A viral video mocking Gore, later linked to DCI Group"The school governor who challenged the screening of Al Gore's climate change documentary in secondary schools was funded by a Scottish quarrying magnate who established a controversial lobbying group to attack environmentalists' claims about global warming," reports The Observer. Stewart Dimmock sought to ban "An Inconvenient Truth" from British schools, with help from Scotland's New Party. Nearly all of the small party's funds come from a quarry company owned by Robert Durward. Durward, along with a former advisor to Tony Blair, set up the group Scientific Alliance to "challenge many of the claims about global warming." In 2004, the group "co-authored a report with the George C Marshall Institute, a US body funded by Exxon Mobil, that attacked climate change claims." A UK High Court judge rejected Dimmock's request to ban the film, but did require schools showing the film to provide "Guidance Notes" to teachers, since the film touches on political issues. (The judge explained that his ruling "did not relate to an analysis of the scientific questions," though many news reports have confused the ruling, according to Tim Lambert.)

"Kettle Foods this week called in Hill & Knowlton to protect its bruised reputation following a widely criticised attempt to dissuade its workers from unionizing," reports PR Week. The PR firm's London office confirmed it is working for the upscale potato chip maker, "on a reactive basis." On October 1, The Guardian reported that Kettle Chips' UK owners had brought in the California-based Burke Group, "to dissuade the 340 workers at their Norwich factory from joining Unite, the country's largest union." Burke Group runs Omega Training, called "one of the leading US union-busters." News of the anti-union campaign led to calls to boycott Kettle Chips. The Norwich workers voted against joining the Unite union. A local labor organizer blamed the vote on the company's "long poisonous campaign not to join the union."

ArmeniaAs the U.S. House of Representatives considers a controversial resolution "recognizing as 'genocide' the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians in the former Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago," the Turkish government is increasing its Washington DC lobbying. Ankara is "spending more than US$300,000 a month on sophisticated public relations specialists and former Washington lawmakers to help defeat the measure," reports Asia Times. "The Turkish Embassy is paying $100,000 a month to lobbying firm DLA Piper, which is associated with former Democratic House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt, and $105,000 to the Livingston Group (connected to former Republican lawmaker Robert L. Livingston), and it recently paid public relations firm Fleishman-Hillard $114,000 ... a month." The Bush administration is opposing the Armenian resolution, saying its passage could harm U.S. military operations in Iraq. Most U.S. air cargo to Iraq, as well as fuel and vehicles, goes through Turkey. After the French parliament voted in 2006 to make the denial of the Armenian genocide a crime, Turkey severed military ties with France. After the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee passed the Armenian resolution, "Ankara ordered its ambassador in Washington to return home for 'consultations,' but says he has not been formally withdrawn."

"America should hire al-Qaeda's PR Agent," argues Matt Armstrong. Iraq, he says, has become "a stage" for "a new public diplomacy that insurgents understand, and the U.S. State Department doesn't. ... An Islamic version of the story of David and Goliath, IED videos posted on YouTube and elsewhere are the new 'war porn.' Whereas Americans are addicted to grainy green images of high-tech bombs raining down on the enemy, insurgent supporters prefer images of grassroots combat that sticks it to the Man. While insurgents effectively use images to generate and maintain support—even using graphics, banners, and music in their online videos—the United States clumsily shapes our public image with symbols like the newest 'Crusader castle' in the Middle East, otherwise known as the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad."

Karen Hughes, the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, has been using the term "diplomacy of deeds" to describe U.S. charitable activities aimed at winning hearts and minds overseas. Retired Foreign Service officer John Brown has some doubts. He agrees that "US charitable works, like the charitable works of other nations (we are, after all, not the only country that aids other nations), are often gratefully received by those whose lives are improved by them. ... But Hughes's diplomacy of deeds has severe limitations. First, it cannot automatically be assumed that ostentatious public displays of good deeds (and Hughes certainly makes sure that her actions are covered by the media) are always appreciated by the people for whom they are intended. ... Second, Hughes's overseas public service deeds, in the global scope of things, are of small significance, for they are those of an administration that (in the eyes of the world) has committed some of the most horrid deeds of this new century, ranging from an unjustified war of aggression on an impoverished third world country to the establishment of an detainee camp at Guantanamo where prisoners are not granted basic human rights."

Media activists in Grand Rapids, Michigan attended Shell Oil president John Hofmeister's recent talk there, on "How the US Can Ensure Energy Supply for the Future." Hofmeister "stated up front that he was on a 50 city tour and that Grand Rapids was number 45," according to Media Mouse. Hofmeister told the audience that there has been an "intolerant debate after Katrina" on energy issues, and that the goal of his local presentations is to "engage key audiences" and talk "to the American public about energy security." Hofmeister also met with Governor Jennifer Granholm in Lansing, and General Motors executives in Detroit, reported the Grand Rapids Press. During a local television interview, Hofmeister rejected the idea that he was in the oil industry: "We're in the mobility industry. ... We do bring fuels to the marketplace. Most of those fuels are today, and will continue to be, petroleum-based fuels. But we don't rule out bio-fuel." On October 25, Chevron CEO Dave O'Reilly will visit Los Angeles to speak about "Securing California's Energy Future."

"Three months prior to the announcement that Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner Jeffery S. Merrifield would be joining the Shaw Group Inc. as Vice President of its Power Group, Mr. Merrifield vigorously championed several major policy initiatives that directly benefited his future employer," states the watchdog group Project on Governmental Oversight (POGO) in a press release. A previous Spin of the Day noted that, as Commissioner, Merrifield supported reducing government and public oversight of new nuclear power plant construction. Shaw's website says the company is "a leading force in nuclear new plant design and construction." POGO adds that, "because Shaw is among the largest construction companies in the nuclear industry, few companies stood to benefit more from this initiative." Merrifield also pushed to "accelerate the approval process for new nuclear plant construction by, among other things, scaling back public hearings and public comment periods." Merrifield began working at Shaw just 12 days after leaving the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. POGO is urging the NRC, including the agency's Inspector General's Office, "to thoroughly investigate the circumstances surrounding Mr. Merrifield's actions."