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[eccr] The Weekly Spin, Wednesday, May 26, 2004

Wed May 26 09:46:25 GMT 2004


>THE WEEKLY SPIN, Wednesday, May 26, 2004
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>The Weekly Spin features selected news summaries with links to
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>THIS WEEK'S NEWS
>
>1. "Banana Republicans"  Wage War at Home
>2. Brand Name: "War President"
>3. First, Do No Harm
>4. As the Coalition Crumbles
>5. The Depressed Press
>6. Beware the Big Box Bullies
>7. The Doors of Perception of Conflicts of Interest
>8. Economic Protection Agency
>9. It's a Small OneWorld, After All
>10. Celebrate (or Protest) Somewhere Else
>11. Department of the Fourth Estate
>12. The Decriminalization of Dissent
>13. Utterly Out of Favor
>14. Crude Warnings
>15. GAO Video "News" Rebuttal
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>1. "BANANA REPUBLICANS"  WAGE WAR AT HOME
>http://www.bananarepublicans.org/excerpt.html
>   "Notwithstanding their stated aversion to 'big government,' now
>   that they have become the government [right wing Republicans] have
>   not hesitated to expand its powers in precisely those areas that
>   are most threatening to individual freedoms ... . The likelihood
>   that those powers will be abused has increased, moreover, as the
>   conservative movement accuses its ideological adversaries of
>   'treason,' 'terrorism' and 'un-Americanism;' threatening
>   long-standing traditions of tolerance and diversity. ... In sum,
>   the direction in which forces in the GOP are moving looks - at
>   times absurdly, at times ominously - similar to the 'banana
>   republics' of Latin America: nations dominated by narrow corporate
>   elites, which use the pretext of national security to violate the
>   rights of their citizens." [This is an excerpt of our new book
>   Banana Republicans: How the Right Wing is Turning America into a
>   One-Party State, now in thousands of bookstores. Please buy a copy
>   and also help us to publicize the book by emailing this excerpt to
>   your family, friends and co-workers. All proceeds from Banana
>   Republicans support the research and education work of our
>   non-profit Center for Media and Democracy.]
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085544000
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085544000
>
>2. BRAND NAME: "WAR PRESIDENT"
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB108543803159820080,00.html?mod=politics%5Fprimary%5Fhs
>   How is Bush-Cheney '04 like a marketing campaign? "In 2000, Mr.
>   Bush shattered fund-raising records... by recruiting supporters to
>   join a program called the Pioneers, fund-raisers who pledged to
>   raise at least $100,000. This year, the campaign is broadening its
>   reach by going for both higher-end and lower-end targets, just as
>   marketers launch new products to capture different slices of the
>   market." These include "Rangers" (who raise $200,000), "Super
>   Rangers" ($300,000), and "Mavericks" ($50,000), younger donors
>   "heretofore dismissed as being insufficiently rich or politically
>   active." Since the Federal Election Commission decided not to
>   regulate groups separate from but aligned with political parties,
>   the GOP is establishing "527 groups" to counter liberal 527s like
>   MoveOn.org or The Media Fund, with the help of PR pro Craig
>   Shirley, original "Pioneer" James Francis, Jr., and direct mail
>   specialist Tom Synhorst.
>SOURCE: The Wall Street Journal, May 25, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085457601
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085457601
>
>3. FIRST, DO NO HARM
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB108542637575019786,00.html?mod=mm%5Fhs%5Fmarketing%5Fstrategy
>   "As food companies look for ways to cash in on the nation's
>   obsession with healthy eating, an increasing number are copying
>   marketing tactics that long have been used by the pharmaceuticals
>   industry: They are pitching their products directly to doctors. The
>   hope is that doctors will start recommending specific foods - and
>   even brand names - to patients," reports the Wall Street Journal.
>   Fruit juice makers, meat and seafood suppliers, and large companies
>   like Pepsi and General Mills are "pitching" MDs, with some even
>   "rewarding doctors for recommending their products." The Revival
>   Soy snack company "has sales representatives visit doctors' offices
>   to drop off samples ... [and] pamphlets encouraging doctors to
>   'pseudo-prescribe Revival.'" Patients aren't the only target
>   audience. "Physicians employed by food companies are presenting
>   information at medical conferences," the Journal reports.
>SOURCE: The Wall Street Journal, May 25, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085457600
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085457600
>
>4. AS THE COALITION CRUMBLES
>http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=524309
>   A leaked internal British Foreign Office memo warns: "Heavy-handed
>   U.S. military tactics in Fallujah and Najaf ... have fuelled both
>   Sunni and [Shia] opposition to the coalition and lost us much
>   public support outside Iraq." Moreover, "the scandal of the
>   treatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib has sapped the moral authority
>   of the coalition inside Iraq and internationally." News of the memo
>   comes as Members of Parliament are "calling on Tony Blair to
>   distance London from Washington" and just after Newsweek reported
>   on the "military friction" from the "'doctrinally' different
>   approaches" of British and U.S. forces in Iraq. One thing's clear:
>   "the UK will boycott the upcoming trial of Saddam [Hussein] if
>   there is any risk of the former dictator being put to death."
>SOURCE: The Independent (UK), May 24, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085371202
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085371202
>
>5. THE DEPRESSED PRESS
>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50403-2004May23.html
>   The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press' recent survey
>   of nearly 550 national and local media workers finds journalists
>   "unhappy with the way things are going in their profession these
>   days." The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz writes, "Two-thirds of
>   national media staffers, and 57 percent of the locals, believe that
>   profit pressures are seriously hurting news coverage. Nearly half
>   of national journalists say the press is too timid." In fact, 55
>   percent of national press felt that the media's treatment of George
>   Bush was not critical enough. In a perhaps-related finding,
>   "national news media ... express considerably less confidence in
>   the political judgment of the American public than they did five
>   years ago."
>SOURCE: Washington Post, May 24, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085371201
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085371201
>
>6. BEWARE THE BIG BOX BULLIES
>http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4127282,00.html
>   In its annual list of the most endangered U.S. historic places, the
>   National Trust for Historic Preservation included the entire state
>   of Vermont, "because of plans for several new Wal-Mart Supercenters
>   across the state." Trust president Richard Moe explained, "Vermont
>   is uniquely a state of small towns, and many of these downtowns
>   would be decimated," by plans to quadruple Wal-Mart's presence in
>   the state "to at least 1.3 million square feet in seven new
>   stores." Dismissing the Trust's characterization, Wal-Mart's
>   community affairs manager Mia Marsten said, "We are asking for and
>   getting local input" on the new stores. The Trust encourages
>   Vermonters to "persuade Wal-Mart and other large retailers to adapt
>   the way they do business so as to enhance existing communities."
>SOURCE: Guardian Unlimited (UK), May 24, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085371200
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085371200
>
>7. THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION OF CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
>http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%7E11676%7E2164693,00.html
>   The Denver Post reports that one "hallmark" of the Bush
>   administration is a rapidly spinning revolving door. There are
>   "more than 100 high-level officials ... who [now] govern industries
>   they once represented as lobbyists, lawyers or company advocates.
>   ... In at least 20 cases, those former industry advocates have
>   helped their agencies write, shape or push for policy shifts that
>   benefit their former industries." These include "a former
>   meat-industry lobbyist who helps decide how meat is labeled; a
>   former drug-company lobbyist who influences prescription-drug
>   policies; a former energy lobbyist who, while still accepting
>   payments for bringing clients into his old lobbying firm, helps
>   determine how much of the West those former clients can use for oil
>   and gas drilling."
>SOURCE: Denver Post, May 23, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085284800
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085284800
>
>8. ECONOMIC PROTECTION AGENCY
>http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-na-plywood21may21,1,7550783.story?coll=la-headlines-frontpage
>   "EPA decisions now have a consistent pattern: disregard for
>   inconvenient facts, a tilt toward industry, and a penchant for
>   secrecy," said longtime Environmental Protection Agency official
>   Eric Schaeffer, who quit the agency in protest in 2002. He was
>   responding to a new decision to exempt wood products plants from
>   controls on emissions of formaldehyde, a chemical linked to cancer
>   and leukemia. In making the decision, the EPA "relied on a risk
>   assessment generated by a chemical industry-funded think tank, and
>   a novel legal approach recommended by a timber industry lawyer. The
>   regulation was ushered through the agency by senior officials with
>   previous ties to the timber and chemical industries," reports the
>   Los Angeles Times.
>SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, May 21, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085112002
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085112002
>
>9. IT'S A SMALL ONEWORLD, AFTER ALL
>http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/state/20040521-0019-ca-sierraplan.html
>   The Department of Agriculture ruled that the U.S. Forest Service
>   did not violate federal law when it paid $90,000 to PR firm
>   OneWorld Communications to promote increased logging in
>   California's Sierra Nevada forests. The "Forests with a Future"
>   campaign claimed that today's forests have denser tree growth than
>   in the past, and that increased logging is needed to reduce
>   wildfire threats. The department's general counsel wrote, "The
>   Forest Service seems to be explaining and defending its policies
>   and responding to arguments against those activities - a legitimate
>   activity." Two members of Congress had questioned whether the PR
>   firm contract violated a federal ban on public funds going "to pay
>   a publicity expert."
>SOURCE: Associated Press, May 21, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085112001
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085112001
>
>10. CELEBRATE (OR PROTEST) SOMEWHERE ELSE
>http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2004/05/21/bostons_party_gets_a_new_spin/
>   The Boston Globe reports that the Democratic National Convention
>   Host Committee's message has changed over the past month, from
>   "Celebrate Boston" to "Let's Work Around It." "The desire to make
>   the convention a community celebration is rubbing up against
>   security precautions ordered for the first political convention
>   since the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks," the Globe writes.
>   Protest restrictions at both the Boston Democratic and New York
>   Republican conventions are raising concerns. An American Civil
>   Liberties Union senior staff counsel remarked, "It's a false
>   premise to say protest equals terrorists or a security risk." But
>   security - and the desire "to avoid the sort of image fallout
>   sustained from riots at Chicago's 1968 Democratic convention and
>   from the activist free-for-all at Seattle's 1999 World Trade
>   Organization meeting" - is driving the restrictions.
>SOURCE: The Boston Globe, May 21, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085112000
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085112000
>
>11. DEPARTMENT OF THE FOURTH ESTATE
>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42960-2004May20.html
>   Marcela Sanchez reports, "The Bush administration is stepping up
>   the pressure on [Venezuelan] President Hugo Chavez. State
>   Department officials say they are talking with U.S. editorial
>   writers, hoping to send a clear message to Chavez through the
>   press: let the recall referendum happen or face the consequences."
>   An anonymous senior State Department official told Washington Post
>   editors and reporters that Chavez supporters' challenges to the
>   presidential recall effort are "a consolidation of a dictatorship."
>   Sanchez writes that future U.S. action "will be shaped by ... the
>   anti-Castro focus of top policy makers and commercial and big
>   business interests. ... The demise of the referendum would
>   obviously be bad news for Venezuela. But any U.S. unilateral
>   intervention would be worse news."
>SOURCE: Washington Post, May 20, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085025604
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085025604
>
>12. THE DECRIMINALIZATION OF DISSENT
>http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/breaking_news/8709124.htm
>   In a rare "directed verdict" issued less than three days into the
>   trial, the environmental group Greenpeace was found not guilty of
>   the 19th century crime of "sailor mongering." A Miami federal judge
>   found that activists who boarded a ship six miles from the Port of
>   Miami-Dade did not break the 1872 law, which requires the ship be
>   "about to arrive." The ship was carrying some 70 tons of mahogany
>   from the Brazilian rain forest. One lawyer remarked that the case
>   brought against Greenpeace by the U.S. Department of Justice "must
>   be woefully inadequate." Greenpeace director John Passacantando
>   called the ruling "a victory for the American tradition of peaceful
>   protest" but warned the case "showed the extent to which the
>   government will go to criminalize free speech."
>SOURCE: Miami Herald, May 20, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085025603
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085025603
>
>13. UTTERLY OUT OF FAVOR
>http://counterpunch.org/chalabi05202004.html
>   "In dawn raids today, American troops surrounded Ahmed Chalabi's
>   headquarters and home in Baghdad, put a gun to his head, arrested
>   two of his aides, and seized documents," Andrew Cockburn writes.
>   "Only five months ago, Chalabi was a guest of honor sitting right
>   behind Laura Bush at the State of the Union. What brought about
>   this astonishing fall from grace of the man who helped provide the
>   faked intelligence that justified last year's war?" According to
>   Newsweek, "Bush administration officials say the latest
>   intelligence indicates [Chalabi] may have been supplying the
>   Iranians with information on U.S. security operations in Iraq that
>   could 'get people killed.'" Chalabi later said the U.S. must leave
>   Iraq: "Let my people go. ... It is time for the Iraqi people to run
>   their affairs."
>SOURCE: CounterPunch, May 20, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085025602
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085025602
>
>14. CRUDE WARNINGS
>http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/25186/story.htm
>   High gas prices are drawing politicians' attention. "Democratic
>   proposals range from a temporary halt in shipments to it to
>   releasing a portion of the crude" oil in the 660 million barrel
>   U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, for some price relief, Reuters
>   reports. But George Bush told reporters, "We're at war. We face a
>   tough and determined enemy on all fronts, and we must not put
>   ourselves in a worse position in this war. And playing politics
>   with the Strategic Petroleum Reserve would do just that." Instead,
>   he urged Congress to pass the stalled energy bill, which activists
>   call "corporate welfare in the guise of a national energy policy."
>   Last week, U.S. climate change negotiator Harlan Watson said that
>   the Bush administration's climate change policy was
>   misunderestimated: "We need to get our message out better."
>SOURCE: Reuters, May 20, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085025601
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085025601
>
>15. GAO VIDEO "NEWS" REBUTTAL
>http://thehill.com/news/052004/medicare.aspx
>   Congress' investigative arm, the General Accounting Office,
>   determined that video news releases (VNRs) touting the new Medicare
>   law, which ran as news reports on some 40 stations, violated a ban
>   on government funded "publicity and propaganda." The Hill notes,
>   "VNRs are standard practice in the public-relations industry and
>   local news reports often rely on them. ... However, the GAO said in
>   its decision, 'our analysis of the proper use of appropriated funds
>   is not based upon the norms in the public relations and media
>   industry.'" O'Dwyer's PR Daily writes, "Video PR pros said many
>   reports [of the Medicare VNR scandal] were off base or simply
>   ignorant as to how TV news is produced ... [or] somewhat
>   hypocritical, in that VNRs are simply video versions of written
>   press releases, which are widely used."
>SOURCE: The Hill, May 20, 2004
>More web links related to this story are available at:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/spin/May_2004.html#1085025600
>To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
>    http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1085025600
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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