Style Bustin’ (WBZ Is The Latest Sucker Edition)

Posted on September 30, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

Style Boston, which dubs itself “Your Insider Lifestyle Connection” but is actually the call girl of local TV content, has found a new pimp – sorry, TV station.

The cable-access-quality infomercial (it auctions off its segments to marketing sponsors) started out on NECN, which wound up suing Style Boston for nonpayment, as the hardworking staff noted last year:

New England Cable News has slapped ex-Boston Common magazine honcho Terri Stanley and her TV show “styleboston” with a lawsuit, charging the lifestyle program owes NECN $73,000.

From there Stanley took her dog-and-pony-up show to WCVB, as we also noted:

Meanwhile, styleboston has shifted its shifty infomercial content (most of the segments are sponsored – read, “paid for” – by their subjects) to WCVB.

“Styleboston” spokeswoman Jan Saragoni said the show’s attorneys are reviewing the lawsuit. “We’re hopeful and confident that all issues will be resolved,” said Saragoni. “The show is doing terrifically well on Channel 5.”

(Yeah, tell that to the real journalists at ‘CVB, who are ripping that the station is pawning styleboston’s marketing material off as editorial content.)

The hardworking staff has chronicled (don’t even ask how the folks at “Chronicle” feel about the “show”) styleboston’s spotty history from the start.

Now, we’re just rooting for the end.

Sadly, the end has not come.

What has come is a new incarnation of Style Boston at WBZ.

Boston Herald report:

‘Styleboston’ changes channels, kicks off fourth season Saturday

“Styleboston,” a Hub-based television show devoted to lifestyle trends and celebrities in the fashion, arts and entertainment worlds, returns to the airwaves Saturday on WBZ-TV and myTV38 (WSBK-TV).

The show’s fourth season kicks off with interviews with Rob Thomas and Kyle Cook of hit band Matchbox 20, bestselling author Dennis Lehane, and New England Patriots [team stats] linebacker Jerod Mayo.

“Everything we cover and everyone we interview has style: the stories we choose, the questions we pose, the visuals we select and the way we present them,” said the show’s creator and executive producer Terri Stanley. “The move to CBS Boston’s WBZ-TV and myTV38 is part of our expansion plan for styleboston as we begin to launch in other cities. We look forward to being on such great stations.”

The idea that Style Boston is a “show” is an absolute fraud on the TV viewing public. As for its “seasons,” they’re known in the marketing business as advertising flights.

The ultimate insult?

Since the show’s launch, “styleboston” has received four New England Emmy nominations.

Shame on you, Boston news media, for letting Style Boston’s charade continue this long and this profitably.

 

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Brown/Warren Senate Race: We’re Number Ugliest!

Posted on September 29, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

It’s official: The U.S. Senate bakeoff between incumbent Scott Brown (R-She Clearly Isn’t) and Elizabeth Warren (D-I Am What I Am) is the nastiest race in the country right now.

Or maybe the ugliest. Via the Daily Beast:

[T]his year’s most expensive Senate race between Elizabeth Warren and Scott Brown has boiled down to whether or not one of the candidates looks minority enough. “Professor Warren claimed she was a Native American, a person of color,”Sen. Scott Brown charged in a recent debate. “And as you can see, she is not.” The charge led people to pore through Warren’s employment history, which then led Democrats to ask whether Brown thinks you can identify people’s ethnicity just by looking at them, which then led alleged Brown supporters to do a tomahawk chop mocking Warren, which then led to an apology demand from a Native American leader, which then led… you know, I’m just going to stop right there.

Scott Brown has been in the United States Senate for more than two years.  For just as long, Elizabeth Warren has been a well-known “consumer advocate.” Neither is an unknown entity to the people of Massachusetts. So what is this back and forth all about? And what do these charges and countercharges possibly mean about their capacity to govern?

This, then, is the Honey Boo Boo campaign—mindless. A race in which the Republican, Mr. Brown, has spent millions trying to prove that he’s a better Democrat than the Democrat running to replace him.

And spent millions, the hardworking staff might point out, undermining the barn jacket wearing, pickup truck driving, laundry folding nice guy image Brown so painstakingly assembled.

Goodbye to all that.

Hello, Smashmouth Scottie Brown.

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Smartads Imitate Smartphones

Posted on September 29, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

New social-media marketing campaigns create images that mimic Smartphone pix. Details at Sneak Adtack.

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It’s Good To Live In A Two-Daily Town (Native Americans Whomp ‘Em In Massachusetts U.S. Senate Race)

Posted on September 28, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

There’s plenty of  outrage to go around over Elizabeth Warren’s Native American heritage  claims. Some from Native Americans. Details at IGTLTDT.

 

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OBuyer’s Remorse

Posted on September 28, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

For months now the pro-Romney forces have been trying to thread this needle with independent voters: You had high hopes for Barack Obama; you gave him a chance; he wasn’t up to the task; it’s okay to move on.

(See the hardworking staff’s recent summary – with representative TV spots – here.)

Now comes a new salvo, via our More In Sorrow Than In Anger (MISTIA) desk:

The Super PAC Buyer’s Remorse Tour.

Exhibit A (via the New York Times):

Republicans Intensify Drive to Win Over Jewish Voters

BOCA RATON, Fla. — Using billboards, television advertisements and finely honed voter lists, Republicans here and in other battleground states have intensified an effort to lure a small but potentially significant group of new or wavering voters from President Obama.

Focused on South Florida, Ohio and Nevada, the Republican Jewish Coalition, backed mostly by the casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, a Zionist, has begun spending $6.5 million on an air-and-ground strategy to reach Jewish voters who may view Mr. Obama as unreliable on the question of Israel’s security. Jewish voters, who generally vote for Democrats in big numbers, overwhelmingly supported Mr. Obama in 2008, giving him 78 percent of their vote, according to exit polls conducted by Edison/Mitofsky.

In Florida, where the largest share of the $6.5 million is being spent, one of the group’s most visible messages is along Interstate 95 and the Florida Turnpike, including in Boca Raton and in Broward County, areas with large Jewish populations. A series of red-and-blue billboards lament: “Obama … Oy Vey!!” Then ask, “Had enough?”

Not enough advertising, apparently, given Exhibit B (via Politico’s Morning Score):

RICKETTS SUPER PAC LAUNCHES “WHY I CHANGED MY VOTE” CAMPAIGN: Ending Spending Action Fund, the conservative super PAC backed by billionaire investor Joe Ricketts, is making an initial $1.5 million buy as part of the pledged $10 million campaign against Obama with two ads that will debut nationwide today on cable. A 30-second spot features former Alabama Congressman Artur Davis complaining that Obama pushed through his health care law without a single Republican vote. A 60-second spot features three middle-aged women who voted for Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Barack Obama saying they’re voting for Romney this election.

 

Look for more on the MISTIA patrol in the few weeks left until the election.

 

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It’s Good To Live In A Two-Daily Town (Split Decision On ‘Last Resort’)

Posted on September 27, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

Dueling TV reviews in the local dailies? Excellent! Details at IGTLTDT.

 

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Let The Whatever-Billion-Dollar Rumpus Begin! (MISTIA Edition)

Posted on September 27, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

From our More In Sorrow Than In Anger desk

Perhaps aware that their presidential race is becoming too much of a smashmouth tilt, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama are starting to take the not high – but soft – road.

New Romney ad:

 

Script (via Politico’s Playbook):

‘Too many Americans are struggling to find work in today’s economy. Too many of those who are working are living paycheck to paycheck, trying to make falling incomes meet rising prices for food and gas. More Americans are living in poverty than when President Obama took office and 15 million more are on food stamps. President Obama and I both care about poor and middle-class families. The difference is my policies will make things better for them. We shouldn’t measure compassion by how many people are on welfare. We should measure compassion by how many people are able to get off welfare and get a good paying job. My plan will create 12 million new jobs over the next four years—helping lift families out of poverty and strengthening the middle class. I’m Mitt Romney and I approve this message because we can’t afford another four years like the last four years.’

Then there’s Obama’s second 47% spot:

 

Script:

When Mitt Romney dismissed 47% of Americans for not pulling their weight, he attacked millions of hard working people making 25, 35, 45 thousand dollars a year. They pay social security taxes. State taxes. Local taxes. Gas, sales, and property taxes. Romney paid just 14 percent in taxes last year. On over 13 million in income. Almost all from investments. Instead of attacking folks who work for a living…Shouldn’t we stand up for them?

Might we be moving into a kinder, gentler phase of this scorched-earth presidential campaign?

Don’t count on it.

 

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It’s Good To LIve In A Two-Daily Town (Brown Rally Goes Chop Chop To Globe Front Page)

Posted on September 26, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

That tomahawk chop mishegoss by Scott Brown’s minions got very different play in the local dailies. So what else is new? Details at IGTLTDT.

 

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No Homers In Red Sox Broadcast Booth

Posted on September 26, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

Yesterday the Wall Street Journal, doing what it does best, published The Announcer-Bias Index, described as the “[n]umber of comments perceived as bias that were made by each club’s TV broadcast team over the course of one game – including the use of words like ‘we,’ ‘us’ or ‘our’; referring to a player by a nickname; or blatantly rooting for the home team.”

Interestingly, old Red Sox friend Ken “Hawk” Harrelson ranked as the biggest homer – for the Chicago White Sox.

How Biased Is Your Announcer?

A 30-Team Study Shows Some Baseball Teams Don’t Play It Straight; ‘The Good Guys’

If you’re wondering what’s going on in the American League Central pennant race over the next week, all you need to do is tune into a Chicago White Sox telecast and listen for the voice of the team’s play-by-play man, Ken “Hawk” Harrelson.

Harrelson is, to put it diplomatically, a bit of a “homer.” In other words, he’s unapologetic about his devotion to the White Sox, the team he routinely calls “the good guys.” According to one measure, Harrelson and his booth partner, Steve Stone, make more nakedly biased statements during a single game than every other TV broadcast team in the American League combined.

“Let’s just say that if we’re losing, you’re going to know it,” Harrelson said in a recent interview. “I won’t sound happy.”

Also interestingly, Red Sox announcers Don Orsillo and Jerry Remy wound up in a five-way tie for last in the bias index:

(Sorry to point out that the Yankee broadcasters are also cellar-dwellers.)

Regardless, Don’t Go, Sox!

 

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It’s Good To Live In A Two-Daily Town (Elizabeth Warren’s No Apology Tour)

Posted on September 25, 2012 by Campaign Outsider

The Native American issue is at issue again in the Massachusetts Senate race, with the local dailies taking different angles, as usual. Details at IGTLTDT.

 

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