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["Melody O." <melody AT crecon.com>]

At 11:11 AM 3/14/05 EST, you wrote:
> 
>In a message dated 3/14/2005 1:35:56 AM Eastern Standard Time,  
>lurine AT softcom.net writes:
>
>excerpt:
>Under the Bush administration, the federal  government has
>aggressively used a well-established tool of public  relations: the
>prepackaged, ready-to-serve news report that major  corporations have
>long distributed to TV stations to pitch everything from  headache
>remedies to auto insurance. In all, at least 20 federal  agencies,
>including the Defense Department and the Census Bureau, have made  and
>distributed hundreds of television news segments in the past  four
>years, records and interviews show. Many were subsequently  broadcast
>on local stations across the country without any acknowledgement  of
>the government's role in their production.
>
>
>
>Of course, Clinton did the same thing, My Mother and Step Father, both  
>worked for the federal government under the Clinton admin as television
producers. 
>They put together all
>sorts of pre-packaged releases. My mother was a producer for WTBS and CNN  
>before 
>taking the government job. My stepfather was transferred to homeland  
>security 2 years ago to do the same sort of work. There is absolutely
nothing wrong 
>with the government 
>putting together these bits. It was originally conceived as a way to film  
>pieces in secure 
>areas that the press is not allowed into. The ONLY problem with this is
that 
>it is up to the
>broadcast agency to identify the pieces and their sources. If a station
does 
>not do this, it
>could mislead the viewers. 
> 
>Drew

This was an interesting snippet that relates to what you have said, Drew:

"Whether a stricter ethics code will have much effect is unclear; it is not
hard to find broadcasters who are not adhering to the existing code, and
the association has no enforcement powers.

The Federal Communications Commission does, but it has never disciplined a
station for showing government-made news segments without disclosing their
origin, a spokesman said."

Without recognition of who is really speaking does make it propaganda;
otherwise an unaware TV watcher simply thinks that the segment is an
unbiased look at how things really are.  

Best wishes,
Melody