p.r. firms come under fire for advising some of the world's most controversial regimes that are taking advantage of a vulnerable climate in the arab world. that sleezy biggest placement a group of six sit down for a stellar examine the moscow region to prove they've got the right stuff to be the next mission to the i said this. this is the r.t. news channel it's nine pm friday night here in moscow welcome if you just joined us my name is kevin know and our top story fierce battles that reportedly rage across libya tonight between opposition and duffy forces on the so-called day of rage thousands are said to have been killed in the fighting the reuters news agency is reporting that the protesters are known control of the airport in the largest oil rich forth ruslan of moving towards the capital in tripoli meantime place have used tear gas and live ammunition to disperse hundreds who pulled into streets after prayers demanding khadafi steps down in support has issued an international alert f

p.r. firms under fire for helping whitewash some of the world's most unpopular regimes including the dolphins. it's not easy being a spaceman just i just ask these guys are through six sit down for a stellar exam in the last hour region of who they've got the right stuff to lead the next mission to the i.o.c. . we're bringing you news around the clock from around the world and that treasure this is our t.v. it's six pm in moscow fierce battles are reportedly raging across libya between opposition and gadhafi forces with dozens said to have been killed in the town of zawiya west the capital in the town of benghazi thousands of gathered demanding get out these removal on a so-called day of rage witnesses say the largest oil rich port newfies under attack and heavy artillery in the capital tripoli security forces used tear gas in the live ammunition to disperse crowds of protesters who poured into the streets after prayers meanwhile u.s. and u.k. are becoming increasingly isolated as they ref

p.r. firms under fire for helping whitewash some of the world's most unpopular regimes including. and it's not easy being a spaceman just as these guys are a crew of six sit down for a stellar examine the moscow region the crew they've got the right stuff to be the next mission and international space station. and that of many of giant roussel rejects the offer to sell twenty percent stake in the north nickel back to the company find out more on that another business news in twenty minutes time. five pm in moscow bring you news around the clock from around the world this is our t m matras or our top story the u.s. and u.k. becoming more isolated as they refused to rule out intervention in libya germany has joined international voices opposing foreign military action washington massing its forces off the libyan coast claims it's keeping all options on the table and ready to step in if the crisis deepens hardy's policy or has more. well i'm standing here on the border crossing between trinit

p.r. . tricks good evening it's monday march seventh seven pm here in washington d.c. i'm lucy coughing up and you're watching our t.v. and when it comes to the american dream visions of the white picket fences are front and center but for decades those fences have been propped up by the government largely through fannie mae and freddie mac. now since taking over these emperor to enterprises in the wake of the housing crisis the federal government is now backing ninety per cent of u.s. mortgages but with new proposals the message of the obama administration is sending seems clear this country can no longer afford to prop up the middle class lester explains. the american dream. to be a bar home and provide for your family so we saw by the way picket fence it's that traditional vision of homeownership central to living the dream like the many people we have in the faberge which is turned into a nightmare for millions of americans who've lost their homes to foreclosure or are facing it now pe

p.r. firms come under fire for helping whitewash some of the world's most unpopular regimes including get the thieves. it's not easy biggest place but a crew of six sit down for a stellar exam in the moscow region to prove they've got the right stuff to lead the next mission the suspects. this is r t very good evening my name is kevin owen it's now eight pm here in moscow our top story tonight for you fierce battles are reportedly raging across libya between opposition and gadhafi forces with dozens said to have been killed in the town of zawiya west of the capital in the capital itself tripoli security forces have used tear gas and live ammunition to disperse hundreds of protesters who poured out onto the streets after prayers witnesses say the largest oil rich port rustler an officer under attack from heavy artillery tonight and in the town of bint ghazi thousands have gathered demanding gadhafi is removal on the so-called day of rage interpol's issued an international alert for the liby

p.r. firms are cashing in on the unrest. the influence of p.r. companies in distorting the truth is well known in hollywood movie wag the dog a p.r. agent engine is a war to distract from the president's plan during the debate to show the world the country. think of and sometimes truth is stranger and much more damaging than fiction spin has been crucial in middle eastern politics for many many years i mean spin is what took britain into the iraq war for example crass headlines about weapons of mass destruction and in forty five minutes p.r. industry experts reckon the majority of the arab states in turmoil bahrain egypt libya have some kind of representation in a london p.r. firm and the reason they come here and that kind of regulation while in the u.s. if a p.r. company takes on a foreign government it has to register the fact with the department of justice in the u.k. there's no such rule. if you're a foreign government looking for representation in london look no further than bellhops

p.r. firms under fire for helping to drive wash some of the world's most unpopular regimes including moammar gadhafi. it's not easy being to spaceman a crew of six sit down for a stellar exam in the moscow region to prove they've got the right stuff to lead the next mission to the i assets. news around the clock from around the world four pm in moscow i match reza good to have you with us here on our t.v. the u.s. and u.k. are becoming more isolated as they refused to rule out intervention in libya germany has joined international voices opposing foreign military action washington massing its forces off the libyan coast claimed it's keeping all options on the table that are ready to step in if the crisis deepens archies policy or has more. plans ending here on the border crossing between china sea and libya every year and it certainly is a growing sense here that as the situation in libya deteriorates so too does the possibility for foreign intervention grow now the u.s. president barack o

p.r. firm has come under fire for devising some of the world's most controversial regimes and taking advantage of a vulnerable climate in the arab world right now as we report plus it's not easy being a space when a crew of six sit down for a stellar exam in a moscow region the crew they've got the right stuff to meet the next mission to the i s s. i know you're watching the r.t. news channel at eleven pm moscow time this friday night my name is kevin now in our top story fierce battles have broken out across libya today between opposition and gadhafi forces on the so-called day of rage dozens are said to have been killed in the fighting meanwhile the u.s. and u.k. are becoming more isolated as they refused to rule out intervention in libya artie's paula slayer is on the choosing libyan border with more. i am on the libyan she has the on board of ems throughout the course of the day around two thousand refugees made their way through here they come in with stories of intimidation on the ot

p.r. firms under fire for helping whitewash some of the world's most unpopular regimes including gadhafi. it's not easy being spacemen just ask these guys a crew of six sit down for a stellar examine the moscow region to prove they've got the right stuff to leave an exhibition on the i asked for high oil prices an optimistic job lists dates in the united states have meant a strong week for russia the most extending the week one percent up the other has three point eight percent up that's despite friday's session being slightly negative more of that around twenty minutes time. news around the clock from around the world seven pm in moscow good to have you with us here on r t fierce battles reportedly raging across libya between opposition forces and forces with a dozen said to have been killed and that's how it was a week west of the capital in the capital tripoli security forces have used tear gas and live i mean ition to disperse hundreds of protesters who poured into the streets after th

p.r. firms come under fire for advising some of the world's most controversial regimes and taking advantage of a vulnerable climate in the arab world right now. and it's not easy being a space one a crew of six sit down for a stellar exam in the moscow region to prove they got the right stuff to lead next mission to the us. this is r.t. it's ten pm friday night here in moscow my name is kevin owen you're most welcome to the program our top story fierce battles have broken out between libya across libya between opposition and gadhafi forces on the so-called day of rage dozens are said to have been killed in the fighting today meanwhile more updates the u.s. and u.k. are becoming more isolated as they refused to rule out intervention in libya. as i said just now is on the news in the libyan border will be crossing the shortly as soon as we get a line through here on r t tonight should be bringing us up to date with the very latest well another news lines of this something else has come out t

p.r. is revolt pools in the middle east and north africa in sports or spin doctors being recruits its own way the plugs. out as america's top diplomat hillary clinton campaigns for funds are missing america's news in the media war we look at the u.s. as cards spending the cash washington's message. and i was well can see this is all to see life from moscow now there's increasing speculation the u.s. and u.k. could intervene in libya with the use of force president obama said he's keeping all options open and is ready to act if the crisis deepens washington has already increased its minute your presence in the region still has more of a situation. the u.s. has already sent walsh have reached the mediterranean and are making their way towards libya we're hearing that four hundred u.s. soldiers are in the mediterranean right now ready to board these warships at the same time the british prime minister david cameron calling for a no fly zone there are many other an international community who

so as p.r. spin masters now outnumber journalists four to one in america to say that journalism and that is dead we accepted this new norm and learn how to live and work with it or is there still something that can be done maybe like looking organizations that leak rather than just stand joining me to discuss the discourse for chambers lecture at georgetown university and author of the blog at her venture chris thanks so much for joining us i mean now if you think about it if you go into p.r. you probably work less and you probably make a whole lot more money than you do if you're a journalist so can we say they were really shocked that people are choosing to go to p.r. instead well not really i mean they're oh no i mean if you're in the market and given the orientation of things but i mean journalism is more of a calling i mean i don't need to tell you that i mean it's a profession i mean you're part of it i'm part of it i mean the p.r. is come. but use that term lightly off of basic corporate

beltway game they go to the p.r. firms these big slick p.r. firms that represent corporate clients as well so what they've always done this is this something that's kind of new. i think you know the last you know i was reading a story about firms doing this back in the ninety's that unions will give money to these same kind of firms i think these firms are slick and they're good and you know at the same time the funding people that are working for the other side so it's really kind of counterproductive it's aimed at you know as well as a waste of union resort of these s.k.t. knickerbocker that's one of these firms so in this is this isn't this headed up by someone who used to be in the white house anita dunn is a former white house communications director and is seen as somebody who's a gatekeeper to the white house lot of unions went to her paid millions of dollars for different services and they went to her because you know she's very well connected she's very influential in this town she is the year of the president and it turns out that th

and i would agree that it's mostly a p.r. move i would go one step further i'd call it a slight of hand issue on twitter isn't paid to reach the issue on twitter is an organic reach problem not put organic in quote no box etc so they basically followed a problem that they didn't have and then shined the faceplate on the shine a spotlight on facebook. and so you know the issues that are on twitter are still there and they're as bad as ever and you know bravo to them on a slate of hand p.r. who but it doesn't make a difference in the political space or be in solving any problem that twitter actually have. so i want to share the decision of course it was sent in a twitter thread from jock just our audience all in the same page this was that decision we've made the decision to stop all political advertising on twitter globally we believe political messages reach should be earned not bought why a few reasons and jack goes into it it's a whole thread but we pulled up this one here while internet advertising is incredibly powerful a

this does feel like a good p.r. exercise for jack but tom i want to pick up on just because 2nd point. this chart here from ward's twitter spending by candidate and this is data that comes from twitter and you can see some of the top presidential u.s. presidential candidates here they're spinning this is just in the thousands right and you scroll down a little bit and this is ad spending on facebook it is in the millions so you can see the discrepancy there and of course as i mentioned the president trying to just take his advertising elsewhere as of right now elsewhere could be faced about because there are stiff $1700000.00 spent on ads from january to october 2019 so what do you make of this point you say that there's it's a good thing because there is something happening a change is happening but does it make an impact if a spark is it making that change i think is 2 points here the 1st point is that twitter is not just burned out for time saying from political figures they've also . political topics so they've

p.r. stunt because we've seen so many awful bills out of congress over the past six months and originally i believe he supported cispa so maybe he's trying to atone for his sins here in any case it's definitely a good step and senator wyden are very powerful in congress they're both high ranking members and they can really get something done here so i think this is a good move ok so you seem consciously optimistic about this do you think it sounds like you also think that some of them are might be unrealistic. yeah i mean we don't have to descend into total idealism the bill of rights that we already have prevents a lot of the more awful bills we're seeing in congress member becoming law things like cispa clearly violate your fourth amendment rights and potentially even your first amendment rights but certainly it's a good idea to clarify these things and to bring things up to date for the modern age because the founding fathers didn't have an internet to work with and i think when they wo

maybe the p.r.epartment needed to lean on him, because he could sell it. >> brian: here's my analogy. it's like me scoring seven touchdowns and saying, my big problem was i didn't tell the president called the press directly and say how many touchdowns i scored, therefore i'm not going to get credit. he forgot one thing. he says me to the people as a straight line, but he's forgot he's got to make a left and go to the people. if he ever went to congress and legitimately dealt with congress, may be marek garland is a supreme court justice pretty republicans, what do you want? i need this done, i need is past. and said he didn't deal, he felt as though his megaphone wasn't good enough, which is unbelievably tone-deaf. >> that is part of it, but everybody is guilty of this when they lose, both on the left and right. afterwards they look and they say we are right, our ideas are right, you just don't get it. we just didn't communicate it well, it is not our core principles, it is that you just didn't und

of eyes rolling at the p.r. firms most of them in washington to whom the saudi government pays millions of dollars to burnish its image through the news media to global policymakers and the public our starting point this week israel. the wrist of the woman driving left of us took everybody by surprise if a single newspaper discovering that. we did not need this in fact to reveal the true face of all that. cold totalitarian regime where rights granted by a royal decree not when it is demanded by activists it doesn't match the rhetoric this is a reform in country because it's arresting human rights activists right even the p.r. machine of the kingdom is having a difficult time defending decision. the question for the saudi authorities is why do this now of all times why just as the global media were busily churning out good news stories of saudi women preparing to take the wheel in the last country on the planet which had banned them from driving with the government choose this particular moment to arrest seven ac

it's p.r., right? p.r.just hard and you don't know if what you put out is what you're going to get out of it. and cara did a really amazing job. but it seems hard. even still. >> well, i think the first thing you have to do is you have to line up and know who your target is. what are the values of your target audience, what are they interested in, what are their attitudes. then line up who the celebrities match up with. you don't want to give away $200 bag just to anybody. so why not -- when a celebrity approaches that's right for your brand, you want to make the connection. then you want to be able on spit out your special sauce as soon as you can. so what is unique about your product, unique selling proposition. give them a story to engage in really fast. >> let me simplify this, it's the kardashians world, we're just living in it. this is huge for a lot of companies that we cover. everything from sort of the fashion and accessories that to see products you wouldn't necessarily think of. celebrities are p

firm notion p.r. . which gave them the billing address for these services stating that the rest of the conversation was with their lawyers now this really gave more questions than answers of course this all comes against the backdrop of tension between qatar and its gulf state neighbors egypt saudi arabia the. they've imposed a law and their and sea blockade on the gulf state citing funding for terrorism coming from qatar qatar accuses its neighbors of bullying tactics and sparking tension now speculation will no doubt grow that this has something to do with that visit and with those that provide attention was given how little of the nation is available about this mysterious p.r. firm and just how this whole event turned around something quite unusual of course for the u.k. will no doubt keep people guessing as more information comes to light. just a note on this r.t. has contacted neptun p.r. the firm in question asking for comment on the situation and we will let you know when we receive a response fr

the cost, up to $90,000 for six months of p.r. that bought the city a three-person media team including one executive who gets paid $500 an hour. that's in addition to oakland's full-time media relations staff who are already earning six-figure salaries. should the city be paying someone $500 an hour to manage p.r.? >> the answer is no. that's really unexplainable, inexcusable. >> reporter: according to the contract, the press shop was paid to develop media strategies and communications relating to the warehouse fire. all to reduce the city's risk against lawsuits. >> it is reasonable -- >> reporter: charles buyers is a public relations professor at santa clara university with more than 40 years of p.r. experience. he says the price of the contract is average for the industry and says the firm can help city leaders craft their public statements so they're not leaving oakland more vulnerable to lawsuits. >> the burden of any liability is going to fall upon the taxpayer. >> reporter: the oakland warehouse was never permitted as hous

back to the question asked at the outset why now there's really no clear answer to the p.r. led charm offensive and the m.b.'s interviews were targeted at the international media and foreign politicians the arrest of the activists and the discourse a chilling message that that sent were designed primarily for domestic consumption if that created a few unflattering headlines in the global media then so be it the image that the crown prince projects at home power above all else is the priority that's always been the way in the house of saud and for all the talk of reform and the generational change of the guard in riyadh it hasn't changed. we're discussing other media stories that are on our radar this week with one of our producers joanna who's joe a series of developments coming out of egypt over the past few days intensifying the pressure on journalists and bloggers there give us a rundown there are two main developments richard first there is a story that we have been following for more than two years and egyptian military court has finally sentenced journalists an academi

america facebook page and that's what they did in addition to basically doing the general p.r. effort for b.p. through the disaster to manage the message as they put it themselves and they did this very very effectively i mean for example when tony hayward made bad gaffes of saying i want my life back it was it was over he that was in charge of basically doing disaster control on that so they came in and started becoming b.p. apologist and making it appear as though well that was taking out of taken out of context in this sort of thing but that as well as all the social media so b.p.'s twitter feed. b.p.s. america facebook page and let's talk about specific examples of what was happening with people works pressing concerns on the facebook page and give us some examples of what this entailed problems arose when people were using the page as it was set up was to give b.p. face feedback positive and negative mostly negative about how they were handling the oil spill and one woman who goes by the alias marie because she is under she feels a direct threat from people working for b.p

could actually help hold them that's why the best p.r. was going to go if i just shut up and he just stopped talking because he knew that if everything you said was going to be corruptible. it was at its core corrupt so we know. now because the being cold hearted people you know women it's just it's the nature of the business which shouldn't surprise you know i actually in this case i don't really think it's fair do you think that craigslist is in essence you can rant and horrible. go right starts to you question craigslist do you think red list is and horrible and all of those things that you're saying about goldman sachs i don't know maybe ok no you're not helping i don't know them are going to go me ok we're going to medical group i'm saying in this case craigslist was you know accused of having these ads were very lucrative but they were allowing prostitution and sex trafficking ended up getting rid of the business a lot of those ads went to this back page dot com which is part of village voice which goldman sachs own fifteen percent

little journalism and a lot of p.r. all about the frequent findings of recent media surveys in the u.s. as newspapers across the country close the p.r. machine is rushing to fill the vacuum christine fossils been finding out what it may mean for. it is the end of the first of all the additional intelligence of. newspapers like the seattle post intelligencer the rocky mountain news and hundreds more have now become relics from the past. slash budgets have stopped the presses at newsrooms nationwide. and nast layoffs throughout media have meant far fewer journalists to investigate policy and procedure who are losing their sense of accountability in government in business in all our. life lives if we lose journalists who aren't asking questions about what's going on and the numbers particularly dramatic with newspapers where revenue has been cut nearly in half while the journalism industry is shrinking the public relations industry is expanding at one time a one to one ratio between p.r. employees and journalists today tha

events and p.r. arguments would take place he was an odd man supremely as it were a madman supreme and should i say and because of his work on the political p.r. side the expression so-called go propaganda entered the contemporary russian lexicon you mention that around with you saying that he had that's not the. is it recently that he said well it's he's you're are you referring to school couple here and. worked with president medvedev of modernization he advocated setting up the school technology hold the research excellence hold that running outside moscow now . a strong vision for modernization of russian economy and bringing innovation culture into russia's economy. most recently has been involved in a rather controversial corruption probe. has been used in a public dialogue with one of the prosecutors spokesman's spokesman. it was stressed today those so-called decision to resign had nothing to do about it and that it was related to his role as deputy prime minister for carrying out the preside

students i believe it was a about the p.r. machine that they ran and he was very specific about the types of things that they would do he he gave the example of anyone who's familiar with the stories maybe seen there's a b.p. commercial where there's an african-american woman named iris and she claims to be from new orleans and from the gulf and she's working for b.p. and she's standing there with a shirt on saying you know i'm from new orleans i'm here with b.p. and we're not going to leave until we make things right he said they would run these ads and then track the media impact of them via facebook and twitter gauge audience response. based on that response and then run them again immediately in order to quote unquote target the constituents more effectively so that's the level the really insidious in precise level that they were functioning on and from what i can see continue to function on today. daryn invested in the gulf since the deepwater horizon oil spill in two thousand and ten and you know as you just mentioned if

we call the p.r. described as news the new pretty good as gold mimics press releases also often read on the air or posted on the web before any fact checking is done with the focus often on getting it first rather than getting it right good evening everybody breaking news tonight but we are cutting into our program with some breaking news where corporate and government p.r. departments are filled with former journalists who know how to sell their message they understood how media worked what. reporters saw those a good story as opposed to hype which ward works for nearly twenty years as a journalist with the philadelphia inquirer but after layoffs he left to work for health insurer independence blue cross before returning to work as a journalist that revolving door army queen of france and p.r. the present governor. it is causing real concern about what the long term effects could be if the influx of spin doctors take over the message machine completely but there is very little journals and be done in

the cost, up to $90,000 for six months of p.r.t bought a 3% media team, including one executive who gets paid $500 an hour. that's in addition to oakland's full time media relations staff who are already earning six-figure salaries. it was being used for both. the records we obtained showed city building inspectors knew about that unpermitted activity well before the disaster. according to the contract, the city is paying the press shop to develop media strategies and communications all to reduce the city's risk against lawsuits. but it is impossible to know about what the city is getting for all that money since parts of the contract have been blacked out or redacted. the city tells us that is privileged since litigation could be involved. oakland has paid for $15,000 of work. the city of oakland's media team and the private p.r. firm hired by the city are getting your tax dollars to deal with us, the media. but both decline our request to be interviewed. thes director sent us a brief statement saying the p.r. firm would hire guy

company neptune p.r. was very new as was the company itself the tweet as you can see there was rife with grammatical errors and indeed the web site of this p.r. company was suspiciously empty. extras then public replied they showed allegedly a screenshot of an email conversation with this p.r. firm that simply are. which gave them the billing address for these services stating that the rest of the conversation was with their lawyers. now this really gave more questions than answers of course this all comes against the backdrop of tension between. qatar and its gulf state neighbors egypt saudi arabia the u.a.e. . they've imposed a land there and sea blockade on the gulf state citing funding for terrorism coming from qatar qatar and other hand of accuse those states of bullying and seeking to stoke the funds of a fan the flames rather of a conflict now speculation will no doubt grow that this has something to do with that visit and with those the provider tensions although given how little of the nation is