Former tobacco industry spokesman Thomas Lauria has been working for the Northern Alliance since mid-September when he became their media liaison. Lauria, with lobbyist Otilie English and Northern Alliance spokesman Haron Amin, worked to increase awareness of the Alliance, lobbied for American military support, and tried to "dampen" reports of Alliance human right's abuses. With Northern Alliance officials now occupying high posts in Afghanistan's interim government, Lauria has been picked as one of Afghanistan's Washington-based representatives.

Until recently, the U.S. government rarely included any emotional content in its press materials, knowing that public relations that pander to emotions are often dismissed as propaganda. But the State Department's newest venture, a Web-based pictorial documenting life in New York City three months after the attacks, is unabashedly sentimental.

Sahara Communications, a public relations firm hired to promote historically black Morgan State University, is under fire for telling students not to show up for a TV commercial with dreadlocks, head wraps, corn rows or braids.