THE WEEKLY SPIN, February 6, 2008 Date: Wed, 6 Feb 2008 10:42:02 -0600 (CST) THE WEEKLY SPIN, FEBRUARY 6, 2008 == BLOG POSTINGS == 1. James Glassman: The Journalist Turned Journo-lobbyist's Bid to Be PR Czar == SPIN OF THE DAY POSTINGS == 1. Freedom's Watch Wants to be the Right's MoveOn 2. Edelman Defends Wal-Mart Against Yet Another Environmental Charge 3. Who's Spinning Who in the U.S. Presidential Race 4. Blackwater Practices "Redwashing" 5. Hard Times at Fox News 6. Green PR Guy Adam Werbach Sells Out to 'Saatchi & Saatchi S' 7. Think Tank Talks Up Telecom Immunity 8. Big Oil Tries to Inspire Warm Gooey Feelings 9. Weekly Radio Spin: Of Palm Oil and Snake Oil 10. Russia Dolls Up Its Image with New Groups 11. U.S. Freezes Out Arctic Science 12. Green Ads Raise Red Flags Worldwide 13. Seeking Protection for Whistleblowers That's Worth Its Salt 14. Canada's Chalk River Nuclear Reactor Up and Running Again, but Safely? -------------------------------------------------------------------- == BLOG POSTINGS == 1. JAMES GLASSMAN: THE JOURNALIST TURNED JOURNO-LOBBYIST'S BID TO BE PR CZAR by Diane Farsetta James Glassman, the nominee for Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, probably won't have much of an impact on how the United States presents itself to the rest of the world. For one thing, he'll only have 11 months in the post. For another -- as his predecessor Karen Hughes proved -- putting shinier lipstick on the pig of U.S. foreign policy doesn't do much to assuage widespread anti-American sentiment. Still, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's January 30 hearing on Glassman's nomination provided some insight into Washington's evolving view of public diplomacy. To read the rest of this item, visit: http://www.prwatch.org/node/6953 == SPIN OF THE DAY POSTINGS == 1. FREEDOM'S WATCH WANTS TO BE THE RIGHT'S MOVEON http://www.prwatch.org/node/6969 Bill Berkowitz reports, "a number of right wing groups have been contending for the unofficial designation of the conservative version of MoveOn.org, the liberal grassroots lobbying organization. These days, Freedom's Watch appears to have a leg up on them all. ... 'Freedom's Watch is raking in huge donations from a few donors, a model that other federally sanctioned campaign groups cannot follow, because donation sizes are limited by law,' John Stauber, executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy, told IPS. 'And like MoveOn, Freedom's Watch intends to augment that approach with a grass-roots fundraising model that energizes a base of supporters as it brings in money. ... Freedom's Watch is being quite transparent about its motives in running anti-immigrant ads. It's all about hot button issues that will turn out the Republican base and defeat Democrats. ... Ari Fleischer and his cohorts are all about winning, by any means necessary.' " SOURCE: IPS News, February 5, 2008 2. EDELMAN DEFENDS WAL-MART AGAINST YET ANOTHER ENVIRONMENTAL CHARGE http://www.prwatch.org/node/6968 Wal-Mart has turned to the Edelman public relations firm to help it deal with its latest environmental black eye. The retail giant is charged with selling wood products made from timber harvested from protected Russian forests. Chinese suppliers are using that less expensive wood to meet Wal-Mart's tight pricing structures. The charges were levied by The Environmental Investigation Agency in a lengthy report. Edelman responded for its client by saying that the company will "continue to encourage and advise our supplier partners to source from sustainable and ethical sources." They also asserted that by 2010 they would achieve full transparency regarding its wood suppliers. This goal is part of Wal-Mart's guidelines for their Wood Furniture Supplier Preference Program, but they refused to provide a copy to the public, saying it is an internal document. SOURCE: O'Dwyer's PR Daily (sub req'd), January 30, 2008 3. WHO'S SPINNING WHO IN THE U.S. PRESIDENTIAL RACE http://www.prwatch.org/node/6966 Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee's media team is led by "Kirsten Fedewa, a long-time press adviser from Huckabee's days with the Republican governors' association ... and Alice Stewart, a glamorous Arkansas TV anchor," according to the Belfast Telegraph's rundown of candidate "spinmeisters." Mitt Romney's "press team leaders are ... quintessential DC insiders" like former Republican National Committee staffer Matt Rhoades and Bush-Cheney 2004 spokesman Kevin Madden. John McCain lost his communications team last July, leaving "loyal New Hampshire staffer Jill Hazelbaker" in charge of media. (Hazelbaker was linked to "fake blog postings on a Democrats website" during a 2006 Senate campaign; she maintains her innocence.) On the Democratic side, Barack Obama's media team is led by David Axelrod, an "acknowledged genius in the marketing of a political 'personality'" with "particularly close ties to Hillary Clinton." Howard Wolfson, a crisis management specialist at the Glover Park Group, and Mandy Grunwald lead Clinton's famously combative media team. Clinton's campaign also includes Burson-Marsteller CEO Mark Penn and several Dewey Square Group staffers, including Michael Whouley, notes Frank Rich in the New York Times. SOURCE: Belfast Telegraph (Northern Ireland), February 4, 2008 4. BLACKWATER PRACTICES "REDWASHING" http://www.prwatch.org/node/6963 Jeremy Scahill, author of the bestselling book Blackwater, notes that "Blackwater Worldwide, the Bush administration's favorite mercenary company, is no stranger to blood -- its operatives have caused a lot of it to be spilled in Iraq. ... This week, the company received an award from the American Red Cross ... for Blackwater's recent blood drive, where company employees reportedly gave 264 units of blood. 'That means that well over 600 lives have been saved in this region,' said Georgia Donaldson of the Mid Atlantic region Red Cross. The group presented Blackwater's owner, Erik Prince with a plaque honoring the company. ... This isn't the first time Blackwater and the Red Cross teamed up. After Hurricane Katrina, where Blackwater raked in over $70 million in federal 'security' contracts, the company held a Red Cross fundraiser and pulled in $138,000 -- about $100,000 short of Blackwater's estimated daily take at the height of its Katrina operations. The keynote speaker at that event? L. Paul Bremer, the original head of the US occupation." SOURCE: Alternet, February 2, 2008 5. HARD TIMES AT FOX NEWS http://www.prwatch.org/node/6962 "My guess is that Fox News guru Roger Ailes has been reaching for the Tums more often than usual early in the New Year," comments Eric Boehlert. The right-wing network's rating are down compared to competitors such as CNN; its recently-launch Fox Business Network has ratings so low that they "are in danger of being surpassed by some large city public access channels"; its effort to promote Rudy Giuliani for president collapsed; and Democratic candidates aren't bothering to participate in Fox-sponsored presidential debates. The network's problems, Boehlert says, stem from the same things that drove its previous popularity: "Fox News years ago made an obvious decision to appeal almost exclusively to Republican viewers. The good news then for Fox News was that it succeeded. The bad news now for Fox News is that it succeeded." SOURCE: Media Matters, January 29, 2008 6. GREEN PR GUY ADAM WERBACH SELLS OUT TO 'SAATCHI & SAATCHI S' http://www.prwatch.org/node/6960 Adam Werbach, once the youngest head of the Sierra Club and currently on the board of Greenpeace, must have a lot more "green" in his bank account today. As Fast Company reports, his green PR firm Act Now "has been scooped up by none other than the lovemark-man himself: Saatchi & Saatchi's Kevin Roberts. The new company, called Saatchi & Saatchi S, in which Werbach will remain CEO, plans on bringing sustainability to the ad agency's clients, which include A-listers like P&G, Toyota, and Visa. ... Pairing up with Wal-Mart was painful enough for the environmental establishment to swallow. Now Werbach will be owned by The Mad Men of Madison Avenue, the one place where greenwashing is most feared and excessive wastefulness still runs rampant." Werbach's current clients are presumably now clients of Saatchi & Saatchi S. They constitute a score of corporations, foundations, Big Green groups and others such as Amnesty International, Center for American Progress, General Mills, Nathan Cummings Foundation, National Wildlife Federation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Sierra Club and World Wildlife Fund. SOURCE: Fast Company blog, January 31, 2008 7. THINK TANK TALKS UP TELECOM IMMUNITY http://www.prwatch.org/node/6959 The Democratic think tank / advocacy group Third Way has been working with Senate Democrats to help sell a controversial measure granting retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies, reports Matt Renner. The measure "is the major sticking point over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) legislation that is currently stalled in the Senate." During a meeting with Senator Jay Rockefeller's legislative aide for military and national security issues, Third Way's Matt Bennett suggested "talking points to help make the case for telecom immunity." Bennett said, "We thought it would be a bad idea to allow these companies to be held legally liable for cooperating with the government ... you want to encourage the cooperation of not just the telecom industry, but all other industries in the future." Third Way would not disclose whether the group receives telecom funding, but some of its board members do have telecom ties. Reynold Levy, for example, formerly served as AT&T's senior officer in charge of government relations. SOURCE: Truthout, January 31, 2008 8. BIG OIL TRIES TO INSPIRE WARM GOOEY FEELINGS http://www.prwatch.org/node/6958 As ExxonMobil breaks its own record to post the largest annual profit by a U.S. company, the American Petroleum Institute (API) is trying to tap some goodwill. At the Super Bowl U.S. football championship game, API is sponsoring "Kickoff to Rebuild," highlighting its work with Rebuilding Together, a nonprofit organization that promotes homeownership. API and Rebuilding Together are launching an "Energy Efficient Homes Initiative," which aims "to incorporate energy-efficiency measures in the more than 9,000 homes revitalized each year by Rebuilding Together." API has been battling the oil industry's negative public image for years, with increased outreach to journalists and bloggers. In related news, O'Dwyer's reports that Saudi Arabia's oil ministry paid the PR firm Hill & Knowlton $1 million, to promote OPEC's "message of hope and reassurance" around its November 2007 summit in Riyadh. SOURCE: Rebuilding Together press release, February 1, 2008 9. WEEKLY RADIO SPIN: OF PALM OIL AND SNAKE OIL http://www.prwatch.org/node/6957 Listen to this week's edition of the "Weekly Radio Spin," the Center for Media and Democracy's audio report on the stories behind the news. This week, we look at nuclear power plant safety, officially misleading green marketing and what happens when Big Oil's on campus. In "Six Degrees of Spin and Fakin'," we tell you how many steps it takes to get from Hillary Rodham Clinton to Mitt Romney. The Weekly Radio Spin is freely available for personal and broadcast use. Podcasters can subscribe to the XML feed on www.prwatch.org/audio or via iTunes. If you air the Weekly Radio Spin on your radio station, please email us at editor@prwatch.org to let us know. Thanks! SOURCE: Center for Media and Democracy, February 1, 2008 10. RUSSIA DOLLS UP ITS IMAGE WITH NEW GROUPS http://www.prwatch.org/node/6952 The Russian government, upset at criticism from such foreign-funded organizations as the U.S. think tank Freedom House, is turning the tables. Moscow approved the creation of the Institute of Democracy and Cooperation, which will "study democracy and human rights in Europe and the United States." The Institute, whose funding comes from "private businesses," has offices in New York and Paris. "No country can monopolize the definition of standards of democracy and human rights," said Institute founder Anatoly Kucherena. In related news, the National Information Center will open in Moscow next month. "The center's aims include improving Russia's image abroad, promoting national projects and providing [Russian and foreign] journalists with first-hand contacts in the presidential administration," reports the Moscow Times. The Center will also be funded by business leaders, while Vasily Shestakov, "a friend and judo partner of President Vladimir Putin," has been invited to head its supervisory board. SOURCE: Associated Press, January 28, 2008 11. U.S. FREEZES OUT ARCTIC SCIENCE http://www.prwatch.org/node/6951 Scientists in eight Arctic nations prepared "a landmark assessment of oil and gas activity" in the region over six years, including "a clear set of recommendations on how to extract safely what are thought to be up to one quarter of the world's energy reserves." But the United States government blocked the report's release, as it prepares "to sell off exploration licenses for the frozen Chukchi Sea off Alaska, one of the last intact habitats of the polar bear." One of the authors of the report said the U.S. move "could be linked to activities in the Chukchi Sea ... where more research and assessment is needed." Another author said a "key message" of the stalled report is "to check more before you drill for oil and gas in the Arctic." The U.S. Center for Biological Diversity's climate director called the U.S. action "part of the Bush-Cheney strategy of handing out as many fossil fuel entitlements as quickly as they can in their final months in office." The Bush administration rushed the Chukchi sales, scheduled for February 6, "before Congress can complete efforts to protect the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act," which would also complicate oil exploration in the area. SOURCE: The Independent (UK), January 22, 2008 12. GREEN ADS RAISE RED FLAGS WORLDWIDE http://www.prwatch.org/node/6950 An increase in "green" marketing has led to scrutiny by watchdogs around the world. Britain's Advertising Standards Authority recently ruled that television ads from the Malaysian Palm Oil Council were "likely to mislead viewers as to the environmental benefits of oil-palm plantations." The ads claimed that palm oil trees "give life and help our planet breathe," but in reality many palm oil plantations are on illegally cleared rainforest land. In September 2007, Norwegian regulators "banned all cars ads from stating that their vehicles are 'green,' 'clean' or 'environmentally friendly,'" since car production means more carbon emissions. In the U.S., the Council of Better Business Bureaus ruled that "a distributor of infant feeding bottles had to drop ads that claimed that the plastic used in a competitor's bottles was unsafe for both the environment and kids." The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is also planning to update its environmental advertising guidelines, which currently include standards for what can be marketed as "recyclable" or "biodegradable." As mentioned in an earlier Spin, there are no FTC standards for "carbon neutral" or greenhouse gas emissions offset programs. SOURCE: Wall Street Journal (sub req'd), January 30, 2008 13. SEEKING PROTECTION FOR WHISTLEBLOWERS THAT'S WORTH ITS SALT http://www.prwatch.org/node/6949 The case of Pierre Meneton is fueling demands for legal protections for whistleblowers in France. Meneton is a researcher for the National Institute of Health and the National Institute of Health and Medical Research. He is going to court on January 31, 2008, to face charges of defamation. Several industrial salt producers are suing Meneton for a comment he made during an interview in March 2006. "The lobbying of salt producers and agribusiness is very active. It misinforms health professionals and the media." While the negative effects of salt on health are no secret, it was not until Meneton went public with claims of unethical practices in the research analysis of the French Authority for Food Safety and of the consistent meddling of the salt industry that it was widely publicized. Environmental health researcher Andre Cicolella says that while Meneton may not be a whistleblower by all definitions, his case would benefit from the same types of protections that are lacking for those that do qualify. For instance, Veronique Lapides is a resident of the Paris suburb of Vincennes. She raised the alert about a high rate of childhood cancer in the area and pushed for environmental clean up. Now she is being sued for defamation by the mayor of Vincennes. Cicolella said that this case shows "absent laws to prtect whistleblowers, this type of pressure can be exerted not only on scientists, but on citizens as well." In the U.S., the Senate just passed a bill to reinforce whistleblower protections for U.S. government workers, but it needs to be reconciled with a stronger bill passed by the House in March 2007. SOURCE: Le Monde (France), January 29, 2008 14. CANADA'S CHALK RIVER NUCLEAR REACTOR UP AND RUNNING AGAIN, BUT SAFELY? http://www.prwatch.org/node/6948 The fifty-year old nuclear reactor at Chalk River in Ontario, Canada, is running again after the Canadian Parliament overruled the president of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. The facility is owned by Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, which is a public-owned corporation of the Government of Canada. Then-Commission President Linda Keen has since been fired from her position. But she still testified in front of the House of Commons' Natural Resources committee Tuesday, saying, "When it comes to nuclear facilities, ignoring safety requirements is simply not an option b?" not now, not ever." At issue was the lack of adequate safety systems at the plant. "Ms. Keen said that without the backup system in place, the risk of a nuclear accident stood at one in a thousand -- 1,000 times higher than the international standard of one in a million." The reactor produces nuclear isotopes for medical use, and the members of the Conservative party in Parliament claimed that keeping the reactor shut down was leading to a medical emergency in Canada and worldwide. Others have disputed this, and point to the lag in time between the plant's shutdown and the government's sounding the alarm with other isotope producers. Regardless, Keen pointed out: "Under the law, the commission did not have the authority to take the issue of isotopes into consideration." She also added that "the Chalk River reactor, which is more than 50 years old, would not be licensed today by any nuclear regulator in the world." SOURCE: Globe and Mail (Toronto, Canada), January 29, 2008 -------------------------------------------------------------------- The Weekly Spin features selected news summaries with links to further information about media, political spin and propaganda. It is emailed free each Wednesday to subscribers. PR Watch, Spin of the Day, the Weekly Spin and SourceWatch are projects of the Center for Media & Democracy, a nonprofit organization that offers investigative reporting on the public relations industry. We help the public recognize manipulative and misleading PR practices by exposing the activities of secretive, little-known propaganda-for-hire firms that work to control political debates and public opinion. Please send any questions or suggestions about our publications to editor@prwatch.org. To subscribe to the Weekly Spin, visit: http://www.prwatch.org/sub CMD also sponsors SourceWatch, a collaborative research project that invites anyone (including you) to contribute and edit articles. For more information, visit: http://www.sourcewatch.org Contributions to the Center for Media and Democracy are tax-deductible. To donate now online, visit: http://www.prwatch.org/donate Don't want to receive this email? Unsubscribe at http://www.prwatch.org/unsub