[ecrea] The Weekly Spin, September 13, 2006

>THE WEEKLY SPIN, September 13, 2006
>
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>THIS WEEK'S NEWS
>
>== BLOG POSTINGS ==
>1. What Media Democracy Looks Like: Testifying in Milwaukee
>2. A View of 9/11 from North of the Border
>3. "The Best War Ever"  -- Watch the Web Movie, Read the Book, Learn 
>the Truth About Iraq
>4. Latest Update: Exposing Earmarks
>5. Update: Congress vs. the President
>
>== SPIN OF THE DAY ==
>1. The Year of Lobbying Dangerously
>2. How 9-11 Changed the News
>3. Corporate Spin Can Come in Disguise
>4. More Journalists On U.S. Government Payroll
>5. Wal-Mart Sends in the Tanks
>6. Profs Smell Smoke in Food Marketing to Kids
>7. Breathless Audacity
>8. Open Letter to ABC
>9.  Pharma PR Tries to Spin Gold From Yawn
>10. Sept 7 in Milwaukee: Future of Media FCC Hearing
>
>== UPCOMING EVENTS ==
>1. SEATTLE - The Best War Ever
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>== BLOG POSTINGS ==
>
>1. WHAT MEDIA DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE: TESTIFYING IN MILWAUKEE
>by Diane Farsetta
>
>   "Media democracy" is a term that everyone defines a little
>   differently.  Is it quality reporting that not only informs about
>   local, national and international issues, but also facilitates
>   citizen involvement? Is it having the diversity of our communities
>   represented among media owners? Is it giving local programmers
>   access to the airwaves? Is it holding broadcasters to the terms of
>   their freely-granted licenses? Is it ensuring a variety of news and
>   cultural media offerings?
>        One thing's for sure -- what happened last Thursday in
>   Milwaukee was media democracy in action. More than 300 people
>   attended the Town Meeting on the Future of the Media, which was
>   organized by the media reform group Free Press and co-sponsored by
>   the Center for Media and Democracy. The event gave attendees the
>   opportunity to tell Federal Communications Commission members
>   Jonathan Adelstein and Michael Copps how well the media are serving
>   their communities.
>For the rest of this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5168
>
>2. A VIEW OF 9/11 FROM NORTH OF THE BORDER
>by Judith Siers-Poisson
>
>   I happened to be in Vancouver Sunday evening and all day Monday, so
>   spent 9/11 north of the border. While people in the U.S. and other
>   parts of the world only had The Path to 9/11 docudrama as a
>   television viewing choice, I was fortunate to be able to watch two
>   excellent documentary films about 9/11 and its aftermath aired by
>   the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC). I also enjoyed the unique
>   perspective of watching them in the home of Amy and Gregor
>   Robertson, a member of the Britsh Columbia Legislative Assembly.
>   Journalist Linda Solomon, who was living 15 blocks from the World
>   Trade Center on 9/11, was also there. You can read her article about
>   how 9/11 affected her here.
>For the rest of this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5169
>
>3. "THE BEST WAR EVER"  -- WATCH THE WEB MOVIE, READ THE BOOK, LEARN 
>THE TRUTH ABOUT IRAQ
>by John Stauber
>
>   The Best War Ever: Lies, Damned Lies and the Mess in Iraq is the new
>   Sheldon Rampton / John Stauber book on sale everywhere September 14.
>   You can preorder it and view a powerful web movie based on the book
>   at www.TheBestWarEver.com. The book explains how the propaganda that
>   misled America into war is leading to defeat. The Best War Ever is a
>   follow-up to Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in
>   Bush's War on Iraq, published in July 2003. That was the first book
>   to expose the deceptions that sold the war. Although Weapons of Mass
>   Deception was a New York Times bestseller, the same mainstream media
>   who behaved like a government propaganda arm to cheerlead America
>   into war largely ignored it. To bypass such censorship, this time
>   the authors asked filmmaker Matt Thompson to produce a web movie
>   based on the new book. It's viewable at www.TheBestWarEver.com.
>   Check it out. You can watch the short film, order the new book, and
>   even sign the Voters For Peace Pledge to only support politicians
>   who make peace their priority.
>For the rest of this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5164
>
>4. LATEST UPDATE: EXPOSING EARMARKS
>by Elliott Fullmer
>
>   The politics of ?secret holds? continues in the Senate.
>        After deciding to drop his original hold on the
>   Coburn-Obama-McCain-Carper earmark reform bill, Sen. Ted Stevens
>   (R-Alaska) first reinstated it, and has now dropped it yet again.
>For the rest of this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5159
>
>5. UPDATE: CONGRESS VS. THE PRESIDENT
>by Conor Kenny
>
>   A few weeks ago, we first posted on the subject of presidential
>   signing statements. At that time, we issued a challenge to all the
>   citizen journalists out there to help us pin down the positions of
>   the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Sen. Arlen
>   Specter?s (R-Pa.) Presidential Signing Statements Act, where the
>   bill currently resides. The bill would grant Congress the right to
>   file suit in order to determine the constitutionality of signing
>   statements.
>        With your help, and some research of our own, we've been able
>   to pin down the positions of half the members of the committee (nine
>   of eighteen). Special thanks to one of Sen. Mike DeWine's Ohio
>   constituents, who sent in an email he got from the senator on the
>   subject. We've put calls into the offices of the other nine, but for
>   whatever reason they are unwilling or unable to come out publicly on
>   the bill. The current count: five in support, two opposed, and two
>   officially uncommitted. For the full breakdown, see the handy chart
>   on our presidential signing statements page.
>For the rest of this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5156
>
>== SPIN OF THE DAY ==
>
>1. THE YEAR OF LOBBYING DANGEROUSLY
>http://www.publicintegrity.org/icij/default.aspx?aid=519
>   "Indonesia's national intelligence agency used a former Indonesian
>   president's charitable foundation to hire a Washington lobbying firm
>   ... to press the U.S. government for a full resumption of
>   controversial military training programs," reports the Center for
>   Public Integrity's International Consortium of Investigative
>   Journalists. The firm, Collins & Co., was retained by the Gus Dur
>   Foundation in May 2005, for $30,000 a month, to "remove legislative
>   and policy restrictions on security cooperation with Indonesia."
>   From June to October 2005, "Collins & Co. lobbyists, sometimes
>   accompanied by [Indonesian intelligence] officials, met with several
>   key members of Congress and their staffs," including Senators Leahy,
>   Hagel and Murkowski, an aide to Senator Obama, and Representative
>   Jesse Jackson Jr. In late 2005, the State Department "fully
>   reinstated military cooperation and aid to Indonesia." The Gus Dur
>   Foundation's mission is to build orphanages, libraries and schools.
>   The man who signed the lobbying contract on the foundation's behalf
>   said former Indonesian president Wahid "didn't know" about it.
>SOURCE: International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, 
>September 7, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5166
>
>2. HOW 9-11 CHANGED THE NEWS
>http://www.journalism.org/node/1839
>   "How did 9-11 change the news?" asks the Project for Excellence in
>   Journalism (PEJ). To answer the question, ADT Research's Tyndall
>   Report analyzed network evening news shows, comparing "the four
>   years of network newscasts prior to 2001" with "the four years
>   since." The study reveals "increased coverage of foreign policy and
>   global conflict ... but less coverage of domestic issues." PEJ
>   writes, "A rise in foreign coverage may not surprise anyone. U.S.
>   troops are currently fighting and dying in Iraq and Afghanistan. The
>   issue of global terrorism is the new question of our times." Yet,
>   "the balance between reporting-driven 'hard news' and softer
>   features, interviews and commentaries remained virtually unchanged
>   after 9-11." The topics with the steepest decline in U.S. network
>   news coverage since 9-11 are drugs, alcohol and tobacco; space,
>   science and technology; and crime, penal policy and law enforcement.
>SOURCE: Project for Excellence in Journalism (U.S.), September 11, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5165
>
>3. CORPORATE SPIN CAN COME IN DISGUISE
>http://www.sptimes.com/2006/09/10/news_pf/Worldandnation/Corporate_spin_can_co.shtml
>   "If McDonald's makes the case that fast food is nutritious or
>   ExxonMobil argues against higher taxes, it looks like simple
>   self-interest. But when an independent voice makes the case, the
>   ideas gain credibility. So big corporations have devised a form of
>   idea laundering, paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to
>   seemingly independent groups that act as spokesmen under disguise.
>   Their views wind up on the opinion pages of the nation's newspapers
>   - often with no disclosure that the writer has financial ties to the
>   companies involved. A few examples: James K. Glassman, a prominent
>   syndicated columnist, denounced Super Size Me, a movie critical of
>   McDonald's. Readers were not told that McDonald's is a major sponsor
>   of a Web site hosted by Glassman. ... Steven Milloy, an analyst at
>   the Competitive Enterprise Institute, wrote a column in the
>   Washington Times that sided with the oil industry against windfall
>   profits taxes. Readers weren't told that groups closely affiliated
>   with Milloy have received at least $180,000 from ExxonMobil. By
>   having others deliver their talking points, the companies stay above
>   the fray, said John Stauber, whose Center for Media and Democracy
>   tracks corporate front groups. 'What these companies are doing is
>   paying somebody else to attack their critics while keeping their
>   fingerprints off the attack.'"
>SOURCE: St. Petersburg Times (Florida), September 10, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5163
>
>4. MORE JOURNALISTS ON U.S. GOVERNMENT PAYROLL
>http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/15466239.htm
>   Ten Miami journalists have been paid by the Office of Cuba
>   Broadcasting (OCB) for their involvement in programs for the
>   anti-Castro propaganda stations, Radio Mart? and TV Mart?. The OCB
>   is a unit of the the U.S. government-funded Broadcasting Board of
>   Governors. Three of the ten were journalists with El Nuevo Herald.
>   "Pablo Alfonso, who reports on Cuba and writes an opinion column,
>   was paid almost $175,000 since 2001 to host shows on Radio Mart?
>   and TV Mart?. El Nuevo Herald freelance reporter Olga Connor, who
>   writes about Cuban culture, received about $71,000, and staff
>   reporter Wilfredo Cancio Isla, who covers the Cuban exile community
>   and politics, was paid almost $15,000 in the last five years," Oscar
>   Corral wrote. Alfonso and Isla have been fired by El Nuevo Herald
>   and Connor's freelance relationship terminated. The director of OCB,
>   Pedro Roig, defended the payments.
>SOURCE: Miami Herald, September 8, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5162
>
>5. WAL-MART SENDS IN THE TANKS
>http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/08/business/08walmart.html
>   "As Wal-Mart Stores struggles to rebut criticism from unions and
>   Democratic leaders, the company has discovered a reliable ally,"
>   report Michael Barbaro and Stephanie Strom: "prominent conservative
>   research groups like the American Enterprise Institute, the Heritage
>   Foundation and the Manhattan Institute," as well as lesser-known
>   think tanks such as the Pacific Research Institute. "Top policy
>   analysts at these groups have written newspaper opinion pieces
>   around the country supporting Wal-Mart, defended the company in
>   interviews with reporters and testified on its behalf before
>   government committees in Washington." What the think tanks haven't
>   done is disclose the more than $2.5 million in funding they've
>   received from Wal-Mart over the past six years. The National
>   Committee on Responsive Philanthropy has compiled a report detailing
>   the political objectives of Wal-Mart's charitable activities, titled
>   "The Waltons and Wal-Mart: Self-Interested Philanthropy."
>SOURCE: New York Times, September 8, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5161
>
>6. PROFS SMELL SMOKE IN FOOD MARKETING TO KIDS
>http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/ads-for-junk-food-likened-to-pushing-cigarettes/2006/09/05/1157222132672.html
>   Governments should learn a lesson from tobacco marketeers and
>   restrict junk food advertising aimed at children, says a prominent
>   obesity specialist. Boyd Swinburn, professor of population health at
>   Deakin University in Australia, was one of several members of a
>   global task force on obesity who called for international standards
>   on advertising food products to children. "If you put a child in a
>   sweet shop and say 'Choose not to consume that', it's an almost
>   impossible responsibility," said Neville Rigby, director of policy
>   and public affairs for the London-based International Obesity task
>   force. (Companies like Altria have historically launched joint
>   efforts to combat criticism of tobacco and food industry policies.)
>   Papers and talks presented at the International Congress on Obesity
>   in Australia were promptly attacked by snack food and restaurant
>   industry advocates. Food industry PR flacks allege that at least one
>   obesity task force member is underwritten by pharmaceutical
>   companies seeking to market antiobesity medications. Many conference
>   participants are calling on the UN's World Health Organization to
>   promulgate uniform restrictions on food marketing to children.
>SOURCE: Sydney Morning Herald, September 6, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5160
>
>7. BREATHLESS AUDACITY
>http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/09/06/breathless-audacity-how-the-white-house-betrayed-the-real-heroes-of-911/#more-4362
>   The largest study yet of lung problems among 9/11 rescue workers
>   shows bad news. "Nearly 70 percent of the rescue and cleanup workers
>   who toiled in the dust and fumes at ground zero have had trouble
>   breathing, and many will probably be sick for the rest of their
>   lives," reports Amy Westfeldt. The study, conducted by the Mount
>   Sinai Medical Center, monitored the health of nearly 16,000 ground
>   zero workers. The volunteers who dug through the rubble in search of
>   survivors inhaled dust laden with asbestos, pulverized concrete,
>   mercury and toxins that will leave many of them chronically sick for
>   the rest of their lives. As Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber
>   reported in their 2004 book, Banana Republicans, this tragedy
>   happened because the same politicians who struck heroic poses
>   following America?s worst terrorist attack betrayed the real
>   heroes of the day — the construction workers, police,
>   firefighters and everyday citizens who rushed to the scene and tried
>   to help. In a report for the FireDogLake weblog, they tell the story
>   of how volunteers dug through the rubble while receiving assurances
>   — now proven false — that the air in which they worked
>   was safe to breathe.
>SOURCE: FireDogLake, September 6, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5158
>
>8. OPEN LETTER TO ABC
>http://openlettertoabc.blogspot.com
>   A group of activists has launched an Open Letter to ABC and its
>   parent company, Disney, challenging the network's right-wing bias
>   and factual distortions in its upcoming docudrama, "The Path to
>   9/11." The open letter includes information about Disney's history
>   of caving to the right, the right-wing only marketing campaign used
>   to promote the film, and rebuttals of its fabrications. The New York
>   Times and Editor and Publisher magazine are also reporting on the
>   controversy around the film.
>SOURCE: Open Letter to ABC, September 5, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5157
>
>9.  PHARMA PR TRIES TO SPIN GOLD FROM YAWN
>http://www.prweek.com
>   Americans may tire quickly of some pharmaceutical PR, but they've
>   got nowhere to turn (certainly not in bed) when it comes to a new
>   campaign sponsored by the makers of a sleep-fighting medication,
>   Provigil. Drug-maker Cephalon hired Dorland Global Public Relations,
>   which has spun consumers' disinterest in "sleepiness" into a
>   Homeland Security-like campaign for "alertness." The trick: target
>   employers. "No employer is going to allow you to bring advertising
>   into their marketplace," notes Cephalon PR director Sheryl William.
>   Instead, employers opened the door when Dorland created an
>   "education" campaign, including two ex-NASA scientists, to warn
>   employers that the lack of alertness at work could be dangerous.
>   Among other things, Provigil has FDA approval for treatment of
>   "shift work sleep disorder"--a condition that can result from
>   employers' rotating shift requirements. Dorland also created a
>   website and launched a pilot in Atlanta and Chicago that included
>   street interviews and visits to baseball games. The "alertness"
>   website (which gently leads the viewer to Cephalon) has reached four
>   times its hoped-for audience.
>SOURCE: PRWeek, August 28, 2006 (sub req'd)
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5155
>
>10. SEPT 7 IN MILWAUKEE: FUTURE OF MEDIA FCC HEARING
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5112
>   Do you want more quality journalism? Are you concerned about the
>   consolidation of media ownership? Is your community fairly
>   represented in the media? Tell the U.S. Federal Communications
>   Commission directly, at the "Town Meeting on the Future of Media" in
>   Milwaukee! The Center for Media and Democracy is co-sponsoring the
>   September 7 event, at which members of the public will share media
>   concerns with FCC Commissioners Copps and Adelstein. See our website
>   or Free Press' website for more information. At a similar hearing in
>   Los Angeles this week, FCC Commissioners heard from people concerned
>   "that the consolidation of station ownership had led to a pronounced
>   decline in in-depth news reporting, diversity of viewpoints and
>   quality children's programming," and from Hispanic community members
>   concerned about media labor practices and racist radio programming,
>   reports the LA Times.
>SOURCE: Center for Media and Democracy, September 6, 2006
>For more information or to comment on this story, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5153
>
>== UPCOMING EVENTS ==
>
>1. SEATTLE - THE BEST WAR EVER
>Date: 09/19/2006 - 20:30 to 09/19/2006 - 22:00
>   Co-Author John Stauber speaking.
>         Location: Seattle, WA, Elliot Bay Book Company
>         URL: www.elliottbaybook.com/
>For the further information, visit:
>http://www.prwatch.org/node/5015
>
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>The Weekly Spin is compiled by staff and volunteers at the Center
>for Media and Democracy (CMD), a nonprofit public interest
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