[Media-watch] FW: The Weekly Spin, Wednesday, March 24, 2004

Wed Mar 24 09:21:35 GMT 2004

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Date: 24 Mar 2004 06:00:00 -0000
To: weekly-spin at prwatch.org
Subject: The Weekly Spin, Wednesday, March 24, 2004

THE WEEKLY SPIN, Wednesday, March 24, 2004
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THIS WEEK'S NEWS

1. Dirty Is Clean, Gray Is Green - Vote for Me!
2. No FREE Lunches
3. Ground (Beef) Zero
4. One Person's Propaganda Is Another's News
5. The Apparat
6. Smile, And That's An Order
7. Lights, Cameras, Capture!
8. Iraqi Human Rights, One Year Later
9. The Play's the Thing
10. Iraq on the Record
11. State of the News
12. World Opinion, One Year Later
13. Spun Out of Office
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1. DIRTY IS CLEAN, GRAY IS GREEN - VOTE FOR ME!
http://www.thedesertsun.com/news/stories2004/election/20040323010458.shtml
  "Republicans can't stress enough that extremists are screaming
  'Doomsday!'" reads a leaked memo from the U.S. House of
  Representatives' Republican Conference communications office to GOP
  members. The memo isn't referring to the Middle East -- it's
  offering advice on how to dismiss environmental issues raised by
  Democratic challengers. Suggestions include: "Global warming is not
  a fact," "links between air quality and asthma in children remain
  cloudy," and the Environmental Protection Agency is "exaggerating"
  water pollution claims. The House memo echoes an earlier warning
  from GOP pollster Frank Luntz that the party is "most vulnerable"
  on environmental issues.
SOURCE: Gannett News Service, March 23, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1080018001
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1080018001

2. NO FREE LUNCHES
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16251-2004Mar22.html
  Three federal appellate court judges have been urged to resign from
  the board of the Foundation for Research in Economics and
  Environment (FREE). FREE, which receives funding from companies
  including Texaco, ExxonMobil and Monsanto, says it "harmonizes
  environmental quality with responsible liberty and economic
  progress." FREE pays for judges to attend seminars and "visit
  resorts in the area around Yellowstone National Park" -- to the
  tune of $10,000 per person, according to tax records. The dean of
  New York University's law school remarked: "A judge should not sit
  on the board of a group like FREE or any other group with a
  strident ideological profile on isues of a kind that come before
  the court."
SOURCE: Washington Post, March 23, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1080018000
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1080018000

3. GROUND (BEEF) ZERO
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107974244799560780,00.html?mod=americas_b
usiness_whats_news
  "Canadian investigators have identified... the probable source of
  recent cases of mad-cow disease in North America," reports the Wall
  Street Journal. Canada imported 192 cattle from Britain in the
  1980s. After one of the British cows tested positive for mad cow
  disease in 1993, Canadian officials tried to "remove" them from
  domestic herds. But 68 cows were missing, "most likely because they
  already had been slaughtered." Canada's Food Inspection Agency
  concluded that "the infected U.S. dairy cow and a Canadian beef cow
  diagnosed" with mad cow disease last year "most likely" ate feed
  from at least two separate mills contaminated with rendered meat
  from the missing British cattle. If true, this scenario suggests
  more cases which "may just now be surfacing."
SOURCE: The Wall Street Journal, March 22, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079931601
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079931601

4. ONE PERSON'S PROPAGANDA IS ANOTHER'S NEWS
http://www.prweek.com/news/news_story.cfm?ID=205608&site=3
  The General Accounting Office is investigating whether the
  Department of Health and Human Services' video news releases
  touting the new Medicare law constitute illegal "covert
  propaganda." Some PR pros think it's much ado about nothing: "VNRs
  have been around since the dawn of TV," said the CEO of Medialink.
  But the director of the National Association of Government
  Communicators warned that the VNR "Hollywood approach" could
  undermine public trust. Karen Ryan, the "reporter" in the Medicare
  spots, told the Columbia Journalism Review's Campaign Desk she
  feels like "political roadkill." Ryan, a former journalist, heads
  her own PR firm. Karen Ryan Group Communications was hired by Home
  Front Communications, which was hired by Ketchum Advertising, which
  was hired by HHS to do the VNRs. According to Campaign Desk
  reporter Zachary Roth, "The real question, however, is: How did so
  many television stations end up running the segment? While taking
  ultimate responsibility for their error, many news directors
  pointed the finger at two other targets: the Bush administration
  and CNN," whose "CNN Newsource" service is a "sort of wire service
  for TV," but gets paid for mixing VNRs with genuine news stories.
  "It mixes in the client's material with legitimate, CNN-produced
  news stories to be used by local stations - acting as a paid 'news
  launderer' on behalf of the VNR producers," Roth writes.
SOURCE: PR Week, March 22, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079931600
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079931600

5. THE APPARAT
http://www.mediatransparency.org/stories/apparat.html
  Jerry M. Landay has written a detailed report, showing how
  "hundreds of tax-exempt organizations of the far right have been
  exploiting the twilight zone of campaign and IRS regulations for
  three decades -- receiving billions of dollars in grants and
  contributions to wage ideo-political warfare for far-right ideas,
  causes, and Republican candidates ... a vast machine that, in the
  judgment of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy
  (NCRP) has 'played a critical role in helping the Republican Party
  to dominate state, local and national politics.' It is now
  operating at full throttle to keep Bush in office. ... The endgame
  for the apparat is a one-party state in which elections project
  only a vestigial appearance of democratic process."
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079806836

6. SMILE, AND THAT'S AN ORDER
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A6089-2004Mar18.html
  When George W. Bush visited Fort Campbell as a warm up to the
  one-year anniversary of the Iraq invasion, he was met by happy
  soldiers waving flags and chanting "U.S.A!" "Bush outlined the
  triumphs of the 101st Airborne as a way to describe U.S. successes
  in Iraq over the past year. He celebrated the division's killing of
  Hussein's sons, the capture of various Iraqi cities, the
  construction of schools and medical clinics, and the preparation
  for Iraqi elections," the Washington Post's Dana Milbank writes.
  But the warm welcome wasn't exactly spontaneous. Soldiers on the
  base, which has lost 65 soldiers in Iraq and seven more in
  Afghanistan, were given small U.S. flags before Bush's arrival and
  told, "We're going to show him a lot of love by waving flags. ...
  You're going to wave and clap and make a lot of noise. ... You must
  smile. We are happy campers here."
SOURCE: Washington Post, March 19, 2004
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079672401

7. LIGHTS, CAMERAS, CAPTURE!
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-media19mar19,1,7601355.s
tory?coll=la-headlines-world
  "It's not in the budget, but we're doing what we have to do," said
  the senior vice-president for news at CBS. "Clearly, if and when
  Osama is found, having resources over there is going to be
  critical," said ABC's senior vice-president for international news.
  Thousands of Pakistani troops and "a dozen or so" American
  intelligence agents are carrying out an intensive raid against
  Al-Quaeda leaders believed to be in Pakistan's South Waziristan
  region. CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN and Fox are getting reporters in place.
  It's a ratings war: "From a financial standpoint, the capture of
  Bin Laden can't come soon enough for some network executives." On
  Thursday, Colin Powell accorded Pakistan "major non-NATO ally"
  status, which allows the country to buy depleted uranium weapons
  and receive U.S. financing for weapons purchases.
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, March 19, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079672400
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079672400

8. IRAQI HUMAN RIGHTS, ONE YEAR LATER
http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE140062004
  "A year after US-led forces launched war on Iraq, the promise of
  improved human rights for Iraqis remains far from realized," warns
  Amnesty International in a detailed new report. "Most Iraqis still
  feel unsafe in a country ravaged by violence," the report states.
  Moreover, "Coalition Forces appear in many cases to be using the
  climate of violence to justify violating the very human rights
  standards they are supposed to be upholding. They have shot Iraqis
  dead during demonstrations. They have tortured and ill-treated
  prisoners and detainees. They have arrested people arbitrarily and
  held them indefinitely without charge and without access to a
  lawyer. They have demolished houses and other property in acts of
  revenge and collective punishment. And they are operating in a
  legal framework that offers no mechanism in Iraq for bringing
  members of the Coalition Forces to justice for such acts."
SOURCE: Amnesty International, March 18, 2004
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079586001

9. THE PLAY'S THE THING
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/18/international/middleeast/18CAIR.html?8hpib
  "It allows people to exercise a kind of hour of hate, or whatever
  George Orwell called it," said the drama critic for Egypt's largest
  newspaper, explaining the popularity of "a harshly anti-American
  show" called "Messing with the Mind." The writer, director and
  star, Khaled al-Sawy, said: "Most plays just weep about our general
  situation... I felt people wanted a play that talks about
  resisting." The U.S. TV network broadcasting to the Middle East,
  Al-Hurra, is satirized in one scene where George Bush, on
  "Democracy Television," says: "We just want to clean you up, make
  you human beings." Another scene features a CNN reporter gushing:
  "Our boys have entered Umm Qasr, and everybody was hugging them and
  ululating."
SOURCE: New York Times, March 18, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079586000
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079586000

10. IRAQ ON THE RECORD
http://www.house.gov/reform/min/features/iraq_on_the_record/
  Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) has released a report and database that
  identifies 237 specific misleading statements about the threat
  posed by Iraq uttered by the five Administration officials most
  responsible for providing public information and shaping public
  opinion on Iraq: President George W. Bush, Vice President Richard
  Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin
  Powell, and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice. Covering
  125 public appearances in the time leading up to and after the
  commencement of hostilities in Iraq, "Iraq on the Record" can be
  searched by any combination of speaker, subject, keyword, or date.
  The Nation's David Corn writes, "If the commission Bush
  begrudgingly appointed to study the prewar intelligence on Iraq's
  WMDs is going to investigate whether Bush abused the intelligence,
  this website would be of tremendous value to it. ... But Waxman's
  report practically makes it unnecessary for the commissioners to
  worry if Bush falsely characterized the prewar intelligence. After
  all, why bother investigating a question with such an obvious
  answer?"
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079562132
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079562132

11. STATE OF THE NEWS
http://www.stateofthenewsmedia.org
  The Project for Excellence in Journalism has produced a detailed
  report on "The State of the News Media 2004." It points to eight
  major trends, including the following: "Much of the new investment
  in journalism today - much of the information revolution generally
  - is in disseminating the news, not in collecting it. Most sectors
  of the media are cutting back in the newsroom, both in terms of
  staff and in the time they have to gather and report the news.
  While there are exceptions, in general journalists face real
  pressures trying to maintain quality. In many parts of the news
  media, we are increasingly getting the raw elements of news as the
  end product. This is particularly true in the newer, 24-hour media.
  In cable and online, there is a tendency toward a jumbled, chaotic,
  partial quality in some reports, without much synthesis or even the
  ordering of the information. There is also a great deal of effort,
  particularly on cable news, that is put into delivering essentially
  the same news repetitively without any meaningful updating." And
  there's good news for flacks: "Those who would manipulate the press
  and public appear to be gaining leverage over the journalists who
  cover them."
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079530150
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079530150

12. WORLD OPINION, ONE YEAR LATER
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=206
  "A year after the war in Iraq, discontent with America and its
  policies has intensified rather than diminished," concludes a new
  international survey conducted by the Pew Research Center for the
  People and the Press. "Opinion of the United States in France and
  Germany is at least as negative now as at the war's conclusion, and
  British views are decidedly more critical. Perceptions of American
  unilateralism remain widespread in European and Muslim nations, and
  the war in Iraq has undermined America's credibility abroad. Doubts
  about the motives behind the U.S.-led war on terrorism abound, and
  a growing percentage of Europeans want foreign policy and security
  arrangements independent from the United States. Across Europe,
  there is considerable support for the European Union to become as
  powerful as the United States."
SOURCE: Pew Research Center, March 16, 2004
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079413202

13. SPUN OUT OF OFFICE
http://www.guardian.co.uk/spain/article/0,2763,1169666,00.html
  "We have won without lies," chanted the crowd outside the Madrid
  headquarters of Spain's socialist party, PSOE, which swept to
  victory in the country's March 14 elections. "Spin was indeed at
  the centre of PSOE's extraordinary, unexpected triumph," notes
  reporter David Mathieson. "There is no word in Spanish for 'spin,'
  but there has been no absence of the practice in Madrid over the
  last year - and especially in the past few days. The spectacular
  gains made by PSOE ... were in large part a result of the
  government's clumsy attempts at media manipulation following the
  Madrid bombs on Thursday." Anxious to avoid the impression that its
  support for the war in Iraq had attracted the terrorist attack,
  Spain's ruling Popular Party attempted to pin the bombings on
  Basque separatists in the face of mounting evidence that Al Qaeda
  was actually responsible. "On top of the agony of the bomb, people
  were furious at government attempts to hide the truth," Mathieson
  writes. "Yesterday, voters took their revenge."
SOURCE: Guardian (UK), March 15, 2004
More web links related to this story are available at:
   http://www.prwatch.org/spin/March_2004.html#1079326801
To discuss this story in the PR Watch Forum, visit:
   http://www.prwatch.org/forum/discuss.php?id=1079326801

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