February 28, 2005
A little hypocrisy with that rubber chicken?
There is an air of righeous rectitude that does not become the Mainstreatm Media in their current criticism of the public relations business. MSM have excorited the Bush Administration for paying PR firms, as it turns out, millions of dollars to promote the president's initiatives.
Fair enough. Taxpayers should not have to foot the bill to promote Bush's policies like No Child Left Behind. But taxpayers do have a legitimate interest in, for example, the promotion of healthy lifestyles (My employer, pr firm Capstrat, has a contract for one of those government programs.) that hold down medical costs.
So, let's talk about disclosure. How much dough does Tim Russert get for delivering a 20-minute political analysis to the National Association of HVAC Dealers? What about Lou Dobbs' entertaining blather to the national Osteopath's confab? Or Robert Novak's rants against the Left to the Confederation of Insurance Brokers?
Journalists can easily double their base compensation with these gigs, which ususally come with first-class airline seats and hotel accommodations in warm climates. But few journalists are willing to disclose this lucrative source of income.
What are we supposed to do, trust that they'll be fair in reporting on tax policies that could affect the members of their audiences?
No, there's more than enough hypocrisy to go around these days. And these journalists-as-celebrities lead the way.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:53 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 22, 2005
MSM's indignity is misplaced
The mainstream media are expressing outrage that the government pays PR firms to help promote their programs.
Their outrage is made easier because of the Armstrong Williams fiasco. Williams, you'll recall, is the conservative commentator (who owns an ad agency on the side) was recruited by the Ketchum PR firm to create some ads touting the Bush Adminstration's No Child Left Behind Law. As part of the $240,000 deal, funded by the U.S. Department of Education, Williams says nice things about NCLB on his radio and TV appearnces. It's sleazy.
The MSM are using this debacle to complain about all government PR contracts. But if MSM were doing their jobs, government agencies wouldn't feel the need to tout their programs.
Mostly, newspapers are bitter that they no longer set the public policy agenda the way they used to. Before the ascendency of television news, newspapers were the primary source of information to citizens. That hasn't been the case for a long time.
The MSM resent that the government is pormoting its agenda, as if the only information that citizens should get is the information deemed appropropate by MSM.
Those days are fast disappearing. Also outdated is press critic A.J. Leibling's observation: "Freedom of the press belongs only to those wealthy enough to own one."
With the Internet, the barriers to entry have diminished. Over time, the influence of newspapers to set the public policy agenda will splinter even more.
And let's be clear why. They've abdicated. Most newspapers don't seriously cover public policy. They cover the noise -- the acrimonious colloquy, the controversy, the foibles of politicians. But they don't really care much about enlightening readers.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 21, 2005
Authenticity
In the past few weeks, three men I know or know of have killed themselves, each leaving behind a family. One was a minister.
It's not hard to understand why people kill themselves. Who hasn't been so awash in despair that there was almost no hope left that life would ever be better? If it weren't for the sliver of hope to hang onto, there would be many more suicides.
The puzzling thing about these cases is that the men seemed to go about their business, fully functioning, with little warning that they had reached the end. In retrospect, there were hints of desperation that finally overcame their hope. But by and large, few people around them thought it would end this way.
Men seem to have limited capacity to show their vulnerabilities. They don't want people to know they'e in pain, or that they're overcome with disappointment. Why?
The way we were raised, no doubt. But I also think that sometimes we try, but we're not adept at tugging at someone's sleeve and saying, "You know, I'm really in a bad spot."
I look back over my life and wonder if I've been able to discern when somoene has tugged at my sleeve, or have I been to busy or self-absorbed to realize it.
I want to be a more authentic person today. Not just a hypchondriac or a whiner. But I'd like to be open to the notion that if I'm feeling overcome with the cares of the world, I can say so. And I want to be an instrument of peace to the guy tugging in desperation at my sleeve.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:48 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 17, 2005
Raise the cigarette tax. It's easy.
On one of the walls of my home, one block east of the North Carolina governor's mansion in Raleigh, is a lacquered golden tobacco leaf. It was a gift from friends.
It's meant to remind our family of our state's tobacco heritage. Tobacco has build nearly everything in the eastern part of the state -- universities, churches, parks. It has sent thousands of North Carolina farm boys and farmer's daughters to college.
A few facts about tobacco and our stte government right now:
Treatment of smoking-related diseases in North Carolina cost well over a billion dollars a year. The state's tobacco tax is 5 cents a pack. Only Kentucky, at 3 cents a pack, is lower.
This year, North Carolina faces a budget deficit of at least $1.3 billion.
Raising the tobacco tax to 75 cents a pack would raise about $350 million.
Research has shown over and over that raising the tobacco tax north of 50 cents a pack will dramatically lower the number of teens who start smoking.
So the question is, "Why wouldn't the state legislature be sprinting to enact this tax. Why shouldn't smokers pay the price?
Yes, North Carolina has cigarette manufacturers and, yes, there are still tobacco farmers. But the time for their ride is over. The meth labs that all the law enforcement agencies are cracking down on don't cause nearly as much harm as cigarettes.
Raising the tax makes sense in every respect. As a sound, responsible public policy, it's a no-brainer.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 10:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 14, 2005
Can you believe this? Maybe, maybe not.
On Sunday, the New York Times featured a story about the ethical problems of PR firms. The article cited a payment of $240,000 by the U.S. Department of Education to conservative pundit Armstrong Williams.
The whole mess, apparently orchestrated by the PR firm, Ketchum, would have Armstrong producing TV and radio ads and, oh, by the way, touting the Bush Administration's No Child Left Behind initiative in his commentaries on programs like This Week with George Stephanoplous and USA Today.
We don't really know the entire story yet. Did Ketchum think up this sleaziness? Or did Armstrong Williams have a fan in the Department of Education, who directed Ketchum to pay Williams to produce the ads and tout No Child Left Behind in his commentary?
Williams behavior reminds me of something the redoubtable Louisiana politician Huey Long once said: "I can't be bought. But I can be rented."
Armstrong's conservative beliefs, which he will give to just about any media outlet, can be strengthened even more if you, ahem, also use his ad agency to produce TV spots.
The Times argued that Ketchum may have suffered an ethical lapse because agencies like Ketchum, which in recent years have been consolidated into advertising conglomerates like Omnicom, are under pressure to produce higher profits.
I doubt it. This more likely is an example of an agency simply too eager to please a client. A PR agency leader has to be willing to say to any client, no matter how large or how small, "I'm not going to jail for you."
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:44 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 11, 2005
Chairman Dean?
It looks like Howard Dean is going to be elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee. This could be an interesting experiment.
A little over a year ago, the former Vermont governor had poked his finger in the eye of the Democratic establishment. He criticized the party leaders for give George Bush a pass on the Iraqi debacle. “I represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party,” he told one candidate forum. He rocketed to the top of the polls with an insurgency unparalleled in the party’s history.
But once the voting started, the party dropped him like a bad habit. John Kerry flattened Dean in the primaries. Beat him like a rented mule. They rejected him and ridiculed him. Mostly, the analysts say, they decided that Dean was unelectable.
So now, Howard Dean has wrapped up a successful campaign to become chairman of the Democratic National Committee. I am not a big Howard Dean fan. For my money, he is a little too messianic. He comes across as having all the answers and if you don’t agree with him, you’re not only wrong, you’re stupid.
But if chairman Dean can rekindle the enthusiasm of his insurgency, bringing new participants into the mainstream Democratic Party and generating energy and donations to challenge the Bush agenda, then he could be a real force.
The Democratic National Committee apparatus doesn’t control the national debate. By tradition, the party's congressional leaders -- Senator Harry Reid and Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi -- will control the Democratic message until the presidential campaign takes over again, after the 2006 mid-term elections. Not the chairman.
Maybe Howard Dean will be different. It would not be a bad thing for the Democrats to have a point person on the anti-Bush message. If Howard Dean can subvert his own 2008 presidential ambitions, which he has promised to do, then he could make an unusual and unusually good party chairman. Stranger things have happened, but not many.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:44 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 10, 2005
Don't Ignore the Media, Indict Them
John Kerry has re-emerged in public after lying low following his defeat on November 2. In his first extensive interview on Meet the Press January 30, he was asked why he lost. His explanation: voters didn't want to change commander-in-chief in the midst of a war.
Perhaps. But the election probably was lost in late summer, in the weeks following Kerry's nomination. That's when a group called Swiftboat Veterans for Justice began attacking Kerry's record as a Vietnam War hero. The news media were co-conspirators.
Swift Boats had rasied about $500,000 to buy ads questioning Kerry's patriotism. The media gave the ads non-stop coverage while Kerry went on vacation, windsurfing off Nantucket.
With that 24-hour-a-day coverage, Swift Boats was able to raise nearly $14 million by Election Day. They slimed John Kerry, especially among white male voters who might have been attracted by his exemplary war record.
The media didn't create Swift Boat Veterans for Justice, but they breathed life into the nascent body and then gave it steroids.
Without relentless, nonstop media coverage just before Labor Day, the Swift Boat ads would have been a campaign blip. And John Kerry probably would be president.
But Swift Boats made the most compelling case against Kerry, and nullified the central strategy of his convention week -- to show Kerry as a fit commander-in-chief.
No doubt about it, the ads of Swift Boat Veterans for Justice were skillful. But the media were the organization's arms, legs and...megaphone. Once again, the media as unindicted co-conspirator.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 09, 2005
Bush's Budget
There are some things to like about the Bush budget proposal. There's $3.2 billion to treat AIDS around the world. It's not as much as he had promised in 2003. But it's something.
Thre's $2 billion to build health clinics in poor neighborhoods. There's increased funding the FBI, though its arguable whether that money can help an agency badly in need of house-cleaning.
But there's no money -- zero dollars -- budgeted to fight wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. There is no money to implement Bush's plan for private savings accounts in Social Security, though most estimates put that cost at at least $80 billion in the next five years.
Cuts in the EPA, education funding and Medicaid that are puzzling, while there's an increase at NASA. Bizarre.
The most outrageous part of this budget is the $53 billion to cut taxes forever for the top 1% in income. There is another $23 billion in tax cuts budgeted over the next five years.
In the face of a $427 billion budget deficit, with no money budgeted for the war in Iraq and Social Security changes, the irresponsibility of tax cuts is breath-taking.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:12 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 08, 2005
Self-Immolation
In a nation that has sent 1,400 Americans to their deaths to give freedom to Iraqis, we have begun to rival the Taliban in repressing our own freedoms.
In the past year, we have witnessed the surreal event of two dozen ABC televison affiliates voluntarily refusing to air "Saving Private Ryan" for fear that the Federal Communication Commmission might levy fines for violence and profanity. This arguably is the best war movie in a generation, but gutless TV station managers were afraid of what the FCC might do.
In North Carolina, a popular public radio station, WUNC-FM, demanded that IPAS, an international health organization, modify a tagline it had been using to announce its on-air radio sponsorship. The station management objected to the phrase "protecting women's reproductive rights," as somehow being an endorsement of abortion. The feckless WUNC managers worried that the Bush Administration might take regulatory action against the station. So it told IPASS to change the wording. IPAS refused.
The American Taliban on the religious right have objected to SpongeBob SquarePants, for goodness sake.
What are we doing to ourselves? This is not the kind of freedom that we would want for Iraq, and it's certainly not the kind of free exchange of ideas that we deserve in America.
Posted by Ken Eudy at 06:35 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack