Tag Archives: cancer

Komen hires the wrong PR firm, missing the boat once again (and some thoughts on PR Daily’s coverage of the story)

So, the Susan Komen Foundation has hired a big-hitter PR firm. And not just any PR firm, either. Now, Komen is assessing the damage, and it’s using a consulting firm founded by two former Democratic strategists. Penn Schoen Berland (PSB), the firm Komen hired to help determine how badly the crisis hurt its reputation, is founded by former Democratic strategists

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Komen VP resigns; an important first step, but a long road to reconciliation remains

The Komen Foundation VP at the center of the Planned Parenthood firestorm, Karen Handel, has resigned. A few days ago I predicted on Facebook that she’d be gone within a week, but  then retracted the prediction when I learned more about the heavy-Right political leanings of the rest of the board (and the involvement of Ari Fleischer in their strategy

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Komen Foundation pretends to change its mind. One corporate communications executive wonders: is the public stupid enough to buy it?

Read. The language. Closely. Contrary to what Komen’s highly-paid PR crisis hacks and gullible headline writers at newsdesks around the nation would ask you to believe, The Susan G. Komen Foundation does NOT promise to fund Planned Parenthood in the future. They promise to let PP APPLY for grants in the future. Applying and receiving are different things, as anyone who

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Why I envy people with cancer

That headline probably sounds like the dumbest thing anybody ever said, doesn’t it? In truth, though, I mean it as a profound compliment. Let me explain why. Today is LiveStong Day and it’s also Susan Komen Race for the Cure Day here in Denver. Earlier this morning, roughly 50,000 people participated in the Race for the Cure over at Pepsi Center, and

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ArtSunday: Let the musicians die

Every once in awhile I come across unrelated stories that somehow associate themselves in my mind. Take these, for instance: First, I hope you saw Lex’s tribute to Starchild (given name, Gary Shider), he of P-Funk fame. As Lex notes, Shider experienced problems where the cost of fighting the cancer that killed him was concerned. Second, another American music icon,

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War and Postwar: a look at LIFE and technology

Part three in a series. In an age and a culture dominated by scientism, the word “sample” tends to invoke the adjectival “representative,” and I cannot begin to imagine culling a meaningful representative sample from LIFE’s 400-plus issues. Still, it seems important to devote a few pages to what happened with LIFE and technology between the Fort Peck Dam and

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