Happy Fourth of July to all our readers. The next issue of the Newsletter will be July 12.
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SOS INT’L LANDS BIG PENTAGON ACCOUNT.

SOS International, a New York-based “management consulting” firm that has handled work from counter intelligence training to linguistics for the FBI, NSA and private companies, has emerged from a lengthy review to monitor foreign media for the U.S. Strategic Operations Command known as STRATCOM.

The contract had been held by The Rendon Group, which was in the last stages of a 15-month $8M contract.

The new contract with SOS caps at a whopping $67M. Bid documents indicate a $5.25M budget for 2007 that could grow to about $18M a year through ’10.

SOS, which has an office in Reston, Va., is charged with tracking foreign press in several languages across Europe, Latin America, Middle East, Asia and Mexico with a focus on the so-called Global War on Terrorism. The company did not return a call.

SOS has supplied anti-money laundering training to the United Nations in Nigeria and was one of four companies awarded a multimillion-dollar contract with the FBI last year to provide training and role players to support the Bureau’s nationwide counterintelligence training program. It also supplied a team of linguists to Kellogg, Brown & Root in Uzbekistan and was a subcontractor for the National Security Agency.

A swath of companies in and around the PR industry took an interest in the assignment, including Lincoln Group, TV Eyes, Delahaye, Factiva and Carma Int’l, along with dozens of consulting shops.

The Pentagon declined a request by this website for the names of companies submitting proposals.

MERCK’S WAINWRIGHT TO TYCO SPINOFF.

Joan Wainwright, Merck’s VP-PA, has exited that post to take on the senior VP-PA and communications slot at Tyco Electronics.

TE is to be spun off from Tyco International in the first quarter of ’07.

Wainwright’s job is to help create a brand, culture and mission for the $12.2 billion publicly traded company that will have more than 90,000 employees.

Merck has initiated a search for a Wainwright’s replacement.

Former Fleishman-Hillard executive Doug Dowie has filed a motion of acquittal in U.S. District Court, claiming the government had insufficient evidence and failed to prove the crimes charged in the indictment of the former Los Angeles PR chief. A hearing is set for July 24.

KOMISARJEVSKY JOINS APCO.

Chris Komisarjevsky, former CEO at Burson-Marsteller, has joined APCO Worldwide's New York office, where he will counsel the Washington, D.C.-based firm’s corporate, financial and investor relations clients. He will work closely with fellow former PR firm CEO Kirk Stewart, who headed Manning, Selvage & Lee before switching to Nike.

Komisarjevsky, 61, was appointed CEO of B-M in ’98 and exited in ’04. Before B-M, he served as president of Gavin Anderson, and CEO of Hill & Knowlton’s Europe, Middle East and Africa operations.

APCO Margery Kraus issued a statement that praised Komisarjevsky’s global prospective in mergers and acquisitions, and corporate restructurings.

Chris and Reina Komisarjevsky wrote "Peanut Butter and Jelly Management: Tales of Parenthood Lessons for Managers” in ’03.

SIX VIE FOR SCAG ACCOUNT.

Six firms are considering a challenge to incumbent Cerrell Associates for a six-figure PR contract with the Southern California Association of Governments.

MWW Group, Consensus Planning Group, Burson-Marsteller, VPE PR, Lee Andrews Group, and Pacific Municipal Consultants all attended a pre-bid conference last week for the contract, which is worth $500K over two years – one year at $250K plus an option.

The regional entity wants a firm to boost its four-person communications team. Cerrell Associates hashandled the contract for nine years.

NEW BYLAW INVITES LEGAL PERILS.

The Central Michigan chapter has been told by PRSA COO Catherine Bolton that Assembly delegates would be “personally liable for any damages caused by an action taken by the Assembly” should the Assembly adopt the chapter’s proposal to transfer power from the board to the Assembly.

Under a bylaw change sent to PRSA h.q. April 19, the Assembly would become the “ultimate policy-making body” of PRSA.

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BENADOR PLACED IRANIAN BADGE STORY.

Benador Associates, the New York-based neoconservative PR firm, was behind the May 19 story about Iran adopting a dress code for “infidels,” Eleana Benador told The Nation (July 3).

She said her firm placed that story in Canada’s National Post. Written by Iranian Amir Taheri, a member of BA’s speakers’ bureau, the article reported that “Jews would be marked with a yellow strip of cloth sewn in front of their clothes while Christians will be assigned the color red.”The NP website ran a poll that accompanied the piece, asking “Is Iran turning into the new Nazi Germany.” The New York Post ran Teheri’s story that was also picked up by Rush Limbaugh, Drudge Report and right-wing bloggers.

The Iranian Embassy categorically denied that any law had passed requiring religious minorities to wear colored badges.

Iran also summoned the Canadian Ambassador in Tehran to protest remarks by Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He said the dress code “reminds people of Nazi Germany.” Harper was forced to disavow those words on May 25 after the NP said the story was not true and apologized for the piece.

Taheri, for his part, blames the media for jumping the gun, claiming that such legislation is under consideration and may or may not be approved in the fall.

Benador told the Nation that accuracy is a luxury when it comes to Iran. “As much as being accurate is important, in the end it’s important to side with what’s right. What’s wrong is siding with the terrorists,” she said.

TOBACCO IS DRUG, SAYS PARRISH.

Altria Group, whose products include the best-selling cigarette Marlboro, was the subject of a cover story in the June 18 New York Times magazine in which senior VP Steve Parrish said he supports regulation of tobacco as a drug by the Food & Drug Administration.

The tobacco industry for many years argued that smoking was not addictive.

The NYT story said about 48 million Americans still smoke and that more than 400,000 smokers die each year of diseases caused by smoking.
Marlboro accounts for about 40% of cigarette sales, the article noted.

Interviewed at length for the article was Parrish, senior VP, corporate affairs, Altria, and with the company since 1990.

A J.D. graduate of the University of Missouri, Parrish heads the “corporate affairs strategies” unit of Altria, according to his bio on the company’s website.

He is involved in company efforts to “build bridges to a range of constituencies including health organizations, anti-smoking groups, civic organizations, the media and government.” He was named to his current post in 1995.

The NYT article, written by staffer Joe Nocera, who joined the NYT from Fortune magazine last year, says that Parrish’s pay, including salary, bonus, and restricted stock, “was valued by the company at more than $14 million” in 2005.

RADIO’S ‘DR. LAURA’ GETS PR HELP.

Radio talk show host Laura Schlessinger has hired MGP & Assocs. for PR and media relations work, Mike Paul, CEO of the New York-based firm told O’Dwyer’s.

Paul says there is a “huge audience” to be tapped for Schlessinger, who has a son serving in Iraq, including “military families and those interested in health and wellness.”

Schlessinger’s “Dr. Laura Show” was nationally syndicated in `94, and at its peak was the highest-rated talk show in the country trailing Rush Limbaugh.

Her anti-homosexual views (“biological error) and hard-right political views (against premarital sex, abortion and two-paycheck families) led many radio stations to drop her program including WABC-AM in New York. (Schlessinger can be heard in the NYC area on a low-powered Christian radio station in Hackensack, N.J).

A threatened boycott by gay activists helped kill Schlessinger’s programming deal with Paramount Television. The Schlessinger show debuted in September `00 and was pulled in March due to poor ratings and little ad support.

Paul is confident he can move beyond the controversy surrounding Schlessinger, noting that radio has dramatically changed since her high-profile dust-up and that there is a whole new generation of radio listeners waiting to be pitched.

The PR counselor also wants to extend Schlessinger’s brand to include her books, (“The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands”), speaking engagements and one-woman show.

VONAGE BOLSTERS IR TEAM AMID SCRUTINY.

Vonage America, the Internet telephone company that limped through its IPO last month, has bolstered its investor relations team with veteran Craig Streem.

Streem, who takes the role of SVP of IR for Holmdel, N.J.-based Vonage, was VP of IR for AON Corp. since 2004 and earlier did stints at Household International, Paine Webber and American Express Group.

BusinessWeek called the voice-over-Internet-protocol service provider’s May 24 public offering “disastrous,” a stumble which has its shares down 30 percent from the IPO and has opened the door for other criticism of Vonage’s operations, although the IPO raised more than $500M for the company.

Manning Selvage & Lee and Connors Communications have handled PR work for Vonage.

F-H PITCHES WWI MUSEUM.

Fleishman-Hillard is handling PR for the $26M expansion of Kansas City’s Liberty Memorial Museum, the only U.S. public museum dedicated to WWI.

The Museum opened on Armistice Day in 1926 with great fanfare as leaders from five allied powers—U.S., France, United Kingdom, Italy and Belgium—attended the ceremonies.

The facility fell upon hard times and was shut down in ’94 because of deterioration.

F-H’s trick is to get the public interested in a war fought almost a century ago, according to a recent Associated Press piece.

DENIRO EYES OBSERVER.

The New York Observer is going to be bought by actor Robert DeNiro’s Tribeca gang, according to New York magazine.

Publisher Arthur Carter, 75, has talked to more than 20 potential buyers, including the New York Daily News’ Mort Zuckerman, who planned to turn it into a Wednesday supplement so his media and mover & shaker friends “would look at his paper at least once a week.”

The money-losing, smart-alecky toned and opinionated weekly has a circulation in the 50K range.

Observer editor Peter Kaplan believes the paper would be “raking it in” if it had a professional sales team. It has similar demographics to the N.Y. Times, but “younger, more highly educated and more affluent.”

DeNiro’s gang includes his long time producer Jane Rosenthal and her real estate investor husband Craig Hatfoff.

EISNER INVESTS IN KID VID FIRM.

Dan Klores Communications reps Team Baby Entertainment, which is being acquired by the firm of former Walt Disney CEO Michael Eisner.

TBE creates DVDs with licensed footage of college sports and adapts the information as entertainment for toddlers and young children. The idea is to allow parents to share love of their favorite teams with their children.

The company has produced DVDs such as “Baby Irish” (Notre Dame), “Baby Longhorn” (University of Texas) and “Baby Wolverine” (University of Michigan). 

TBE also licenses with the NBA, PGA and NASCAR. The company is negotiating a deal with Major League Baseball.

Houston-based TBE was founded in ’05 by Greg Scheinman, a veteran of Miramax Films in New York.

Eisner set up Tornante Co. last year as a vehicle to invest in family entertainment ventures. The company’s name means “hairpin turn” in Italian.

TURCK NAMED PUB OF OLD HOUSE.

Matt Turck, who was associate publisher of Time, has been named publisher of Time Inc.’s This Old House Ventures unit. He assumes the post on July 10.

The 43-year-old executive is in charge of the first-run and syndicated TV series “This Old House,” “Ask This Old House” and “Inside This Old House” plus This Old House magazine and its website. The home enthusiast brand reaches more than 50M a month.

Turck succeeds Dan Robertson. He reports to Tom Beusse, president of Time4 Media.

HUMPREYS TAPPED FOR BLUEPRINT.

Sarah Humphreys, who was editing special issues of Real Simple and its cookbook, has joined Martha Stewart’s Blueprint as its editor.

She takes over for Rebecca Thuss, who left before the maiden issue of Blueprint hit the stands in May.

Sean Gardiner has exited the Sun-Sentinel for a reporter job at the Village Voice. The former Newsday staffer acquires the courts beat.

ELLE LAUNCHES MIDDLE EAST EDITION.

Elle has launched a Middle East edition offering “fashion advice for readers who wear loose-fitting abayas or chadors in public but want to look chic underneath and indoors,” according to the June 20 Wall Street Journal.

“We can mix the East and the West in fashion,” said Desiree Sadek, publisher of the Hachette Filipacchi Medias property.

The WSJ reports that women throughout the Middle East are wearing often- revealing attire indoors, and their social calendars are filled with women-only parties attended by women in slinky dresses and glimmering tube tops.

Many Arab women pick up copies of fashion magazines while traveling overseas. “It’s not uncommon to see women draped in black sitting at their local Starbucks reading Vogue,” noted the WSJ.

Elle is available on newsstands in Lebanon, Jordan and Morocco.

The magazine is slated to hit Saudi Arabia, the most conservative Middle Eastern state, in October. The Kingdom is the biggest fashion market in the Arab world as nearly 40 percent of its 27M population is under the age of 15.

Parents to launch in Indonesia

Meredith Corporation has inked a deal with Pt Metromakmur Sejahtera -- a subsidiary of Indonesian media company Mahaka Media -- to publish Parents magazine in the south Asian country.

MM will publish a local edition of the magazine in Indonesia's official language, Bahasa Indonesia. It will be distributed in the capital city of Jakarta and other large cities, starting in early 2007.

Meredith recently introduced Better Homes and Gardens in China.

PBS RELIES ON BG&R.

The Public Broadcasting Service, which is threatened by a 23 percent cut in its budget, has registered as a client of Barbour Griffith & Rogers, the well-connected Republican shop.

Bryan Cunningham, a former aide to Nevada Sen. John Ensign and chief staff member on the Republican High Tech Task Force; Jennifer Larkin, a staffer to ex-California Rep. and Rush Limbaugh guest host Bob Dornan, and Bill Viney, who has experience in Republican politics in Wisconsin are lobbyists for PBS.

On a GOP party-line vote, a House subcommittee approved the budget cut earlier this month. Paula Kerger, PBS CEO, said the cuts would "drastically reduce the programming and services public television and public radio can provide to local communities and that are greatly at odds with important national goals."

BG&R was founded by Haley Barbour, a former Republican National Committee chief and now Mississippi Governor, and Ed Rogers, who was deputy director of the Office of Policy Affairs in the Reagan White House.

It is owned by the Interpublic Group.

(Media news continued on next page)

People ___________________

Michael Kinsley, former editor of Slate, Harper’s and the New Republic, plans to join the Guardian (U.K.) as American editor-at-large in September.

Kinsley currently writes a column for the Washington Post and Slate. He was American editor for The Economist and co-host of CNN’s “Crossfire” for six years.

Kinsley was tapped to spearhead the paper's expansion in the States.

Matt Cooper, political editor of Time.com and former White House correspondent for the newsweekly, has joined Conde Nast Portfolio as Washington editor, starting in September.

He was formerly a Washington correspondent for Newsweek and wrote the “White House Watch” column for the New Republic.

Earlier, Cooper was Atlanta bureau chief for U.S. News & World Report and an editor at Washington Monthly. His wife is political operative Mandy Grunwald.

Susan Morrison, articles editor of The New Yorker and former editor-in-chief of the New York Observer, has been named fashion editor of The New Yorker in addition to her current duties.

Morrison joined the magazine in 1997 as a senior editor from Vogue, where she was features director from 1995-97. Previously, she was a founding editor of Spy magazine, and an editor at Vanity Fair.

Bonnie Fuller has signed a new three-year contract to continue as chief editorial director of American Media, Inc.

Fuller, who is credited as a key figure in the rise celebrity newsweeklies, oversees AMI magazines like Star, Shape and Men's Fitness.

She has spent the last three years with Star editor-in-chief Joe Dolce revamping the supermarket tabloid into a popular glossy magazine.

Fuller previously worked as the editor-in-chief of Wenner Media’s Us Weekly.

Former President Bill Clinton is writing a book on citizen activism and service to be published in the U.K. by Hutchinson in late 2007 or early 2008, The Random House Group announced. It will be published simultaneously in the U.S. by Knopf.

Briefs _____________________

Fox Cable plans a Chicago-based network to cover sports of the Big Ten college conference football, basketball and other activities. It also will air 60 hours of academic programming when it launches in the summer of ’07.

The New York Times will begin selling ads on the front of its Business Day section next month. They will run on a strip on the bottom on the page.

Bill Keller, editor of the Times, told staffers it was a tough decision. He said it came down to selling premium ads or losing more reporting slots.

The Times also may follow the lead of the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times and shrink the width of the paper next year in a cost-cutting move.

Business 2.0 names “You! The Consumer as Creator” as the most influential on its “50 Who Matter Now” list in its July issue.

“The collaborative intelligence of tens of millions of people, the network you-continually create, and filter new forms of content, anointing the useful, the relevant, and the amusing and rejecting the rest,” says the mag.

Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page follow the consumer. Paul Jacobs (Qualcomm CEO), Rupert Murdoch (News Corp.) and Steve Jobs (Apple Computer) round out the Top Five.

Dow Jones has established the Zawya Dow Jones News Service with ABQ Zawya. The Arabic-language entity will provide news, commentary and market analysis to financial professionals in the Middle East.

Rob Ruijter has been named interim CEO of VNU, the Dutch media combine and will remain chief financial officer until a replacement chief is found.

He succeeds Rob van den Bergh.

VNU is in the process of “going private” after the proposed $7B takeover of IMS Health collapsed in ’05.

Hallmark Publishing has launched a website for Hallmark Magazine, as the magazine prepares to hit newsstands with a September/October issue in late August.

The women’s lifestyle pub is said to be “about being real – not perfect.”

With more attention than usual turned toward Africa – the success of Somalia’s Islamist insurgents and CNN’s much talked about interview between Anderson Cooper and actress/Africa activist Angelina Jolie – the Chicago Tribune’s PR unit issued a press release on June 26 pitching its Africa correspondent Laurie Goering as an interview subject.

The Wall Street Journal and Chicago Tribune were given awards for excellence in news coverage of Asian American issues by the Asian American Journalists Association.

Journal staff reporter Geeta Anand's feature “The Most Expensive Drugs” and the Tribune’s Monica Eng, who wrote “Flameout: The Best-Selling Author Iris Chang,” were honored by the group for print.

Other awards were given in categories like online, photography and graphics.

Online magazine Slate has redesigned its format as it marks its 10th year. Automaker Nissan sponsored the unveiling of the redesign with a sitewide ad buy on June 26.

The new look was developed by New York-based design firm Helicopter.

PRSA national leaders and loyalist chapters are “circling the wagons” because of the Central Michigan proposal to wrest control from the national board and place it in the hands of the Assembly (i.e., chapters).

The board has barred any mention of the CM bylaw change on PRSA’s website or in Tactics or Strategist. Board members and loyalist chapter leaders are blocking any discussion within chapters until just before the Assembly Nov. 11 in Salt Lake City. They have been instructed to “play dumb” if queried about the proposal.

The actions prove that PRSA is woefully lacking in democratic practices.

Central Michigan says it wants to “transform PRSA into a more democratic organization” in keeping with the wishes of Assembly delegates and certain unidentified PRSA directors, as well as the spirit of America.

PRSA h.q. staff and leaders have been withholding news of the CM initiative since April 19 when it was delivered to h.q.

Ironically, both 2005 president Judith Phair and 2006 president Cheryl Procter-Rogers said they would make no attempts at reforms such as decoupling the board from the APR requirement until they first heard from the members.

But as soon as a chapter spoke up and tendered a reform, Procter-Rogers and her executive committee hit the chapter with legal threats, saying delegates could be liable for lawsuits and PRSA would have to pay the costs of revising its New York State charter.

A PR-type response would have been to reach out not only to CM but other chapters, asking what gripes members may have.

Both Procter-Rogers and Phair have refused to use the modern technology that is right under their noses to sample member opinion--blast e-mail.

The Society has 21,000 e-mail addresses of members and uses them to bombard members almost daily with all sorts of sales pitches and announcements.

These are classic behavioral patterns of dictatorships--endless propaganda and withholding of key information. Warning delegates that they will be legally liable if they take the power CM wants them to have borders on ludicrous. No board member, with the same liability, has ever been sued in the 59 years of PRSA. Besides, there is insurance to cover this.

PRSA’s reputation is getting so bad that its own board members are quitting and almost no one wants to be on the board or be an officer.
Ron Owens and Gary McCormick quit this year with years to go on their terms and only six people showed up for seven posts in this year's nominations.

We would also count as "resigned" Tom Vitelli, who last year ran for three offices and now suddenly lost all his ambition. He says he wants to spend more time with his family but he had the same family last year. Maybe he doesn't want his company's name or his name involved with PRSA, which distributes financial statements that are false or misleading in three major ways. He is with Intermountain Health Care and PRSA's 2006 secretary. Normally he would move up to treasurer. Owens and McCormick are also with major companies (Kaiser Permanente and Scripps, respectively).

No candidates showed up for the Northeast district, which includes the large Boston chapter (about 400 members).

Directors are unopposed for Tri-state, Sunshine and at-large. The candidate for Tri-state, which includes New York City and New Jersey, is Francis Onofrio, of Mason Onofrio PR, of the small town of Bethany, Conn. As for at-large, members from any of the ten districts could have sought a post on the board but only one made it his "primary" choice, Tom Eppes of Eric Moser and Assocs., Charlotte, N.C. Onofrio made it his "secondary" choice but he is the only candidate for Tri-state and can't be in two places at once. Same for Leslie Backus, Davie, Fla., the only candidate for Sunshine district.

Three directors are now seeking president-elect--treasurer Jeff Julin and directors Michael Cherenson and Anthony D'Angelo. Gerard Corbett of Hitachi and D'Angelo of Carrier are seeking treasurer which is in line to be president-elect.

Why is Hitachi allowing its name to be attached to PRSA is the question we would raise? Maybe the Japanese see Corbett as the "savior" of the organization, working from within rather than quitting like Owens and McCormick. Maybe PRSA would listen to Corbett and we hope he would correct the financial statements and initiate democratic practices.

If so, we shouldn't have to endure a year of governance by Rhoda Weiss, a solo practitioner who, as far as we can determine, works out of her home. She already has her hands full with her own business, teaching at UCLA and working on a Ph.D.

To our eyes, Weiss has disqualified herself as presidential material by failing to correct PRSA's false financial reports either as treasurer or as president-elect. She has based her PRSA career on avoiding the press so how can she suddenly be the industry spokesperson?

Julin is also not worthy of being president for the same reasons. These people do not realize what a bad odor they have given to PRSA and the profession.

As further proof of the undemocratic nature of PRSA, the period for commenting on Julin, Cherenson and D’Angelo as candidates for president-elect lasts only from June 23 to July 10. This is laughable since it's the July 4 holiday period and members have their minds on other things. PRSA leadership doesn't seem to want comments on the candidates and we don't see the candidates putting forth any platforms, either. No PRSA candidate ever has. We reached Julin and Cherenson and both said they are satisfied with the financials as audited by Sobel & Co. and both say the Central Michigan bylaw proposal will be handled via the normal timetable for Assemblies (meaning there will be no publicity on this from PRSA until October).

--Jack O'Dwyer