Tent

Shades of Rudy G. What PR bonehead thought it was a good idea to set up an undersized tent outside Gracie Mansion so New York mayor Eric Adams could proclaim his innocence in the federal case lodged against him.

The tent was packed shoulder-to-shoulder by preachers and activists who sang praises of the embattled in-over-his-head Mayor. The falling rain encouraged them to nudge closer to each other to avoid the raindrops.

The tent was more suited for a beach. It was out-of-place for such a momentous occasion. Adams is the first sitting Big Apple mayor to face a federal indictment.

His defense against the charges of bribery, conspiracy, fraud, and seeking foreign campaign donations deserved a grander stage. The grand ballroom at the Roosevelt Hotel in midtown would have been a proper setting for Adams. Since the Roosevelt these days is a migrant intake center, arrangements could have been easily made.

Instead the press conference held by the swaggering mayor and good friend of Turkey had viewers reminiscing about Rudy Giuliani’s “Four Seasons Total Landscaping” press conference fiasco in Philadelphia.

At least, the Adams event wasn’t held across the street from a crematorium and steps from an adult book story.

Rudy, though, didn’t have to deal with hecklers.

Creating a PR diversion… Humiliated by the Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz lunatic wing of the Trump party, House Speaker Mike Johnson needed Democratic support to pass a last-ditch measure to avert a partial government shutdown.

So what does Johnson do to gain some mojo? He sends a letter to Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky demanding the immediate firing of its US ambassador Oksana Markarova.

Her crime: she played a part in arranging Zelensky’s visit to an ammunition plant in Scranton so he could thank its workers for the shells that are used to defend his country.

Johnson whined that the trip amounted to a campaign plug for the Democrats since Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro, a surrogate for Kamala Harris, attended the event and not one Republican attended.

The Speaker said the visit amounted to interference in the US election process. What chutzpah!

After reading the letter, Zelensky must have had a good laugh.

The House impeached Trump because he encouraged Zelensky to dig up some dirt on the Biden family ahead of the 2020 election.

Zelensky has better things to do than to deal with the petty Speaker of the House.

Hopefully, Johnson will return to his former role as an under-the-radar Congressman after Democrats retake control of the House in 2025.

BTW, it's standard operating procedure for the Army to invite politicians from districts that represent its industrial events. That’s why Shapiro, and fellow Democrats Sen. Bob Casey and Scranton Congressman Matt Cartwright attended the event.

Johnson should do some homework before he fires off a nasty letter.

Stagwell CEO Mark Penn is working to trash the “brand safety” concept of marketers, which prevents advertisers from placing ads alongside news stories or on platforms deemed to carry “unsavory content.” That ill-conceived notion is demonetizing quality journalism.

There’s plenty of news that might be unsettling to some as wars rage in Ukraine, Gaza, Lebanon, West Bank and Sudan. Half the world is conducting elections in 2024—a fair share of them will be hotly contested and challenged by losing parties. Meanwhile, the world is swept up in a wave of technological upheaval that has many people frightened about the impact of artificial intelligence in daily life.

While the need for informed publics has never been great, the idea of brand safety has led to a “blacklisting” of quality news platforms in favor of lighter fare.

Penn wants a “reset” on brand safety. Stagwell’s Harris polling unit released a survey on September 26 of 22,116 British adults, and a survey in May of 50K Americans.

That report “outed” brand safety. They found that ads placed adjacent to news topics such as politics, inflation and crime perform as effectively as those placed next to business, entertainment and sports stories.

The British survey found that Gen Z respondents, a key demographic group for advertisers, registered a 61 percent average purchase intent for brands whose ads were placed next to Middle East news stories. That topped the 59 percent score for news next to entertainment stories.

Via its “Future of News Initiative,” Stagwell is encouraging the investments in quality news journalism that are needed for a healthy news-advertising ecosystem.

Penn wants to end the “vicious cycle” in which quality news that informs citizens and tackles hard-hitting issues is severely underfunded, leading to the demise of media outlets.

He wants business leaders to work together to create a “virtuous cycle” where advertisers and consumers support news.

His message: when quality journalism thrives, brands reach valuable audiences to drive bottom line results, and citizens receive information they need to made sense of the world.

That is a world in which quality PR thrives.