Oprah's being sued

Oprah sued for defamation by ex-school head

http://tv.msn.com/tv/article.aspx/?news=333722&GT1=28103

Oprah Whinfrey is being sued for defamation by the ex-headmistress of her school for girls in South Africa, Nomvuyo Mzamane. She is saying that Oprah tried to cover up abuse at the school and that she knew about it all along. Mzamane is seeking more than $250,000 on five defamation counts against Whinfrey

Former dorm matron Tiny Virginia Makopo is charged with abusing six students at the school. Makopo allegedly tried to kiss and fondle the victims and is also accused of kicking and hitting some of them. Makopo has plead innocent to 14 charges of indecent assault, assault and criminal injury.

Due to Oprah's stature and how easily all this is accessed on the internet, Msamane has not been able to find work in this field.

I'm really hoping Oprah had nothing to do with this and had no knowledge of what was going on at her school in South Africa. I hope this is just a sad attempt by a disgruntled ex-employee. That would be the most hypocritical thing for Oprah to do if she in fact knew what was going on. 

The fact that the dorm matron, Tiny, was allegedly doing all these things to the girls just makes me sick. It's really disgusting and terrible. 

Somethign else I have to wonder is how were two women that were so important to that institution, so horrible. Was there not a proper background check? Did they just randomly hire these women? Or is this all just a big lie?

Gillette Sharpens Pitch For Expensive Razor

As the economy seems to be pulling toward a recession, customers and consumers are pulling back spending on many of the items that inhabit their daily routines. Gillette, maker of the very common razor blades, is hoping that although many are cutting back, that people will still stay brand loyal by purchasing their blades. On Sunday Proctor and Gamble introduced a new ad campaign that focuses on getting shoppers comfortable with the some-what high prices of the blade replacements. As it stands, the price for 8 of Gillette's replacement blades are on average $25.03, which is considerably high when you compare them to other brands. Gillette's new launch of their Five Blade Fusion has a memorable ad which is trying to show customers how the price of the razors relates to their pocketbooks on a weekly basis. The advertisement as written is:

"In the world of high-performance, what machine can you run for as little as a dollar a week?" an announcer says amid close-up shots of one of the shavers in the line, "Fusion Power," which vibrates via battery. Nascar driver Carl Edwards's reply: "That's money well spent." (The dollar-a-week calculation is based on the price of Gillette's Fusion Power replacement cartridges and average consumption.)

Although this seems to be a tough situation for companies like Gillette who are selling name brand products at a higher price than competitors, they are hopefull that this campaign will stabilize their customer base and furthermore increase their sales.

Article to read -- HARO vs Profnet

This is a must-read article. Both of the services help match reporters to PR folks. I would encourage you to check out HARO -- it's free and will be impressive to an employer (if going to wor for an agency) that you know about it.

Brita Goes to College

Clorox's Brita is launching a new campaign targeted toward college students. Their "College FilterForGood Eco-Challenge" effort is supported by AOR Edelman.

Brita's on-going campaign "FilterForGood" targets the general audience with a goal to reduce bottled-water waste. It's college campaign's goal is to put a fire under kids to come up with solutions to on-campus environmental issues. The top 5 winners will receive $10,000 each.

Personally, I love Brita. I use my water-filter everyday and haven't purchased bottled water in a really long time. I think it's important to reduce waste when and where you can. Brita was smart to target college kids because they know people recognize their name. That, in general, will cause a stir and get kids motivated to compete in this campaign. That, and the large grand prize. Brita's timing is good too. More and more people are becoming aware of the environment and are making it more of a priority.

The campaign's tactics are very well thought through as well. They're putting their information into 100 college newspapers, getting their campaign onto Facebook and announcing the winners at the spring 2009 Earth Day.

Bernhard's Palin gang-rape joke

I read an article from MSN.com called "Bernhard’s Palin gang-rape joke shocks shelter."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26982470/

To summarize, it stated, "Bernhard said Palin would be “gang-raped by my big black brothers” during a diatribe in which she also criticized Palin for opposing abortion rights."

Bernhard, the comedic performer for a women's shelter, was cut from their annual benefit after she pitched that "joke."

I am one to stand up for laughter and the use of comedy most situations but in order for things to be funny they must also be tasteful. It wasn't as much the joke being utterly offensive as it was the context of the joke and the environment in which it was used. Bottom line: if you are offending everyone in the room, it's not going to be funny.

Saying something like that may be funny at a comedy club but she should have known better than to say it at a women's shelter benefit. I'm not sure that people representing a women's shelter would want to laugh at a joke that involves 'rape' in the punchline. While some may argue that it was only a joke, I think there might have been a better time for a controversial line like that.

700 Billion Dollar Bailout

Today, Wednesday, October 1, the Senate voted to go through with the $700 Billion dollar bailout. The vote was 74-25 and both Senators Obama and McCain voted for this bill.

Senator McCain said, "If we fail to act, the gears of our economy will grind to a halt."

I am unsure of what to think of the bailout, I trust the senate has had good financial advising but at the same time I wonder when they will stop bailing out companies in financial crises. I would like to put my faith in the government, but it is still hard when the number is this big.

I think company representatives and senators need to reassure the public that this is the right thing to do and it will only help our economy.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-10-01-washington-bailout-wrap-Wednesday_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip

Is morality natural?

I read the article, "Is Morality Natural" on Newsweek.com and found it very interesting.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/158760

Science is tracing the biological roots of our intuitive sense of what is right and wrong. It is suggested by studies that an unwritten moral grammar has been implemented in our universe. The studies also imply that this "moral grammar" has been designed to generate fast, intuitive and universally held judgments of right and wrong.

I found this article to be one of the most interesting articles I've ever read. Honestly! I was not surprised that the three hypothetical situations generated similar responses across diverse groups of people. I think humans as "individuals" have a whole lot more in common with each other than we want to admit.

Einstein once said, "Our seperation of each other is an optical illusion of conciousness."

In my opinion, we are all one. I'm not sure in what way I mean that but I guess what I'm trying to say is that we're all in this together for one reason or another. This article is definitely something to think about. I'm not sure the human race will ever discover the meaning to life or spirituality but studying the topic definitely expands our thought process!