Author: Jim Eltringham

Political consultant specializing in grassroots mobilization, online media, and public relations.

That guy on MSNBC looks like that guy who used to host SportsCenter

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

S.E. Cupp’s column in today’s New York Daily asks a question that I happened to be thinking of the other night: why is Keith Olbermann, a left-wing political opinion entertainer, a fixture on sports programming while Rush Limbaugh, a right-wing political opinion entertainer, radioactive?  Olbermann and tag team partner Dan Patrick contribute to NBC’s Sunday Night Football, and he writes a baseball blog (baseblog?) for MLB.com. Limbaugh can’t even buy his way into national sports.

Cupp is right to ask the question, but the situation is not a double standard – and media watchdogs would be wise to let this one pass lest they look foolish.  Many folks know that Olbermann made his national bones on ESPN.  Few know that he was a particularly intelligent and funny sportscaster, even if his encyclopedic knowledge of the 1899 Cleveland Spiders Base Ball Club gave an early glimpse into the pomposity with which he now doles out his nightly “Worst Person in the World” award.

Limbaugh is much more widely known, but his entire public persona is based on creating controversy.  And when he had a chance to be a “sports guy,” he injected politics, famously pointing out that Donovan McNabb’s perception had as much to do with desired media narratives as it did with actual on-the-field performance.  Sure, there was media bias in the coverage of what he said, but a seat at an ESPN desk is not the place to talk about sports media bias if you want a long career in sports journalism.  Then again, ESPN was probably looking for a sideshow by hiring Limbaugh in the first place.

This isn’t to say that Limbaugh should be more like Olbermann, but the fact is that there are plenty of people – large numbers, actually – who don’t watch MSNBC.  To them, Olbermann’s image hasn’t been “tainted” by his politics. Olbermann still does sports because he always has done sports – and because, on some level, he’s good at it.

While Limbaugh will always be the “Republican talk radio guy,” Olbermann can still be the guy who pioneered the practice of using catch phrases to narrate sports highlights.  That may or not be something to be proud of, but it’s kept him working.

Responding to BP’s response

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

After yesterday’s crisis management advice for BP, it seems fair to look at what the world’s current least-favorite oil company has been up to online in its response to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

BP devoted a section their company website as a central repository of information about their cleanup efforts.  The pages are very fact-heavy, along with two video responses from BP officials and several pages of pictures.  Essentially, BP’s branded response to the crisis is an online press kit.  While the breadth of information is impressive, this is an exclusively one-way channel.

There are, however, other venues.  BP is one of the driving forces behind DeepWaterHorizonResponse.com, plus an associated Facebook page and Twitter feed. As one might expect, the Facebook page is the best of the group; Deep Water Horizon officials respond to comments with measured, polite answers to legitimate questions; and harsh critics are not censored. It helps that the initiative is not branded as coming solely from BP, thus diffusing some strong emotions folks likely feel toward the company.

It would be nice to see more from the efforts on the ground beyond a few pictures on all of BP’s online properties, something that could evolve as the campaign matures.  It’s a decent enough first step for BP, but it will only work if it’s the first step of many.

Stylin’ and De-profilin’

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Satire makes for a strong protest, and a group called Reform Immigration for America has a funny spoof website based on the Arizona immigration law.  The site – Deprofiler.com – “helps” Latinos avoid being stopped by Arizona law enforcement officials by providing cutout masks of “a friendly white person’s face” (pictured).

Whether you agree or not on the effect of the law, the site is really good – largely due to its simplicity.

The design is basic and minimalist, and there aren’t a ton of extraneous functions.  There isn’t any space wasted with background fact sheets for anyone who hasn’t heard of the issue.  There are only two prominent features: downloading a mask and sharing with a friend.

In other words, the site doesn’t get in the way of its own message.

The most powerful communication is word of mouth.  This site simplifies an important issue, makes its point, plays it for smart yuks, and gets out of the way while you send it out to your social networks.

The terrorism Jump to Conclusions mat

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

For the last year, the story has been the same – voters are upset with and distrustful of government, meaning we should be on guard for violent outbursts from the right.  It’s going to happen at one of these tea parties, we’ve been told.  Glenn Beck and his ilk are spurring violence, and not-so-secretly happy about the idea of angry mobs spurring armed revolution.  Democrats must live in fear, because Republicans are willing to stop at nothing to stop them!

So here’s a thought: just this weekend, New York faced a bomb threat.  The suspect is in custody, but there’s no indication on motive yet.  In fact, in stories buried under a sensational headline about South Park’s recent controversy, Rep. Peter King actually makes exactly that point:

Though King said the “hostile remarks” raised after the South Park incident were worth investigating, other potential targets – such as nearby financial institutions – needed to be looked at as well.

Financial institutions?  Well, let’s think about that.  Plenty of lawmakers have been taking shots at Wall Street, lumping the entire financial services industry in with the fraudulent and dishonest players.  The President himself has made a bit of a political comeback thanks to rhetoric based on widespread popular distrust of these financial institutions.

So if you have a “Jump to Conclusions” mat about the recent failed terror attack in New York, doesn’t one of all those “conclusions written on it… that you could… jump to!…” have to be that the Times Square bomber could have been operating based on what he has been hearing from Washington?  It’s perfectly logical if you buy the argument that harsh rhetoric from media mouthpieces incites acts of violence.

But like the jump to conclusions mat itself, it is a terrible, terrible idea.

Big Oil’s worst nightmare is, ironically, big oil

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

Questions may fly about who will pay how much to clean up the latest catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico, but the answers affect more than British Petroleum’s cash reserves.  The accident which claimed the lives of rig workers and threatens the coastal environment’s short term health comes just months after President Obama made a big show of opening up new areas to offshore energy exploration.  From a business angle, at risk is the future of offshore oil drilling for BP and any other company that relies on the United States government for exploration rights.  In the coming weeks, the drumbeat to cap the wells and bring the oil derricks back to terra firma will only grow louder, unless BP and their colleagues take the right actions now.

The Action

Eventually, there will probably be a rational explanation of why BP wasn’t entirely responsible for all the economic damage, but as the current debate over financial reform legislation demonstrates, rational explanations will do little to convince populist politicians. In addition to directly funding clean-up efforts, BP would be wise to work through local governments to administer small business development programs to help industries affected by the spill get back on their feet – and possibly even exceed their previous production.

Working through local and state governments is especially key.  Criticisms of BP are most likely to come from those voices, but if they are satisfied with relief efforts, they could be powerful allies.

Incidentally, BP should not act alone in this.  Energy companies have been asking to drill for resources in the waters off the U.S. shoreline for a long time, and the most compelling argument against them has come to realization.  While BP’s visibility and leadership is vital, other companies have a dog in this fight, too.

Messages and Messengers

There are two important themes BP and the industry must advance.  First, they must highlight what they are doing to rebuild – the programs they put in place as well as the results.  The second (which involves the whole industry, is to re-affirm the value of offshore drilling.  In both cases, the people delivering the messages matter as much as the messages themselves.

Toyota’s handling of the safety issues which plagued them earlier this year offers some good advice to follow.  Toyota recognized that not only was the perception of their cars damaged, but leaked emails and memos damaged the credibility of their top executives.  Americans don’t trust CEOs, so  Toyota turned to the two groups that could offer credible, positive messages: the engineers and assembly line workers who make the cars, and consumers.

This is where online communication – and especially online video – will be important.  A video channel featuring commentary from government officials and environmental workers will offer a transparent and compelling chronicle of the relief efforts. And oil industry workers – from those on the rigs to those in the refineries – offer an important insight as well.  For them, offshore drilling is as much about putting food on the table as it is about lowering gas prices, and they are now the best spokespersons for the industry.

The reality is that we live in a time where often, government picks winners and losers in the business world – a proposition that puts BP and their colleagues at risk.  Further, since they are hoping to tap reserves in areas controlled by the federal government, The oil industry will not soon shed their image as a huge, greedy, quasi-government entity.  Americans are traditionally suspect of power.  The best thing they could do is admit some level of responsibility, work to rebuild, and – most important – invite the American people and media in to see the details.

Ant-iTrust?

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Apple – or, more specifically, Apple CEO Steve Jobs – flexed some muscles in the last week by proclaiming that Adobe Flash has no place on the iPhone, the iPad, or whatever’s iNext.  As previously discussed (here and there, as well), the walled garden that is the App Store positions Apple not only as the gatekeeper of “tech cool,” but also as the potential object of an antitrust investigation.

Today, two Washington agencies are reportedly deciding who gets to launch an Apple antitrust investigation.

As easy as it would be to point to Jobs’s chest-beating, this is the second time in two weeks where a company is drawing ire from inside the beltway.  And in both cases, the companies in the crosshairs are direct competitors to Google.  That doesn’t make Google the Michael Corleone of federal tech policy, taking out enemies silently and sequentially (though it would be kind of cool if it were).  It does mean that technology policymakers seem to be on the same page as Google as far as what access to the internet or the mobile web should look like.

An American Macaca in London

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Just days away from an election, Gordon Brown pulled a George Allen.

The similarities go deeper than off-the-cuff comments caught on tape during a campaign.

In each case, the comments helped underscore the impressions opposing candidates wanted voters to have of the offending candidates.  In 2006, Jim Webb and Co. would have loved for northern Virginia voters to think of their incumbent Senator as a southern”good ol’ boy” with questionable opinions on race.  That’s not the type of charge a serious candidate can credibly level against a candidate without strong evidence; Allen made it easy when he unwittingly uttered a word that sounded like an ethnic slur.

Similarly, opponents of Brown’s Labour Party could have complained that the Prime Minister was out of touch with ordinary Americans (or however that argument goes over there), but Brown has made it exponentially easy by callously dismissing the concerns of a voter. The snide attitude and duplicitous nature make Brown the stereotypical career politician – aloof, self-aggrandizing, and contemptuous of the constituents underneath him.

The only thing going for Brown is that, at the very least, he didn’t know he was on tape.

Crist crossing party lines

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

It’s hard to portray yourself as an outsider when you sit in the governor’s mansion in one of the biggest states in the union.  But Gov. Charlie Crist did his best yesterday, positioning his decision to run as an independent as an answer to a broken system. And it just might work.

Though polls currently show Marco Rubio with a slight edge, they also show that 35-40% will likely win the race.  (Unlike Sen. Joe Lieberman’s 2006 run after losing the Connecticut Democrat primary, the opposition party is not laying down.)   Even though some Republican donors are sure to ask for their money back, Crist is a sitting governor through the beginning of next year and Florida is a state with plenty of commercial interests.  That math isn’t hard to do.

If Crist wins, the math gets even more fun.  Assuming he stays independent, he could become very difficult to topple as long as he maintains support in one third of the electorate.  That would make him an anomaly in American politics: a safe incumbent with 35% support.

I pahked my blawg at Hahvahd Yahd

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

(Cliff Claven-to-English translation: I parked my blog at Harvard Yard.)

Harvard’s Berkman Center for the Internet and Society released an extremely flawed study of influential political blogs that found some interesting contrasts between the ones on the left and the right.  In sum, liberal blogs are more communal, set up as digital campfire “Kumbaya” sessions that invite multiple users and issue more frequent calls to action.  Conservative blogs tend to be solo acts.

As highlighted by The Nation’s coverage, the study floats the idea that the difference could be as political as it is technical:

The right’s relatively limited integration of user contributions is consistent with readers or users who seek the stability of authoritative voice, consistent with claims… about the kinds of psychological needs that conservatism serves. Similarly, the more egalitarian, participatory practices on the left require tolerance for the unpredictability of open and fluid discourse.

The concept that conservative philosophy leads to more individually-themed blogs makes sense, but for the complete opposite reason outlined here.  In just about every domestic policy debate over the last 30 years, conservatives have argued for a reduction or limitation of government programs, while liberals and progressives have argued for an expansion of government programs.  It follows, then, that a conservative is more likely to start a blog by himself or herself than to round up a bunch of friend; a liberal might be more inclined to look for collective action. I don’t necessarily buy it, but I can understand the argument.

The paper also presents a second, much more plausible explanation: that leftist online political discourse came of age in the mid-2000s, when liberals saw Republicans in power and a Democratic party that boasted dynamic leaders like Tom Daschle, Dick Gephardt, and John Kerry.  Remember at this time, John Edwards was the breath of fresh air that was supposed to bring new life to the party – that’s how hopeless things looked for the Democrats.

This explanation,though it may be closer to the truth, highlights the major problem with the study: it’s based on data collected in 2008.  That’s before Twittering conservatives started holding local tea party protests last year to protest government spending – and well before those protests became a national organizing flash point.

The openness of the tea party movement – and its base of activists who are frustrated by both parties – seems to bolster the latter conclusion on the nature of 2008’s conservative blogosphere, but it begs two more questions:

  1. At the rate technology and tactics develop online, how can you say you have credible current findings about the nature of online activism with two-year-old data?
  2. If a UMass guy can understand that, what the hell is going on Harvard?