Front Groups

Playing the Anti-Consumer Card

by Diane Farsetta — March 23, 2007 - 4:15pm

University of California at Berkeley senior staff attorney and senior fellow at the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology Chris Hoofnagle writes, "In my work on consumer protection, I have begun to recognize patterns" in the actions and arguments of corporations and

Main Source: 
Denialism.com, February 9, 2007

Out with the Old Front Groups & In with the New

by Bob Burton — March 21, 2007 - 3:54am

Two former food industry websites -- Best Food Nation and the Grow America Project -- are being merged and re-birthed as a new front group, the Center for Food Integrity (CFI).

Main Source: 
Food NavigatorUSA.com, March 20, 2007

Multifaceted PR Campaigns Grow on Trees

by Diane Farsetta — March 20, 2007 - 5:05pm

PR Week gave its "Public Affairs Campaign of the Year 2007" award to the Porter Novelli firm and the Abundant Forests Alliance, a front group for the "wood and paper products industry." The campaign was launched in response to "environmental activist" efforts to "change the foresting industry's procurement practices." The campaign's goal was to convince "col

Main Source: 
PR Week (print edition), March 12, 2007

Moore Spin: Or, How Reporters Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Nuclear Front Groups

by Diane Farsetta — March 14, 2007 - 9:52am
  • Topics: Activism, Front Groups, Nuclear Power, Video News Releases, Public Relations

    • "We just find it maddening that Hill & Knowlton, which has an $8 million account with the nuclear industry, should have such an easy time working the press," concluded the Columbia Journalism Review in an editorial in its July / August 2006 issue.

    Tracking the Front Group "Boomerang"

    by Jonathan Rosenblum — March 14, 2007 - 4:06am
  • Topics: Front Groups, Journalism, Education, Public Relations

    • Corporate front groups can cause a "boomerang effect" to their sponsors, damaging the reputations of companies like ExxonMobil, Merck, and PepsiCo, when the sponsor's role in misrepresenting issues is widely revealed.

    Appetite for Profit: An Interview with Michele Simon

    by Judith Siers-Poisson — February 28, 2007 - 11:16am
  • Topics: Advertising, Corporate Campaigns, Obesity, Front Groups, Corporations, Health, Marketing, Media, Politics, Public Relations, Science

    • In December 2006, I interviewed author Michele Simon about her book, "Appetite for Profit: How the Food Industry Undermines our Health and How to Fight Back." The excerpts below are from that original interview, which took place on WORT, community radio in Madison, Wisconsin. For more information on Michele and her work, please visit her website.

    Judith Siers-Poisson (JSP): How did you personally become so involved and interested in food politics?

    Michele Simon (MS): It started about 10 years ago when I was struggling with my own weight and turned to a vegetarian diet and, lo and behold, I lost the weight I was struggling with. And then, from there, I started to learn all of the other ways our diet impacts our own health, in addition to the environment, animal welfare, and labor, and so many aspects of society -- I was just amazed at how much was impacted by those food choices.

    Texas Coal Showdown Spawns Multiple Front Groups

    by Diane Farsetta — February 15, 2007 - 6:28pm

    "The politics of Texas power and pollution have moved suddenly into the living rooms of millions of Texans," over "electric companies' plans to build 16 coal-burning plants using conventional technology that pollutes more than a newer coal system." In addition to lobbying, interested parties are launching ad campaigns and websites and forming new "pressure groups." Campaigning for the coal plants are: Texans for Affordable and Reliable Power, which receives funding from the Dallas-based

    Main Source: 
    Dallas Morning News, February 15, 2007

    Moore's Mission: Save Entergy's Nukes

    by Bob Burton — January 13, 2007 - 2:58pm

    One-time Greenpeace activist turned corporate PR consultant, Patrick Moore, has been hired by a Vermont group called Vermont Energy Partnership to help win a

    Main Source: 
    Reformer (Vermont), January 11, 2007

    The Path to a Pink Slip

    by Sheldon Rampton — January 2, 2007 - 12:35am

    As a reporter for Environmental Science and Technology (ES&T), a small industry trade publication, Paul Thacker discovered an entire industry built around spinning science for the purpose of confusing the public while benefiting big business. He wrote exposés documenting the tobacco and oil industry ties of Steven Milloy's junkscience.com, which purports to debunk bad science about issues such as global warming.

    Main Source: 
    America's Investigative Reports (PBS), November 10, 2006

    Trans Fat Spin Doctors Chart Legislative Risks

    by Jonathan Rosenblum — December 19, 2006 - 1:31pm

    The spin-driven restaurant and beverage industry front group, the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF), has created a grass roots compilation of city, county and state efforts to ban added trans fats in restaurant food.

    Main Source: 
    Center for Consumer Freedom, December 15, 2006
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