John McCain, who has criticized (and then praised) evangelical Christians, and has announced that he is Episcopalian (and then Baptist), and has said that he would not (and then would) vote for a Muslim to be president, announced today that for the remainder of his campaign, he will be a committed follower of a different religious faith each month.

From Oct. 1 to Oct. 31, McCain said, he plans to be an Orthodox Jew. "I regret that I did not convert in time to celebrate Rosh Hashanah," he added.

McCain will be Roman Catholic in the month of November. "I am already looking forward to All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day," he said through a spokesperson.

Labels: flip-flops, John McCain, Political Spin, religion

Say what you will about Dubya, but he can sure put on a good show.

[Bush image by the AP; Flaming Lotus Girls image by John Curley.]

Labels: climate change, George W. Bush, global warming, Political Spin

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• PRWeek comes to Media Orchard's defense (PRWeek)
  
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In all social systems there must be a class to do the menial duties, to perform the drudgery of life. That is, a class requiring but a low order of intellect and but little skill. Its requisites are vigor, docility, fidelity. Such a class you must have, or you would not have that other class which leads progress, civilization, and refinement. It constitutes the very mud-sill of society and of political government; and you might as well attempt to build a house in the air, as to build either the one or the other, except on this mud-sill.

Fortunately for the South, she found a race adapted to that purpose to her hand. A race inferior to her own, but eminently qualified in temper, in vigor, in docility, in capacity to stand the climate, to answer all her purposes. We use them for our purpose, and call them slaves. We found them slaves by the common "consent of mankind," which, according to Cicero, "lex naturae est." The highest proof of what is Nature's law. We are old-fashioned at the South yet; slave is a word discarded now by "ears polite;" I will not characterize that class at the North by that term; but you have it; it is there; it is everywhere; it is eternal.

The Senator from New York [William Seward] said yesterday that the whole world had abolished slavery. Aye, the name, but not the thing; all the powers of the earth cannot abolish that.

God only can do it when he repeals the fiat, "the poor ye always have with you;" for the man who lives by daily labor, and scarcely lives at that, and who has to put out his labor in the market, and take the best he can get for it; in short, your whole hireling class of manual laborers and "operatives," as you call them, are essentially slaves.

The difference between us is, that our slaves are hired for life and well compensated; there is no starvation, no begging, no want of employment among our people, and not too much employment either. Yours are hired by the day, not care for, and scantily compensated, which may be proved in the most painful manner, at any hour in any street of your large towns. Why, you meet more beggars in one day, in any single street of the city of New York, than you would meet in a lifetime in the whole South.

We do not think that whites should be slaves either by law or necessity. Our slaves are black, of another and inferior race. The status in which we have placed them is an elevation. They are elevated from the condition in which God first created them, by being made our slaves. None of that race on the whole face of the globe can be compared with the slaves of the South. They are happy, content, unaspiring, and utterly incapable, from intellectual weakness, ever to give us any trouble by their aspirations.

Yours are white, of your own race; you are brothers of one blood. They are your equals in natural endowment of intellect, and they feel galled by their degradation.

Michael Medved, in 2007.

[For the Rick Murrays of the world, Ebenezer Mortimus Michael Medved is fictional; the real "Cotton is King" speech was made by James Henry Hammond.]

Labels: apologists, Michael Medved, Political Spin, slavery

Beating its large-agency competitors to the punch, Edelman extended its leadership in all things Web 2.0 today by announcing the launch of its Aerial Reputation Management Practice.

The new practice was inspired by the U.S. Navy's decision to camouflage -- at the cost of $600,000 in landscaping and other changes -- the appearance of 40-year-old barracks that happen to resemble a swastika when viewed on Google Maps.

"Our research indicates that many large organizations in both the public and private sectors have not given adequate consideration to their aerial reputations," said Edelman chief Richard Edelman. "We think we should be able to scare up a few bucks off of this one."

As an example of the challenge that could be facing many Fortune 500 corporations, Edelman's research team provided the following aerial photograph of Exxon Mobil headquarters:



"While Exxon Mobil's facility, at ground level, is stately and uncontroversial, from the air it bears an uncanny resemblance to a scientific illustration of carbon dioxide," Edelman said. "Obviously, this could be a bit awkward if not managed properly."

For a limited time, Edelman will provide a complimentary helicopter consultation with every Aerial Reputation Management Practice engagement -- so call today.

Labels: Edelman, Exxon Mobil, global warming, Marketing Views, public relations, reputation management, swastika

• What are Hollywood's values? No -- it's not a trick question (The Newshoggers)
  
• Comcast customer service rep: We don't give a crap (The Consumerist)
  
• Geoff Livingston lets you decide on the Buzz Bin's redesign -- typical consultant... (The Buzz Bin)

Thank God. And the best part is, if it doesn't lead to democracy in Iraq, it might just lead to democracy here at home.

Labels: Ed Morrissey, Erick Erickson, Iraq, Michelle Malkin, Political Spin, surge

• Is the end of the video news release nigh? (Strategic Public Relations)
  
• Wow, what a hot model -- oh nevermind, it's an anorexia awareness campaign (adfreak)
  
• Katie Couric vs. the blogosphere (WebProNews)
  

1. Because they make you like everyone else.

--

BURNED-OUT A-LISTER: Look. You've got it all wrong. You don't need to follow me. You don't need to follow anybody! You've got to think for yourselves. You're all individuals!

B- THROUGH Z-LISTERS: Yes, we're all individuals!

BURNED-OUT A-LISTER: You're all different!

B- THROUGH Z-LISTERS: Yes, we're all different!

ORCHARDO: I'm not.

(Yep -- stolen; er, a tribute.)

Labels: blogging, Life of Brian, Marketing Views

Well, if Albania counts...

Labels: Coalition of the Willing, George W. Bush, Iraq, Kid Nation, Political Spin

Are you a female high school dropout, between the ages of 16 and 25? Are you tired of doors being slammed in your face? Are you tired of lying around in bed all day with nothing to do? Well, you never need get up again, because in six short weeks, Velvet Jones can train you to be a high-paying ho.

Sound too good to be true? Just send for Velvet's new book entitled, I Wanna Be a Ho.

Table of contents:

Chapter 1: Making your amateur porn tape
Chapter 2: Releasing your amateur porn tape on the Internet
Chapter 3: Denying you released your amateur porn tape on the Internet
Chapter 4: Taking a cut of the profits from your amateur porn tape
Chapter 5: Hanging out with successful hos
Chapter 6: Cutting a deal to be on the cover of Playboy
Chapter 7: Landing your own reality show

Velvet would be proud.

Labels: Celebrity Culture, Kim Kardashian, reality TV, sex tapes

What a stud.

Labels: Ahmadinejad, Columbia, Lee Bollinger, Political Spin

• 1,000 bikini babes assemble on beach to spell Cosmopolitan (Sidney Morning Herald)
  
• Buzz is not a measure (Copywrite, Ink.)
  
• Write a dirty story, make dirty money (Dreams of an Erotica Queen)
  
• Paris Hilton banned from Oktoberfest (The Superficial)
  

Hmmm. Apparently Ahmadinejad is right. Here's the research data, which shows no gay population in Iran:

Labels: Ahmadinejad, Columbia, gays, Iran, Political Spin, sex

Well, I've looked all over the damn place and I still can't find the cool kids.

Labels: bloggers, blogging, Marketing Views

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Construction began last Wednesday on a $35 million Florida children's hospital that will bear the Disney name -- a first for the brand. According to reports, Disney "imagineers" currently are working to "develop the patient experience."

I normally wouldn't presume to offer my pitiful, uncreative recommendations to someone who has earned the lofty title of "imagineer" ... but in this case, what the hell:


All patients will be assigned a PCC (Primary Care Character).



Semi-private rooms are standard.



Mealtime will patriotically showcase an all-American cuisine.




Disney's most treasured icons will chip in with patient care.



Uninsured patients will be escorted out of the building by Mickey himself.

Labels: Disney, Florida Children's Hospital, Marketing Views, Walt Disney World

Damn, I love Google. Because of Google, we don't even have to argue why the following turns of phrase are trite; the number of search results for each of these overused word combinations proves the point for us.

So please, never again write a speech, blog post or op-ed piece containing the following words or phrases:

1. "despite, or perhaps because of"

2. "the [blank] effect"

3. "a perfect storm"

4. "wardrobe malfunction"

5. "threw up in my mouth a little"

6. "that's hot" (it's trademarked anyway, right?)

7. "not that there's anything wrong with that" (this is going to be a tough one for us)

8. "not so much"

9. "my bad" (this has been a long time coming)

10. "bling"

11. "keeping it real"

12. "at the end of the day" (the most overused phrase of 2006, officially)

13. "[blank] is the new [blank]"

Thank you.

Getty Images' decision last month to slash prices for Web use of stock photos has sparked an escalating PR war with its photographers -- one that we expect, as has been the case in Apple's misstep with consumers over iPhone pricing, will be a no-win situation for Getty.

The stock image market is in turmoil today, largely because of the disruptive forces of crowdsourcing -- microstock, citizen journalism and Flickr. Getty has responded by buying up startups like iStockPhoto and Scoopt, and now is looking to cannibalize at least a portion of its traditional business to increase its long-term competitiveness.

As Black Star Rising reported on Aug. 29, Getty specifically announced

a new Web-use price of $49 for a 500k 72DPI file of any of its images, regardless of brand or pricing model. This fee entitles the purchaser rights to use any selected RM image on any commercial or editorial Web site, e-mail, mobile devices or multimedia project for one year. RR buyers get the same rights for up to 10 years and rights to use an RF image in perpetuity.

Labels: Getty Images, iPhone, Marketing Views

In the wake of the political nonsense over a pretty standard attack ad by MoveOn.org, I thought it might be interesting to look at a few of the far nastier political advertisements not deemed worthy of a Congressional condemnation:

1. George Bush the Elder's race-baiting Willie Horton ad:



2. Paul Nelson's ad attacking Wisconsin Congressman Ron Kind:



3. "Harold, call me..."



4. David Zucker's ad trashing Clinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright:



5. The one that started it all: LBJ's Daisy Girl:



These were found in five minutes on YouTube. As we all know, there are many, many more like them. So thanks for wasting our time with more political showboating, Congress.

Maybe somebody should make an attack ad on that.

Labels: general petraeus, moveon.org, Political Spin, resolution

• Whatever happened to Crazy Eddie, Little Miss Coppertone, and other real-life advertising icons? (mental_floss)
  
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• An interview with Scoopt's founder: Will Scoopt put local newspaper photographers out of work? (Black Star Rising)

This kid getting the snot beaten out of him really doesn't rank with the great civil rights cases of the 1960s -- and yet, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson were delighted to declare the cause of the "Jena 6" the dawn of the "21st century civil rights movement."

Talk about back to the future.

The real reason Sharpton and Jackson are so happy is because, to them, every public policy issue that concerns race is a nail -- and they've been using the same old hammer for decades. When someone who's black takes a different approach, they feel threatened.

To cheer for another century of 1960s-style civil rights protests is to rally for pessimism and failure. What we should cheer for is the day when such race-based protests will seem as alien to us as slavery, public lynchings and other sad relics of our past.

No -- we're not there yet. But we've gone about as far as we can go with polarizing leaders like Sharpton and Jackson at the helm.

(Snopes tries to separate fact from fiction on the incident.)

Labels: al sharpton, jesse jackson, Political Spin

The Rev. Jesse Jackson accused presidential candidate Barack Obama this week of "acting like he's white."

Now, in an exclusive report, Media Orchard has obtained the contents of Rev. Jackson's dossier on Obama, featuring damning evidence of the Illinois senator's whiteness:


He dresses white.


He watches TV white.


He listens to music white.


And most vexing to the Rev. Jackson, he's popular with whites.

This is shocking stuff. Thank God we have Rev. Jackson around to make sure that black people only do and say "black" things.

Labels: barack obama, jesse jackson, Political Spin, stereotypes

• If you've got naked pictures floating around out there, don't act holier-than-thou on Tyra (iFilm)
  
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First they came for the suspected terrorists,
and I didn't speak up,
because I wasn't a suspected terrorist.

Then they came for the illegal immigrants,
and I didn't speak up,
because I wasn't an illegal immigrant.

Then they came for the war protestors,
and I didn't speak up,
because I wasn't a war protestor.

Then they came for the civil libertarians,
and I didn't speak up,
because I wasn't a civil libertarian.

Then they came for me,
and by that time there was no one
left to speak up for me.

I wrote this update of Martin Niemoller's poem before I discovered the Lonely Goth's version, which I like better.

Farmer Andrew Marsinko and his goose posed for a photograph to promote the State Fair of Virginia back in 1996. The photographer subsequently licensed the image to a stock photo agency, and a decade later it wound up on a gag greeting card with the following text:

Since it's your birthday, you decide --
Would you rather get spanked ... or goosed?

Labels: andrew marsinko, Media News, stock photography

It's called Armed Madhouse. Here's the blog of the author, Greg Palast.

Who is Palast? According to some, he is the best investigative reporter in America -- although he's mostly worked for British outlets such as the BBC and Guardian newspapers. As Asia Times puts it: "The top investigative journalist in the United States is persona non grata in his own country's media."

In his latest book and elsewhere, Palest has produced evidence that:

• Jeb Bush rigged Florida's vote in the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections;


• John Kerry was cheated out of Ohio and New Mexico as well;


• the invasion of Iraq was directly tied to U.S. petroleum policy.

Labels: greg palast, john kerry, Political Spin, taser