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« Previous EntriesBallsy Little Squirrels: McCain Campaign Stumps LiteralMayhem on Ghost Writing Ethics
Thursday, September 25th, 2008One of the more popular posts on this site is one I put up on ghost writing ethics. It’s still getting lots of regular hits even after several months.
But yesterday I saw a posting on Salon about a squirrelly little ghost writing project by the McCain campaign. And I was actually kind of stumped as [...]
Lies, Damned Lies, and Spokespeople… Why Do We Even Listen to Them?
Thursday, September 11th, 2008Debated putting this one up. And I promise no more politics. But we in the PR profession often decry our image as liars, when the most high-profile “PR” practitioners (those in the political field) have raised it to a high art form.
And the kind of “lie” I am referring to is not about economic growth, [...]
Spinning Sarah Palin: Dick Cheney In A Dress
Saturday, August 30th, 2008Stepping back from all the broo-ha-ha over the “experience factor” in the Palin VP pick, as well as the irony of announcing the choice at “Nutter Center,” McCain’s choice fatally punctures one of his key talking points:
It should finally put to rest the idea that McCain is a man who will “stand up to his [...]
Slip of the Tongue? When We End Up Saying More than We Mean
Tuesday, August 19th, 2008Went for a sail in NY harbor over the weekend. Saw this yacht tied up to the pier…
GET A LOAD OF THE BOAT’S NAME…
Hmmm… wasn’t Utopia 1 good enough? The original “Utopia” must not have been all it’s cracked up to be.
Ditto for Utopia 2.
Clearly these people are having trouble finding happiness.
Well maybe “third time’s [...]
Orwellian Olympiad (II): Ministry of Truth Revises Gymnast’s Past and Gets Caught… THIS TIME
Thursday, August 14th, 2008Following up on last week’s post on George Orwell’s 1984…
The latest Olympic development is not just that the Chinese government falsified a gymnast’s birth date on her passport, but that they went back and altered PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED NEWSPAPER REPORTS about her age!!
Columnist/Blogger David Flumenbaum has posted copies of an article from the China Daily that [...]
Girl Power vs. Feminism: An Interesting Juxtaposition at the Brooklyn Museum
Wednesday, June 4th, 2008Recently, I was at the Brooklyn Museum to see the exhibit of Japanese pop-artist Takashi Murakami, and found that it made an interesting comparison to the Ghada Amer exhibit in the museum’s “feminist wing” next door.
More important, I was there with my dear friend Cindy — a marketing whiz extraordinaire who is one of [...]
Jim Abernathy Gives China a Big Sloppy Kiss, Gives PR a BIG BLACK EYE
Monday, May 19th, 2008Just when you thought the PR profession could get no more immoral, unscrupulous, or just plain asinine, along comes Jim Abernathy to take us down to a whole new low.
O’Dwyer’s re-ran quotes of Abernathy’s interview with Business Week about how to deal with China’s PR woes surrounding Tibet, and its overshadowing of the Olympics.
Ever the [...]
JetBlue In The Face (Part II): Exasperation and the REAL Difference Between Marketing and PR
Thursday, May 15th, 2008I’ve still been noodling on the whole JetBlue post from yesterday and I think this event is a pretty good teaching moment for those who still can’t tell the difference between PR and marketing — as well as those executives who treat PR (and PR people) as a hassle without value. (And for PR students [...]
Mahiavelli Fingers Bush: Touching Moments and an Occasion for Tears, a National Groundhog Day
Friday, April 11th, 2008A couple of days ago President Bush “blinked back tears” at the funeral of a Marine who threw himself on a grenade to save his fellow soldiers.
It’s tough to believe anything that comes out of the White House, given its seven-year history of… dissembling… a history in which Herr Karlmiester recreated reality to suit Bush’s [...]
Wherein We Offer a New Philosophical Framework for Understanding the Imperatives of PR
Tuesday, March 4th, 2008A recent “60 Minutes” story, originally aired on February 24, claimed that the prosecution of former Alabama governor Don Sielegman was politically motivated and directed from the White House by His Evil Eminence Karl Rove.
On the Huntsville TV station WHNT, most of the 13-minute story was lost in an 8-minute broadcast interruption. The station first [...]