Media

The PR Firm for "Evil"

Submitted by Bob Burton on

After it was revealed that the floundering American International Group (AIG) had hired Burson Marsteller (B-M) as one of its PR advisers, Rachel Maddow, the host of “The Rachel Maddow Show” on MSNBC, wondered who else the firm had worked for. After a scathing review of their past clients -- including the Argentinean military dictatorship, Philip Morris, and Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu -- Maddow concluded that "when evil needs public relations, evil has Burson-Marsteller on speed dial.” In response, B-M CEO Mark Penn wrote an internal email to staff claiming that Maddow "significantly mischaracterized the nature of the firm's past." In the email, which was leaked to PR Week, Penn wrote that "we are and should be proud of the work we do. ... While we can't spend our time responding to every attack that comes our way over the internet or cable television, I do think it is important that I reach out to each of you to let you know that we have a good story to tell about the work we do."

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Main Source: 
PR Week, March 7, 2009
Topics: 
Crisis Management
Ethics
Media

Congresspedia Has a New Home at OpenCongress

Congresspedia, the CMD citizen journalism project that has thrived inside SourceWatch since 2006, is no longer. Its funder the Sunlight Foundation decided to merge Congresspedia into their OpenCongress project. Much of Congresspedia's content will remain in some form inside SourceWatch but CMD's staff of editors will no longer be regularly updating the articles. CMD is proud to have created what quickly became the best and most extensive 'wiki' website on the US Congress. Our development of Congresspedia led directly to the creation of our growing number of other SourceWatch portals on issues including the tobacco industry, the coal industry, climate change, front groups, global corporations, and the nuclear power industry. We wish the website formerly known as Congresspedia well in its new incarnation at OpenCongress.

Mixing Advocacy, Scholarly Research and Journalism: Can the New America Foundation Square the Circle?

In the spring semester of 2008, I was a fellow researching a paper on think tank ethics ("The Perils of Non-Profit Journalism") at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government's Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy. I was thus pleased when the New America Foundation's President, Steve Coll, spoke at the Shorenstein Center on March 11, 2008, and expressed his commitment to high ethical standards for journalists, researchers and other think tank staff.

New America Foundation logoThe New America Foundation is a Washington, DC based think tank that has pioneered the introduction of journalism to the traditional think tank mix of advocacy and research. A two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, Steve Coll is the former Managing Editor of the Washington Post and spent 20 years at the Post as a reporter and editor. Currently, in addition to serving as New America's President, Mr. Coll writes a column for The New Yorker magazine. Launched in 1999, the New America Foundation currently employs more than 100 individuals and has an annual budget of over $10 million. Its Chairman of the Board is Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google, Inc.

Kids Who Watch R-Rated Movies More Likely to Smoke

Submitted by Anne Landman on

A four-year study of more than 1,200 youngsters performed by the University of Massachusetts Medical School found that children whose parents let them watch R-rated movies are more likely to smoke. Participants were in sixth grade when they started the study, and researchers interviewed them a total of eleven times over the course of the study. They were asked questions about the availability of cigarettes in their home, whether smoking was allowed in their home and whether their parents let them watch R-rated movies and videos.

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Main Source: 
U.S. News and World Report, February 23, 2009
Topics: 
Children
Media
Tobacco

Journalism "Saved My Life"

Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on

Aaron Glantz, the author of books about Iraq including The War Comes Home: Washington's Battle against America's Veterans, has written a powerful and emotional account of his encounter with a veteran who told him that his reporting "saved my life." Glantz has written about James Eggemeyer, an Iraq war veteran whose war injuries left him disabled and homeless while the Veterans Administration dithered on his disability

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Main Source: 
Huffington Post, February 18, 2009
Topics: 
Iraq
Journalism

Take This Job and Love It

Sixteen years after founding the Center for Media and Democracy and our publication PR Watch, I'm moving on this June to new challenges. The search for my replacement began last week, and we hope that by summer CMD will have a new executive director. I believe that CMD needs a high-energy executive director especially skilled at taking us to our next level of success. At age 56 I want a less demanding life with more personal time.

PR Firms Pay for Video Play Online

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

Fake news isn't just for TV newscasts anymore. "The Web's evolving ability to tap niche audiences is expanding the scope of guaranteed placement," or paying to place PR videos. "For our Web distribution, we guarantee placement on major news sites, including Google News [and] MSN," explained PR executive Doug Simon.

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Main Source: 
PR Week, February 9, 2009
Topics: 
Internet
Fake TV News
Public Relations

Lingering Denial

Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on

The "majority of American journalists covering climate change, energy, and environment understand that human industry is primarily responsible for global warming," writes Curtis Brainard. Unfortunately, "a small minority of pundits -- most of whom are talking heads and columnists, rather than hard news reporters" is "still trying to deny the well-established basics of climate science.

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Main Source: 
Columbia Journalism Review, February 18, 2008
Topics: 
Climate Change
Pundits

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