Jump to full article: PR Watch, 2009-10-07
Author: Tim Dickinson on anti-heath reform spin. Dickinson's
Intro: This week's issue of Rolling Stone has an illuminating article, "The Lie Machine," by Tim Dickinson on anti-heath reform spin. Dickinson's article quotes internal corporate memos showing how Big Tobacco spun media stories about health care reform in 1994 and how its progeny are striking again.
Among other things, the RS article excerpts a memo by Philip Morris describing how the company worked "off-the-record" with a right-wing "think" tank, the Manhattan Institute (MI), to manufacture an "expose in The New Republic on what the Clinton plan means to you." That TNR article, "No Exit," was the tip of the spear against health care reform in 1994, and was part of Big Tobacco's strategy to place stories opposing the health care plan with "friendly contacts in the media."
It got the cover of TNR and the attention of George Will. It was then magnified by the right-wing echo chamber and these misleading claims were etched into the public's mind about the reforms. Years later the article was repudiated by TNR, but not before it launched the career of its author (or rather its co-author, given Big Tobacco's invisible hand), Betsy McCaughey. . . .
given how far her propaganda penetrated, it seems Betsy learned well the tools of her trade from the tobacco companies that funded and helped craft her "independent" research early in her career.
It makes you wonder who's paying Betsy's bills and helping with her "research" this time around. She's been at the Hudson Institute, another think tank funded by the right and big corporations . . .
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