Corporations

"[T]he Gray Panthers, a public interest group that defends the rights of senior citizens, took out full page ads in newspapers around the country calling on federal officials to stop awarding federal contracts to MCI WorldCom -- which committed one of the largest corporate frauds in history. ... At the bottom of the ads, in small type, is this: 'This ad was paid for by Gray Panthers.' In fact, the $200,000 spent by the Gray Panthers to place the newspaper ads was raised by Issue Dynamics Inc., a

"The nation's top broadcasters have met behind
closed doors with Federal Communications Commission officials more than
70 times to discuss a sweeping set of proposals to relax media ownership
rules," the Center for Public Integrity writes. "The private sessions
included dozens of meetings between broadcasters and the agency's five
commissioners and their top advisors. A June 2 vote is scheduled on the
controversial proposals, which critics fear will touch off a major new
round of media consolidation. In contrast, FCC officials held five

The leading PR trade association, the Public Relations Society of America, is calling on its 20,000 members to organize a "broad grassroots initiative to persuade the Federal Communications Commission to postpone its scheduled June 2 vote on the biennial review of regulations for broadcast ownership." The group, which represents government, corporate, institutional and individual public relations practitioners, says it advocates postponement of the FCC vote "until the Commission proactively encourages full public participation in an open, r

A new project by the Center for Public Integrity takes a close look at the telecommunications industry and its regulatory body, the Federal Communications Commission.