PR Watch, Fourth Quarter 2003, Volume 10, No. 4

Download PR Watch, Fourth Quarter 2003, Volume 10, No. 4

Flack Attack

Attacks on the public interest--whether they be environmental, human rights, public health or other issues--operate under the cover of disinformation campaigns conceived of and executed by public relations experts at PR firms and industry-funded organizations. PR Watch has spent ten years exposing these kinds of campaigns. Needless to say, we have never found ourselves short on material.

What is the "Disinfopedia"?

by Laura Miller

In the spring of 2002, Americans for Balanced
Energy Choices became a sponsor of National Public Radio. While ABEC
acknowledge on their website that "America's coal-based electricity industry
(producers, transporters, and electricity generators) have provided the
primary initial funding for this worthwhile project," their on-air spot
did not mention this support, leading listeners to email the Center for
Media & Democracy (CMD), PR Watch's publisher.

Frequently Asked Questions

From
Disinfopedia

What is "disinformation"?

align="BOTTOM">Like many good questions, this is hard to answer. It may be easier
to answer questions like "At what point does opinion or advocacy become
disinformation?" or "Can history or ideology remain simplified without
being disinforming?" Such distinctions are studied in the fields of conceptual
metaphor, information warfare, psychological operations, scientific method,

Getting Started on SourceWatch

(revised and updated by Lisa Graves--original version prepared by Laura Miller)

Water Environment Federation

From
Disinfopedia

The Water Environment Federation (WEF)
is the main national trade, lobby and PR association for U.S. sewage
treatment plants. It has been aggressively involved in promoting the
so-called "beneficial use" of sewage sludge for fertilizer. To avoid
the negative connotations associated with the word "sludge," WEF invented
the euphemism "biosolids."

align="BOTTOM">WEF gave PR agent Steve Frank of Metro Wastewater Reclamation
District (Denver, Colorado) an award for his PR work which included a
campaign designed to malign and attack one of the sewage agency's own
board members, Adrienne Anderson, a University of Colorado Environmental
Ethics teacher, appointed to represent workers' safety and health concerns.
Anderson had turned federal whistleblower, revealing the agency's secret
deal to accept wastes from a Superfund Site--the infamous Lowry Landfill
southeast of Denver--as acceptable ingredients for its biosolids product
meant to be spread on farmland, parks and public recreation areas in
Colorado.

Industry-funded organizations

From
Disinfopedia

An industry-funded organization often
acts as a mouthpiece for views that serve the industry's economic interests.
Industry-funded organizations come in many shapes and sizes. These include
trade associations, think tanks, non-profit advocacy groups, and media
outlets. Some of these organizations serve as "third parties" for public
relations campaigns. The third party technique has been defined by one
PR executive as putting "your words in someone else's mouth."

align="BOTTOM">Many organizations purport to represent one agenda while in reality
they serve some other party or interest whose sponsorship is hidden or
rarely mentioned.

Citizens for Better Medicare

From Disinfopedia

Citizens for Better Medicare (CBM) calls itself "a grassroots organization representing the interests of patients, seniors, disabled Americans, large and small businesses, pharmaceutical research companies and many others concerned with Medicare reform." Public Citizen calls it "a collection of shills, seedy direct-mail operatives and industry-funded research and lobby groups working in tight coordination with the drug lobby."

How to Research Front Groups

From
Disinfopedia

PR Watch editors Sheldon Rampton
and John Stauber have written several books about the public relations
industry that can be helpful research sources, in particular Toxic
Sludge Is Good For You: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry and Trust
Us, We're Experts: How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles With
Your Future.

Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America

From Disinfopedia

Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) is one of the largest and most influencial lobbying organizations in Washington. Representing 48 pharmaceutical companies, PhRMA has 20 registered lobbyists on staff and has contracted with dozens of lobby and PR firms--including Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, Barbour Griffith & Rogers, DCI Group, Edelman and Bonner & Associates--to promote its members' interests. PhRMA has a record of hiding its lobbying and PR activities, often by paying other organizations, such as United Seniors Association (USA) or the Consumer Alliance, to advocate industry-friendly policies.

Think Tanks

From
Disinfopedia

A think tank is an organization that
claims to serve as a center for research and analysis of important public
issues. In reality, many think tanks are little more than public relations
fronts, usually headquartered in state or national seats of government
and generating self-serving scholarship that serves the advocacy goals
of their industry sponsors. In the words of Yellow Times.org columnist
John Chuckman, they are "phony institutes where ideologue-propagandists
pose as academics .

American Enterprise Institute

From Disinfopedia

The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research is a think tank founded in 1943 whose stated mission is to support the "foundations of freedom - limited government, private enterprise, vital cultural and political institutions, and a strong foreign policy and national defense." It has emerged as one of the leading architects of the Bush administration's foreign policy. AEI rents office space to the Project for the New American Century, one of the leading voices that pushed the Bush administration's plan for "regime change" through war in Iraq. AEI reps have also aggressively denied that the war has anything to do with oil.

Help Peel the Banana Republicans

From Disinfopedia

PR Watch editors Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber are working on a new book, titled Banana Republicans: How the Right Wing Is Turning America Into a One-Party State. As they did with their previous bestselling book, Weapons of Mass Deception, Rampton and Stauber aim to show how propaganda and public relations are undermining democracy and the public interest. Banana Republicans will investigate how the "right-wing conspiracy," as represented by the GOP and its mouthpieces in media, lobbying groups, and the legal system, is undermining dissent and squelching pluralistic politics in America.