"It looks like the Bush Administration is astroturfing, trying to artificially create the appearance of a grassroots movement supporting their policies," writes Jules Agee.

When they aren't helping clients cope with real disasters, PR professionals hone their skills by simulating fake ones and rehearsing their responses. PR Week recounts the advice of "four seasoned crisis experts" as they respond to a disease outbreak at a fictional seafood plant. Their advice:

Howard Kurtz reports that the New York Times has spiked a "My Job" column by Jeff Barge, a Manhattan public relations executive who described planting stories in major newspapers and blasted the PR industry as "a deceptive business" in which newspapers are fed "quotes that are just plain fabricated by the PR people." According to Times editor Judith Dobrzynski, Barge's piece was "too self-promotional." (The mention of Barge appears in the bottom half of Kurtz's column, under the subhead, "Unfit to Print.")