Flack's Revenge

Obama v. Media: Is Tiff with Fox well Advised?

There was a good article in the NY Times Sunday Week in Review, The Battle is Joined; Now What? about the Obama administration's much talked-about dust up with the Fox News.  According to the story:

Administration officials seemed to have decided that they had had enough.

“We’re going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent,” Anita Dunn, the White House communications director, said in an interview with The New York Times. “As they are undertaking a war against Barack Obama and the White House, we don’t need to pretend that this is the way that legitimate news organizations behave.”

The article analyzed the situation within the historical context of past presidential media wars.  For example, it brought up the Nixon administration, one that was famous for its paranoia.  (To put clients in the right frame of mind in our media training sessions, we start off with famous quotes about the media; e.g. Nixon's "The press is the enemy").

The story included words from Nixon VP Spiro Agnew about the media (“self-appointed analysts” at the Big Three networks exhibited undisguised “hostility” toward President Richard M. Nixon), but did not mention his famous quote denouncing the press as "nattering nabobs of negativism," one of my favorites.

We all know Fox has it in for Obama but does it make much sense for his administration to publicly declare war? Why turn a cold war into a hot war?  The elephant in the "unbiased media" room is that everyone knows there are biases, left and right leaning, and everyone plays favorites (or opposite) in their media initiatives accordingly.  As the article says:

... pretending has traditionally been a valuable part of the presidential playbook. Smiling and wearing beige even under the most withering news media assault is not only good manners, but also has generally been good politics... the history of administrations that have successfully taken on the media and won is shorter than this sentence.

It also cites a rule of thumb in political PR regarding battles: People who work in political communications have pointed out that it is a principle of power dynamics to “punch up “ — that is, to take on bigger foes, not smaller ones.

I'll add one more: Don't let them show you are sweating.  A president that is well known for his cool demeanor should not encourage his operatives to be so blatant about participating in media wars.

Now, you too can be a Political PR Playa

You love reading about their campaigns in all the major media. You aspire to their level of PR sophistication.  Although you realize that their world is harsh, unforgiving and demanding, you somehow covet their klieg lights and glory and believe that this is where the real PR action is.

Well, step right up, tech PR folks.  Now you too can learn about PR political style, and can adapt all their tools and techniques to your next tech PR campaign.  In one easy lesson I will teach you how to:

• Trick out your war room so that is has feeds and displays that rival CES and intelligence that is the envy of the CIA
• Craft position papers and conduct opposition research
• Leak with the best of them and go on deep background
• Drive the other side crazy with astroturf campaigns and dirty tricks
• Develop enemies lists
• Plant negative stories
• Hobnob with the power brokers and elite
• Dodge fire at press briefings and arrange photo opps
• Spew lines like "They're killing us in Detroit.  We need to rally our base and get you on Larry King, stat!" with aplomb

All kidding aside, I do hold a kind of bizarre fascination for political PR, which stems from my addiction to news and passion for politics.  I somehow wound up in tech PR, which kind of makes sense considering I studied and worked in tech previously.

It is an ambivalent feeling.  On the one hand I do think that many in political PR are on the cutting edge of our craft. Then again, it seems to be take no prisoners, cutthroat PR.  You can gather this from reading about the results of their campaigns and inferring what is going on behind the scenes.  Sometimes articles lay out PR tactics in gory detail.  Also, I had first-hand experience: the Obama campaign hired away one of our top guys last year for a "once in a lifetime opportunity" that amounted to a four month gig.  They insisted he decide and start immediately, and we were screwed out of the customary two week notice (hi Ben!)

There's a practice in business called benchmarking, in which managers study practices in diverse industries outside their own to see what they can learn.  Is it possible that the world of tech PR can learn something from political PR?

We can start exploring this question by examining the topic of astroturfing, the practice of contriving grass roots campaigns.  I saw an Op Ed piece in the NY Times which defended the practice and suggested that it is not all that different from plain old political organizing (actually, reading this gave me the idea for this post).

Food for thought? Or is the idea of co-opting political PR tactics for tech PR not a good one?

Matt Lauer Comes to the Defense of PR

It is interesting to watch and get a sense of the new Obama administration's communications style, to see if some of the tactics that proved to be  effective in campaign mode carry over to governing.

So far, I am encouraged to observe that they are aggressive and using all available means to communicate and defend their policies.

As an example, some of you may have caught the dust up with CNBC reporter Rick Santelli.   He had come out extremely critical of the administration's housing bailout plan.  See this Washington Post link for more context: Gibbs Takes on Santelli.  According to the article, in a wildly popular YouTube video, Santelli ranted and ended with:

"President Obama! Are you listening?" Santelli demanded.

Apparently someone in the White House was. In response, Gibbs attacked Santelli by name repeatedly, accusing him of not having read the president's housing plan and mocking the former derivatives trader as not being an effective spokesman for the little guy.

"I'm not entirely sure where Mr. Santelli lives or in what house he lives," Gibbs told reporters, his voice dripping with derision. "Mr. Santelli has argued -- I think quite wrongly -- that this plan won't help everyone. This plan will help, by the money that's invested in Freddie and Fannie, will drive down mortgage rates for millions of Americans."

Later, Gibbs added: "Now, every day when I come out here, I spend a little time reading, studying on the issues, asking people who are smarter than I am questions about those issues. I would encourage him to read the president's plan and understand that it will help millions of people, many of whom he knows. I'd be more than happy to have him come here and read it. I'd be happy to buy him a cup of coffee, decaf."

Agree or disagree with the administration, you have to admire their pluck and in particular Press Secretary Robert Gibbs'  defense.

On the Today Show this morning Matt Lauer interviewed Santelli.  Lauer noted that Rick had said he felt that Robert Gibbs was threatening him.  Although Rick tried to downplay this characterization, he did whine that it was unfair to be personally singled out and mentioned by Gibbs.

Here's the play by play below, and you can check out the YouTube video above:

Lauer:  If you go out of your way to call out the POTUS, you have to expect that  his representative may go out of his way to call you out.  Doesn't that go with the territory?

Santelli:  As a member of the press, do I not get to ask a question?

Lauer: And as the Press Secretary, doesn't he have the right to ask you a question?

Go Matt! (Santelli, if you want to call this blog out by name on national TV by all means, feel free!)

Obama, A Boon for Tech

They say all politics is local, my "neighborhod" is tech.

I don't want to appear to be myopic by focusing on just this aspect of the Obama administration amidst all the inauguration after glow.  But let's face it, the sector can use all the help that it can get, and it is great to have a President who really gets it when it comes to tech.

From his attachment to his BlackBerry, to his co opting of social media as a communications platform, to his views on building out our broadband infrastructure and healthcare information systems (see this Healthcare IT News piece), you can tell that Obama is literate and forward thinking when it comes to tech.

This Portfolio article talks about the positive reception for his FCC pick and links to Obama's Technology and Innovation Plan.

The right will continue to grouse that he is a liberal tax and spender, and find every way to undermine and criticize. 

Yet it is pretty clear that the government needs to continue to do its part in getting the economy going and part of this is spending on public works.  As I have long maintained, continuing to build out our information highway is no less vital than investing in physical infrastructure.  Other nations are ahead of us on this.  (People might think we are doing fine here, but weren't the Internet "pipes" slow yesterday - what did that do to productivity?  What about the digital divide and widespread availability of mobile broadband?)

And stimulating the development of better methods for pooling and sharing medical records will lead to dividends in fewer medical errors, better information for research, and ultimately better health care at lower costs.

Did Team Obama Flub its First Crisis Communications Test?

Opinion columnist Kirsten Powers thinks so, as she wrote in her piece NY Post piece Bungling on Blago yesterday.  According to Powers:

The Obama camp has managed to violate almost every tenet of crisis communications - starting with Rule No. 1: Get all the information out quickly, accurately and fully.

It's imperative that reporters don't learn something from a third party that you could have told them. And, in the era of nonstop news, "quickly" means within 24 hours...

Obama's response has been an exercise in dripping.

Blagojevich was arrested Tuesday, Dec. 9...In the intervening time, Obama has repeatedly stated defensively that he had no contact with the governor or his office and had not discussed the Senate seat, as if either would somehow be inappropriate.

In a Dec. 10 interview, he refused to say whether Blagojevich talked with his top aides: "It's an ongoing investigation. I think it would be inappropriate for me to . . . remark on the situation beyond the facts that I know."

But then, in a press conference the next day, he had no problem stating emphatically, "I'm absolutely certain . . . that our office had no involvement in any deal-making around my Senate seat" - and then said he needed to "gather all the facts" about what contact took place so he could release that info.

Which left everybody scratching their heads: How could he be "absolutely certain" if he still had to gather the facts?

The Obama team has sometimes claimed that it's holding off on giving details at Fitzgerald's request - and sometimes that it will talk specifics as soon as it has found exactly what contact occurred. Which is it?

She points out a couple of times that none of this should matter because there have not even been allegations about any improper involvement from the Obama camp.  Of course, there should be contacts and even some possible deal-making between Obama's staff and the governor's office over who will fill his seat (within appropriate and legal guidelines, of course).

She concluded:

The only scandal here, in short, is the way Obama's camp has mishandled the whole matter.

It is hard for me to argue with her logic.  At the same time I think that it is refreshing to see that there is after all a mere mortal with human flaws in Obama (hard to believe this, given all the positive coverage and heightened expectations). 

Hopefully he will be more focused on good policies and governing then on how he spins.

Blag Hair Day

I decided that I needed to put aside for a moment my deep thinking on the state of PR and tech to explore something really weighty, namely embattled Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich's hair.  It is something bizarrely fascinating, and it seems that even the serious news stories begin or end with an aside about his hair.

So, without further adieu, here are some of the better jokes I have heard (most come from last Saturday's SNL Weekend Update):

Frank Rich (while being interviewed on the Don Imus radio show this morning):  It's like its own warm up act.

Amy Poehler: It looks like you are wearing a toupee that is also wearing a toupee!

(Badum!)

Seth Meyers:

Is that really your hair or did you grow out your eyebrows and comb them up?

It's like you have a proceeding hair line

(Badum Badum!)

Amy Poehler:

It's like someone put the hair on backwards on one of the Fisher Price people.

The first time I saw you I thought you were walking away.

(Badum Badum!)

Little Known Facts about Blago's Hair

According to the NY Times, Blagojevich does not suffer underlings gladly - he

 ...can treat employees with disdain, cursing and erupting in fury for failings as mundane as neglecting to have at hand at all times his preferred black Paul Mitchell hairbrush. He calls the brush “the football,” an allusion to the “nuclear football,” or the bomb codes never to be out of reach of a president.

Chicago Sun Times reports that Blago's hair may be a sign of narcissistic personality disorder.

This Blog Supports Obama

Jolted out of my "it-has-been-a-few-days-and-I-have not blogged" torpor, it occurred to me that it is Election Day and I have not yet chimed in on my endorsement for president.  And that is not very fair to my readers, who I am sure have been anxiously awaiting the choice of the Flack vote.

It is probably not much of a surprise to you that I am voting for Obama - those who read this blog have seen in my occasional posts on politics that I lean left.

It is not that McCain is such a bad guy, perhaps a little misguided and his VP pick did not help, that's fer sure, you betcha.   There are many moderates like myself who might have voted for McCain otherwise.

(Didn't anyone ever tell Sarah that you don't pick fights with people who buy ink by the barrel? 

Take THAT! Liberal Mainstream Media! Take THAT, Sarah Palin!)

I am sure that those geniuses on the right who were so gleeful about the VP pick at the beginning (especially Larry Kudlow, who took credit for selling the idea to McCain on his radio show) now regret it. 

True, McCain was right about the surge in Iraq but has been way too hawkish and wrong in supporting the war from the earliest days of it.

I just don't buy all the arguments against Obama; clearly we need some major change.  I don't buy all the fear mongering about raising taxes, and his questionable associations. 

First off, I am pretty sure I heard that he said that all bets are off on raising taxes if the economy stays in the tank.  Second, I think way too much hay in general (on both sides) is made over taxes.  The cost of gas and heating oil probably hits the average suburban middle class family way worse than any increase that might eventually get adopted.  Tax policy gets thrashed about in the legislative process and the results generally do not significantly alter anyone's standard of living.

Over the weekend a couple of my friends asked me point blank: do Obama's ties to Wright, Ayers, etc. worry me?   Of course, but not to the point that it causes me to question Obama's character and what he might do as President.  These arguments smack of desperation, a little of the old IBM FUD factor to bring this back full circle to terms that resonate with my tech PR and marketing audience.  No, I do not think Obama is some Manchurian Candidate who will load his cabinet with far left extremists and abandon our commitment to Israel, as some would have us believe.

Bailout or Rescue Plan? Just Say the Magic Words

I wrote yesterday that branding happens, whether you set out to build a brand or not.

A corollary to this is that how you tell your story can just happen, too, unless you intentionally set out to pick the best possible words and story.

Some people cynically refer to this as spinning, and do so to malign the PR profession.  Apparently there is only one unvarnished version of "the truth," just waiting to be misshapen by evil flacks.

Well, news flash, the world is a bit more complicated than that.  And there is no better example of the power of words and a good story - and the high stakes that can be involved, and importance of getting your story right - than the current credit crisis, and our lawmakers' attempts to find a way out of the mess.

Some have said that the plan (note I am intentionally not using a modifier here) was doomed from the start because Paulson could not sell it.  I am sure his image as a swashbuckling titan of high finance did not endear him to a public that is getting increasingly disgusted with the excesses of Wall Street.

The NY Times said yesterday:

When the Bush administration announced its $700 billion plan to shore up the nation's shaky financial system, Treasury Secretary Paulson called it the Troubled Asset Relief Program.  Everyone else called it the bailout.  And, from that point on, its fate may have been set.

The article went on:

Since he unveiled the phrase on Sept. 19, it was used in just 23 television talk shows or public hearings transcribed in the Nexis database. By contrast, a Nexis search found 508 mentions of the phrase “Wall Street bailout” in that period.

In another article Lessons from a Credit Crisis: When Trust Vanishes, Worry, the Times said:

But there is good reason for the public’s skepticism. The experts and policy makers who so desperately want to take action have failed to tell a compelling story about why they’re so afraid.

When Bush decided to get personally involved in selling the program, his words were derided as a PR tactic in the Times article President Bush Calls it a Rescue, But Others are Sticking with Bailout.

In a stark example of the way language is used as a public relations tactic, Mr. Bush and other government officials have characterized the measure in positive terms — “rescue plan” and “asset relief program” — thereby carefully avoiding more loaded words like “bailout.”

The media, by and large, did not follow Mr. Bush’s lead. On Sunday, a Google News search conjured more than 157,000 results for “bailout,” and only 42,000 for “rescue plan.”

The terminology of the financial crisis is particularly important because of the emotions the words can stir in readers and listeners. The Hill, a Capitol Hill newspaper, suggested that the bailout label was a “major reason why constituents flooded Capitol Hill offices with phone calls and e-mails, overwhelmingly urging lawmakers to reject it.”

An interesting perspective: the President's words are a PR tactic, yet the word choice  of those fighting the plan are not?

Some portrayed the failure of Congress to act as a crisis in leadership, and evidence of Bush's low popularity and waning power.  I think it was also an object lesson in what can happen if you don't get the story right.

The Sarah Palin "Money Shot"

Call me crazy, but I have carefully reviewed and compared Sarah Palin's and Miss South Carolina's interview performances and I am starting to suspect that these two might in fact be one and the same person.  Have you ever seen them in a room together at the same time?

This judgment is drawn not just from superficial characteristics - their poise and good looks, the fact that both are beauty queens.  I have closely examined unique characteristics in vocal patterns and syntax.

Watch this hilarious video on Prometheus Unbound.  Also, see below, and let me know if you disagree:

Question for Miss South Carolina: Recent polls have shown that a fifth of Americans can't locate the U.S. on a map. Why do you think this is?

Her answer (thanks, Career Life Times )

I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uh, some, uh, people out there in our nation don't have maps and, uh, I believe that our ed- education, like such as in South Africa and, uh, the- the Iraq everywhere, like such as, and I believe that they should, uh, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S. or- or- should help South Africa and should help the Iraq and the Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future. 

Katie Couric asked Sarah Palin why the physical proximity of Alaska to Russia qualifies  as foreign affairs experience.

Her answer (thanks, NY Times):

That Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country, Russia, and on our other side, the land — boundary that we have with — Canada...

Ms. Couric went on to ask the governor if she had ever been involved in negotiations with her Russian neighbors.

“We have trade missions back and forth,” Ms. Palin said. “We — we do — it’s very important when you consider even national security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the airspace of the United States of America, where — where do they go? It’s Alaska. It’s just right over the border.”

Can you tell the difference?

Seriously, I do have some sympathy for Ms. Palin.   Gibson and Couric both seemed like they were suffering from severe constipation when interviewing Palin.  Their stiff demeanors belied the glee they both must surely have felt as they successfully tripped her up.  You can almost envision them huddling with their producers in advance, wondering how they can get that Sarah Palin money shot.

But then, she was packaged and sold to us as a poised and articulate candidate who is ready for the national stage and possibly even the presidency.

McCain's campaign needs to get her prepped and do some media training, and do it fast.