAL STORY
>BEHIND TABOR, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities ( I have since noticed
>on Waterville School website that there is more than one DVD in circulation,
>but this is the one that I have, and I assumed it is the one to which she
>referred).
>
>It occurs to me that Center on Budget and Policy Priorities is a virtual
>address, and that this is actually as the Westbrook lady claims. The reason I
>bring it up is that in No on 1 presentations, the producer is said to be an
>independent think tank, to wit, CBPP. Personally, I believe her, and there
>is no doubt that the money to contract the video maker was ample.
>
>I don't think this is a minor issue, and I am sorry that I do not remember
>the name. It is late, and you have your work, but it would be useful to
>expose the lie for the VNR that it is.
I have been googling much too long and researching the making of "The Real Story Behind TABOR."
www.i2i.org has a detailed rebuttal, but it does not identify the source of production.
In reviewing the 13:33 DVD, there is no apparent credits to production from beginning to end.
The last frames give contact info for www.cbpp.org which has more pages than Carter has pills.
Nevertheless, I offer the following not entirely conclusive observations:
1. CBPP mission is nebulous at best. The phrase or notion that seems to pop up everywhere is "helping the least fortunate" or other such catch phrase.
2. CBPP has many hired guns with professional head-shots and curricula vitae in assorted 501.c.3 and government bureaus. They are listed by departments that can be lumped into client services or operations.
3. I cannot find any department specifically that produces video product, although they do seem to have ample staff who formulate mathematical projections based on any criteria to suit the client. Their charts, for the most part, seem to be formulated in house, although one cannot rule out the eventuality of shared and plagiarized data. In any event, these charts and graphs all appear to have one thing in common: They transform conjecture into play dough.
4. Another area of client service would appear to be cook-books for lobbying bills for 501.c.3 and government organizations that are mostly lower than state level. On cursory inspection, one easily recognizes government and contractor programs already in place, with details of how other organizations conducted drives to enact bills.
5. I need more time to determine the sources of funding. I presume that clients pay with fiscal revenues that are earmarked for "research" and "development", but I glanced a hyperlink for "donations". One could easily extrapolate from client services that lobbyist referral may be a nice piece of change whether for CBPP of affiliates thereof. I believe the French word for that is "a shmear."
6. I did not review the board or founding members, honorary members, emeritus members, etc. In such organizations, many such muck mucks are not terribly relevant and often underwrite programs for "vanity membership". The players may or may not be identified in the website, but they can be sleuthed with a little perseverance which requires time that we do not have.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ed's reasonable but not necessarily reliable conclusion:
"The Real Story Behind TABOR" could have been a CBPP client, but I do not believe CBPP is the producer, or even executive producer. Somebody correct my assumptions or amplify them if correct.
Kristi Hargrove, too old to be soccer mom, seems to dominate the audio portions of the play in head shots and narrative. I would look to Kristi as the keystone to the editor, who could lead to the producer, but not if employed by subcontractor.
I have searched for the Westbrook lady and only come up with
River Of Life
11 Bridge St
Westbrook, ME, 04092-2201
(207) 856-7729
I have enlisted the aid of "Center for Media and Democracy" to pin her down, and will spill the beans as soon as I know.
e
Thank you for a wonderful article! The media has done an excelent job in distorting this issue and spreading unecessary mass-confusion. While requiring a relatively thorough and careful analysis, Mr. Rampton shows that understanding of statistical estimation is not beyond the reach of a lay reader.
The convolution of "counts" vs. "estimates" has been beyond negligent. IBC makes no secret of the fact that their count is likely a vast undercount on their website, due to the under-reporting of casualties. The fact that the mainstream media neglected to add this qualification is bad enough, however, I see no excuse for the omission of what it is that is actually being counted! "Civilian casualties" vs. "excess deaths" alone should be expected to result in a much larger number, let alone the HUGE difference between a "count" and an "estimate". Also, given the mainstream media's LOVE of "experts", I found it interesting that most sources did not seek out expert opinions, perhaps due to the near unanimous support the study enjoyed.
The dismissal of this excelent John Hopkins study, not exactly a Micky Mouse institution, was infuriating to me. I subjected almost everyone I encountered in the following days to a lesson in elementary statistics, venting this frustration! Should the issue come up in the future, I definitely will point them to this article. Thanks again!
VNRs are one of the most deceptive and widely-used PR tactics. Concerns have repeatedly been raised about the undisclosed use of VNRs, by the U.S. Congress and the Government Accountability Office, in the case of government-funded VNRs; and by the Federal Communications Commission, the Radio-Television News Directors Association, and tens of thousands of concerned citizens, with regard to all VNRs. Yet, there was very little publicly-available information about VNR usage by television stations. The Center for Media and Democracy has endeavored, with its two reports, to inform the ongoing VNR debate.
When television stations are granted free use of the public airwaves, they promise to serve the "public interest, convenience and necessity," as mandated by the Communications Act of 1934. They also promise to obey FCC regulations, which include sponsorship identification requirements. However, the status quo appears to be no disclosure, as the New York Times reported in March 2005, with regard to government-funded VNRs; and as CMD's two reports attest, with privately-funded VNRs.
As television remains the number one news source in the U.S., we think undisclosed VNRs are an important issue. Not only that, but we've repeatedly documented wrong, misleading, and highly biased PR being falsely presented as news, because of VNRs. In the case of prescription drugs, VNRs have resulted in "news" segments that are less balanced than ads put out to promote the same products could be, under FDA rules.
I assume you are referring to WDTN-2's [http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2006/11/16/ddn111706nathan.html apparent firing] of Howard Nathan, who presented [https://www.prwatch.org/fakenews2/vnr52 a VNR] tracked in our new report. Based on the information that has been made public, I would say that his firing was an extreme and unfortunate reaction on the part of the station. But CMD is not responsible for that reaction.
I cannot understand this quest to "expose" users of the VNR. What you are actually doing is causing fine journalists to be FIRED for an innocent mistake. Many of those targeted by your "report" did nothing more than pick something interesting off a feed and revoice it. How can this be helping news consumers? Do you people stop to think about the impact of your ridiculous inquisitions? How can you justify this? Don't we have bigger problems in this world than a 20-year-old producer trying to fill his show? I hope you can sleep at night knowing the pain you've caused to innocent people who are just trying to do a good job. Please turn your talents to something important, and please think about the impact of these nasty, smarmy "reports". Shame on you. You are creeps.
>From: Tom Zimmerman
>To: Ed Cohen
>Subject: Re: Heads up
>Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 08:42:12 -0800 (PST)
>
>Ed, thanks for the alert. I'll be sure that everyone that needs to be is aware of this. Your diligence is very helpful.
> Tom
>
>Ed Cohen wrote:
> I met a plump woman in South Portland High School who drives a station wagon
>full of Vote No on 1 propaganda. She is middle age, I guess, and owns a
>501.c.3 provider contracting business. I do not remember her name, but she
>lives in Westbrook.
>
>In conversation, she told me that she is the producer of THE REAL STORY
>BEHIND TABOR, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities ( I have since noticed
>on Waterville School website that there is more than one DVD in circulation,
>but this is the one that I have, and I assumed it is the one to which she
>referred).
>
>It occurs to me that Center on Budget and Policy Priorities is a virtual
>address, and that this is actually as the Westbrook lady claims. The reason I
>bring it up is that in No on 1 presentations, the producer is said to be an
>independent think tank, to wit, CBPP. Personally, I believe her, and there
>is no doubt that the money to contract the video maker was ample.
>
>I don't think this is a minor issue, and I am sorry that I do not remember
>the name. It is late, and you have your work, but it would be useful to
>expose the lie for the VNR that it is.
I have been googling much too long and researching the making of "The Real Story Behind TABOR."
www.i2i.org has a detailed rebuttal, but it does not identify the source of production.
In reviewing the 13:33 DVD, there is no apparent credits to production from beginning to end.
The last frames give contact info for www.cbpp.org which has more pages than Carter has pills.
Nevertheless, I offer the following not entirely conclusive observations:
1. CBPP mission is nebulous at best. The phrase or notion that seems to pop up everywhere is "helping the least fortunate" or other such catch phrase.
2. CBPP has many hired guns with professional head-shots and curricula vitae in assorted 501.c.3 and government bureaus. They are listed by departments that can be lumped into client services or operations.
3. I cannot find any department specifically that produces video product, although they do seem to have ample staff who formulate mathematical projections based on any criteria to suit the client. Their charts, for the most part, seem to be formulated in house, although one cannot rule out the eventuality of shared and plagiarized data. In any event, these charts and graphs all appear to have one thing in common: They transform conjecture into play dough.
4. Another area of client service would appear to be cook-books for lobbying bills for 501.c.3 and government organizations that are mostly lower than state level. On cursory inspection, one easily recognizes government and contractor programs already in place, with details of how other organizations conducted drives to enact bills.
5. I need more time to determine the sources of funding. I presume that clients pay with fiscal revenues that are earmarked for "research" and "development", but I glanced a hyperlink for "donations". One could easily extrapolate from client services that lobbyist referral may be a nice piece of change whether for CBPP of affiliates thereof. I believe the French word for that is "a shmear."
6. I did not review the board or founding members, honorary members, emeritus members, etc. In such organizations, many such muck mucks are not terribly relevant and often underwrite programs for "vanity membership". The players may or may not be identified in the website, but they can be sleuthed with a little perseverance which requires time that we do not have.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ed's reasonable but not necessarily reliable conclusion:
"The Real Story Behind TABOR" could have been a CBPP client, but I do not believe CBPP is the producer, or even executive producer. Somebody correct my assumptions or amplify them if correct.
Kristi Hargrove, too old to be soccer mom, seems to dominate the audio portions of the play in head shots and narrative. I would look to Kristi as the keystone to the editor, who could lead to the producer, but not if employed by subcontractor.
I have searched for the Westbrook lady and only come up with
River Of Life
11 Bridge St
Westbrook, ME, 04092-2201
(207) 856-7729
I have enlisted the aid of "Center for Media and Democracy" to pin her down, and will spill the beans as soon as I know.
e
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