Politics

"The Kerry campaign has enlisted congressional Democrats to play down expectations of the challenger's performance in the first presidential debate this Thursday, and then flood the airwaves with jubilant analysis that he has won it." Kerry campaign officials asked press secretaries of Democratic members of Congress "to schedule their bosses on television and

U.S. media "gives inordinate attention to fly-by-night groups with little evidence of real support. Why? Because these groups' sensational claims make for entertaining and easily produced news stories. The result is that a Swift Boats Veterans for Truth has greater impact on the national debate than long-established activist organizations," writes the Center for Media and Democracy's Diane Farsetta.

The presidential campaign trail offer lessons to the "public affairs community, the PR people paid to push the issues. But what they're watching isn't so much who wins, but how they do it," PR Week's Douglas Quenqua writes. "Nearly every technique for moving public opinion, every tactic employed by public affairs people to get an issue on the radar or to get legislation passed, traces its roots back to a political campaign - usually a presidential one.

The environment is "the sleeper issue of Australia's October 9 election," and Prime Minister John Howard, "once regarded as the nemesis of conservationists - [is] vigorously courting the green vote." Howard pledged Aus$2 billion for "the country's ailing river systems, prompting Labor leader Mark Latham to respond with a billion-dollar package of his own." At the same time, Howard's Deputy Prime Minister attacked the Green Party, saying