When previously spotted pitching in to help the cause of "independent" research involving its products, McDonald's Corp. asked a Connecticut nun to quickly issue an unfinished report about farm workers in order to help the fast food giant fight off a fair wage campaign by migrant tomato pickers. Now McDonald's has donated $2 million to the Scripps Research Institute of La Jolla, California, which (like Sister Ruth Rosenbaum) says it does independent research, this time on the critical medical issue of child obesity. The Institute's press release headline announces, "The Scripps Research Institute, McDonald's Align to Fight Childhood Obesity and Type 2 Diabetes." The release describes McDonald's as "serving a variety of wholesome foods made from quality ingredients to millions of customers every day." It also states, "The relationship unites Scripps ... world-renowned scientists...with McDonald's 50-year legacy of supporting programs that promote children's health and wellness." Bloggers at CarbWire, a diet industry website, call the move a "publicity stunt." Under the Institute's own philanthropy guidelines, McDonald's gift makes it a member of Scripps' "Council of 100" and enables the company to "enjoy private sessions specifically designed for them with....[r]esearch scientists."

Lincoln Group, the PR firm that covertly placed U.S. military-written stories in Iraqi newspapers and has been called "amateurish" by former associates, has won a new two-year, $6.2 million Pentagon contract. Additional requests from Washington DC could increase the value of the contract up to $20 million total. The work includes establishing "a unit of 12-18 communicators to support military PR efforts in Iraq and throughout the Middle East from media training to pitching stories and providing content for government-backed news sites." The Rendon Group previously handled similar work for the U.S.-led military force in Iraq. The request for proposals for the new contract "cited the emboldened insurgency bent on civil war as a key obstacle to the U.S. force's military and communications mission in Iraq." U.S. Senator Robert Menendez has introduced an amendment to halt the PR blitz, according to O'Dwyer's.

Image from an NEI ad

"We all knew it would come to this, didn't we?" a Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial asks, of a new offer by the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) to pay Nevada to accept nuclear waste at the controversial Yucca Mountain storage facility. NEI's offer is $25 million per year, which would double "once the first waste shipment arrives." After calling Yucca Mountain a "boondoggle," with "audit after audit" revealing "glaring flaws in the scientific models created to demonstrate the project's long-term viability," the newspaper slams NEI's offer as too low. "The standard for paying off a state's population was set by the Alaska Permanent Fund, which collects fees and taxes from oil and mineral exploration and production and offers qualifying residents an annual dividend," it states. This year, Alaska residents received more than $1,100 each; NEI's offer translates to a measly $10 per Nevada resident. In other news, a new poll paid for by NEI and conducted by a former NEI employee found that "nearly seven of 10 Americans favor nuclear energy and 68 percent support building a new reactor at the existing nuclear power plant closest to where they live."

On September 1, the South Korean government established the "Korea-U.S. FTA [Free Trade Agreement] Love Corner" in the lobby of Seoul's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, to "dispel public misunderstandings of the proposed free trade agreement between Korea and the United States." While "the response so far has been lukewarm," according to the Korea Herald, a ministry PR person explained, "The name of the corner implies that everyone is welcome." The ministry is waging an uphill love-in, though; according to the Korea Times, public opposition to the free trade agreement is increasing. One-half of Korean men surveyed in July 2006 opposed it and 75 percent were critical of "Seoul's negotiation performance." In early September, the South Korean government signed a $660,000 contract with the U.S. firm Sandler, Travis & Rosenberg, to analyze U.S. law and increase support for the agreement in Congress and among the U.S. business community, reported O'Dwyer's PR Daily.