Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on
Former Enron CEO Ken Lay, "the poster boy for how big guys can rip off suckers in the stock market," is back in the news as his trial date nears. According to Frank Rich, "The enduring legacy of Enron can be summed up in one word: propaganda. Here was a corporate house of cards whose business few could explain and whose source of profits was an utter mystery - and yet it thrived, unquestioned, for years." How? "Enron 'was fixated on its public relations campaigns.' It churned out slick PR videos as if it were a Hollywood studio. It browbeat the press (until a young Fortune reporter, Bethany McLean, asked one question too many)." Rich also writes about Susan Molinari, who "is invariably described as 'a former Republican Congresswoman' or a CNBC political analyst'" on news shows. But her current jobs are "C.E.O. of the Washington Group, Ketchum's lobbying firm, and president of Ketchum Public Affairs" - the same Ketchum responsible for Armstrong Williams and video news releases narrated by faux reporter Karen Ryan.
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