WTF Ad o’ the Week (Star Parker Edition)

Posted on March 22, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

From our Whiskey Tango Foxtrot desk

CURE – the Center for Urban Renewal and Education – has just released a TV spot attacking gun-control advocates (read: Barack Obama) for trying to strip Black Americans of their right to own firearms that enable them to protect themselves and occasionally kill each other.

The spot (which is probably just a news ad – a commercial created not to run as paid advertising but to generate media coverage):

 

CURE description:

This ad illustrates the very real link between gun control and the historical black experience in this country.

Literally from Jim Crow until present day, black urban communities have been under siege.

During the Black Codes the right to bear arms was taken away and perpetuated during Jim Crow. Today, only 16 percent of Black Americans are armed, and in communities like Chicago where there is the most stringent of gun regulations, murder rates from gun violence are the highest in the nation.

The full measure of the Second Amendment must be upheld. It is in the best interest of all Americans, and especially African Americans.

For the full effect, check out CURE curator Star Parker on Sean Hannity’s Fox News program:

 

Yikes.

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Boston Herald Wants To Beat WGBH’s Beat The Press

Posted on March 22, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

Our feisty local tabloid has increasingly increased its video production lately (Exhibit A: High Noon), and yesterday it upped the ante with the introduction of the Boston Herald Press Party on Page 2:

Picture 1

 

Copy:

Picture 5

 

And then there was this full-page ad promoting the webcast:

Picture 4

 

It’s no coincidence that the show will be webcast at 7 pm on Friday: That’s the same time WGBH airs its longtime media review Beat the Press.

(Full disclosure: The hardworking staff was a BTP correspondent for many years but is no longer.)

Let the wild Beatdown rumpus begin!

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Globe Retweets From Its Patrick-Third-Term Gaffe

Posted on March 21, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

So Gov. Deval Patrick made a joke yesterday about running for a third term and wouldn’t you know some people took him seriously and faster than you can say tweet tweet it was out there on the social media wire.

From today’s Boston Globe:

Patrick trips online firestorm with reelection joke

For a few minutes early Wednesday afternoon, the Massa chusetts political world was in flames.

Governor Deval Patrick’s attempt at humor during an appear ance at the University of Massachusetts Boston went viral, leading many to believe that he would seek a third term. That would have been news, indeed, since Patrick has long professed to be satisfied with two terms.

And, while there is no law prohibiting a third consecutive term, there is no modern precedent.

“#Breaking: @MassGovernor announces he’s running for a third term” New England Cable News network tweeted at 1:10 p.m. to its more than 19,000 followers.

That ignited a firestorm of retweets, online exclamations of disbelief, and panicked phone calls by news organizations looking to catch up on a story that would dramatically remake the state’s political landscape.

It turned out to be a false alarm, but what the Globe piece fails to mention is that one of its own was among the retweeters. It was left to our feisty local tabloid to reveal the full story . . .

Read the rest at It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.

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Here’s How You Handle Sponsored Content

Posted on March 21, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

The hardtracking staff has written ad(!) nauseum about how deceptive the new wave of branded content in general and native advertising in particular tends to be.

Not so in the case of media maven Jim Romenesko. Sponsored content posts on his blog are no ads in sheep’s clothing.

Here’s how they look among the other posts:

And here’s what you click to . . .

Read the rest at Sneak Adtack.

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Gardner Museum Guard Has Coming-Out Party On CNN

Posted on March 21, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

Dumbest Museum Guard Ever Richard Abath got his seven-and-a-half minutes of cable fame last night on CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360, during which correspondent Randi Kaye delivered a thoroughly over-the-top recap of the Great Gardner Heist.

Watch it here.

If this guy isn’t guilty of aiding and abetting, he should be.

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Herald Romes Much Farther Than Globe

Posted on March 20, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

It’s a rare day – and therefore a noteworthy one – when the Boston Herald devotes more resources to a big story than the Boston Globe does.

Welcome to today’s edition of our feisty local tabloid gone global. Note the dateline on Margery Eagan’s column:

Vatican PopePope Francis fever catches on in Rome

ROME — The Roman Catholic Church has been losing the faithful in Italy and much of Europe for decades. Pope Francis has clearly revived interest, if only until his novelty wears off.

Yesterday, for the third time in a week, an estimated 150,000 packed St. Peter’s Square. Police were keeping order in subway stations en route to the Vatican as crowds tried to push onto nearly full trains. Streets all around the Vatican were closed to traffic. But they were filled with what looked like thousands more spectators who showed up too late to fit into the square — meaning they didn’t get here by 7:30 a.m. for a 9:30 a.m. Mass.

These thousands watched on at least a dozen Jumbotrons as Pope Francis, just before his inaugural Mass, rode about the square not in the bulletproof glass popemobile, but, unusually, in an open-air model. It allowed him to get on and off and kiss a baby and the forehead of a man who appeared disabled and smiled up at Francis’ face.

Today’s Herald also features a thumbsucker on Sean O’Malley’s elevated status after his waltz with the Great Mentioner at the Vatican conclave . . .

Read the rest at It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.

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Boston’s Retail History: Bonwit Teller Part Two

Posted on March 20, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

In response to our post, Local Dailies Disappear Bonwit Teller from Boston’s Retail History, splendid commenter Rick in Duxbury sent this to the hardreading staff:

If memory serves, the thing that really killed Bonwit’s was the boneheaded real estate department employee who forgot to exercise the renewal option in their lease, thus putting the iconic building on the market in the first place.

(First, full disclosure: Regarding all things retail, we routinely defer to the Missus who, as it happens, worked for Bonwit Teller as an executive shopping consultant throughout the 1980s.)

So, Rick: We think you’ve confused Bonwit’s with the boneheaded Lord & Taylor employee who forgot to renew the Boylston Street store’s lease in 2002.

The Bonwit Teller story is something else again . . .

Read the rest at It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.

 

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Why Aren’t The Boston Dailies Asking About The Gardner Guard?

Posted on March 20, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

Both local dailies on Tuesday featured the blockbuster revelation that the FBI knows who stole 13 works of art from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum 23 years ago.

Boston Globe:

paintings-4793FBI says it knows identity of Gardner art thieves

Names not divulged; trail of Gardner masterworks ended with a sale try a decade ago; investigators cite progress, seek help in cracking 1990 case

Federal investigators, in an unprecedented display of confidence that the most infamous art theft in history will soon be solved, said Monday that they know who is behind the Gardner Museum heist 23 years ago and that some of the priceless artwork was offered for sale on Philadelphia’s black market as recently as a decade ago.

In the most extensive account to date of the investigation, Richard DesLauriers, the FBI special agent in charge of the Boston office, would not identify those involved in the heist, saying it would hinder the ongoing investigation. But he said that knowing the identity of the culprits has “been opening other doors” as federal agents continue their search for the missing artwork.

Boston Herald . . .

Read the rest at It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.

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Local Dailies Disappear Bonwit Teller From Boston Retail History

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

There’s been lots of hubbub the last two weeks over Restoration Hardware’s botched opening (Worst. Party. Ever.) in its new home at 234 Berkeley Street.

Including yesterday’s Boston Globe front page piece:

hardwareAfter packed debut, store at a standstill

Restoration Hardware has buzz, goods, but no permit

On March 5, Gary Friedman, the silver-haired CEO emeritus of Restoration Hardware, was warned that a party in Boston the next night to celebrate the opening of his enormous store could get seriously overcrowded.

“We can ask for forgiveness [afterward],” he told the group, according to people who were there.

Friedman denies saying that, but 24 hours later, police and fire officials were indeed summoned to the former Louis Boston building at 234 Berkeley St. to block a horde of smartly dressed men and women trying to shoehorn themselves through the store’s gaping steel-and-glass doors.

Now, forgiveness isn’t all Friedman needs. The 40,000-square-foot home goods store selling $279 duvet covers and $895 riveted mesh chandeliers still doesn’t have an occupancy permit. Even after the over-the-top party and a photo-op ribbon-cutting, the lavish store in the heart of the trendy Newbury Street shopping district isn’t open. And it’s not clear when it will be.

Further on . . .

Read the rest at It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.

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Herald’s Joe Fitz Kisses Phoenix Goodbye

Posted on March 18, 2013 by Campaign Outsider

From our Late to the (Going Away) Party desk

Last week the Boston Phoenix got its front-page Ave atque Vale from the Boston Globe’s Joseph P. Kahn. (It also got a mournful editorial and this spiffy op-ed by ex-intern Joe Keohane, among other coverage.)

The Boston Herald? A whopping five paragraphs.

Until Saturday, that is. And from the unlikeliest of sources: Columnist Joe Fitzgerald, who notes the anomaly straight off . . .

Read the rest at It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town.

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