Posted on 08/20/2005 2:49:51 PM PDT by atomic conspiracy
Ben and Jerry's founder pays for PR firm for mother of fallen son by Mark Hand PR Week Worldwire 19 Aug 2005
Bush: vigil outside President's ranch CRAWFORD, TX - The PR firm working for Cindy Sheehan as she protests outside President Bush's ranch in Texas campaigning over the death of her son killed in Iraq has been paid for by Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben and Jerry's ice cream.
The 24-hour media attention being lavished upon Sheehan owes as much to the professionals supporting her as it does to the emotional impact of her story.
Fenton Communications is assisting Sheehan, the mother of a US soldier killed in Iraq, to earn media coverage for her vigil. TrueMajority, a nonprofit advocacy group created by Cohen is paying Washington, DC-based Fenton from the $70,000 that the group has raised so far to support Sheehan's protest efforts.
"Fenton is helping her with straight-out media relations, such as interviews and juggling different requests," said Jason Salzman, president of Cause Communications, which handles media relations for TrueMajority. "She's tapped into feelings against the war that have yet to [be] widely disseminated in the media."
Soon after Sheehan began her vigil, she quickly realized she needed help handling the barrage of media requests, said Parker Blackman, deputy GM and MD at Fenton Communications. "We're just trying to help her create a little order out of the chaos and streamline the process for getting reporters to be able to ask her questions," he said.
TrueMajority has asked its members for donations twice to support Sheehan's protest. The first appeal in early August brought in $50,000, while the second appeal, which went out August 8, has generated $20,000 so far, Salzman said.
Sheehan, a resident of Vacaville, CA, plans to continue the protest until Bush agrees to meet with her to talk about her opposition to the war in Iraq or until his vacation ends on August 31. She founded Gold Star Families for Peace and first began her campaign against the war more than a year ago after her son was killed April 4, 2004 while serving in Baghdad.
Sheehan's action caught the media's attention because she traveled to Crawford "to confront the President on his front door," Blackman said. "And you have a White House press corps who is there. The president doesn't spend all day with them. And there's this very compelling story unfolding right there."
Fenton also worked with Sheehan to publicize candlelight vigils held on Wednesday in 1,672 US cities in sympathy with her action. When Fenton organized a press briefing on Tuesday to discuss the coming vigils, about 100 journalists participated in the teleconference, an unheard of number for a typical Fenton-managed press briefing.
I never buy that over-priced ice cream and now will make sure I never do.
Ya know, my list of boycotted products is ever growing but I find I don't miss any of them. There's other products out there just as good or better and many lower priced.
Why aren't all the McDonalds-hating fat activists out there picketing Ben and Jerry?
Agreed. I have not bought anything from those two hippies in decades.
I've been boycotting Ben&Jerry's products since the War started because of their giving $$$$$ to anti-war outfits. Anyone else care to join me in the boycott and to urge other to do the same?
Creeps. Loser leftists.
I don't buy Ben and Jerry's. I've always hated all that hippie junk.
Ben and Jerry (or one of them) also supported cop killer Mumia.
Commie, America hating, hippie scum.
B & J can't have their 'ice cream' and eat it too.
Boycott B & J!
Ben & Jerry are a couple of real punks.
Ice cream is far too important a part of my diet for me to mix up in politics. The sugar and cream balance feeds my brain, politics starves my brain of oxygen.... I choose ice cream
How long have they been selling? I have only seen their products in gas stations over the last couple years... I would never buy ice cream called "Cherry Garcia".
Yep, the entire left-wing activist industry is little more than a corporate protection racket. This hippy image-mongering and left-conformity keep the food police and eco-wackies off B&J's back when they should rightfully be a prime target. It also scores them big points with the segment of the consumer population that is most influenced by image, a segment which also has sizable discretionary income.
Ever notice that the producers of consumer products are almost never targeted by lefty anti-corporate activists? Their ire is reserved for supply-side businesses that have little contact with individual consumers, like Halliburton, the aerospace industry, and the nuclear power industry; or high-profile retailers like Wal-Mart. Even SUV manufacturers get the kid-gove treatment compared to the dealer network or individual owners.
I think this pattern has a lot to do with which industries and businesses are most dependent on high-intensity advertising. Wal-Mart, of course, is a large volume advertiser, but they are also the subject of much complaint and whining from the ad-intensive manufacturers whose feet they hold to the fire on costs and quality. They are also a threat to those retailers who cannot compete on price or quality, but who do benefit from a strong media image and its fabrication.
Their fired.
"Agreed. I have not bought anything from those two hippies in decades."
You too
Those are among the reasons I don't buy B&J ice-cream.
Is this Ben or Jerry? I forget.
I found Rite Aid's dark cherry ice cream to be just as tasty as CG and not as heavy.
They are so inbred who can tell.
btt
Never bought the.......stuff.
I've never eaten Ben&Jerry's ice cream.
Felt the need to repeat yourself?
Erf, they're fire.
Phew.
I don't know if its a national brand but Richardson's Ice Cream beats Ben and Jerry's ice cream any day of the week. Though it might just be a New England brand.
YOU"RE FIRED TOO!
If Ben and Jerry looked around, perhaps they could find a stray cow in China and have their ice cream made there.
Clean-up on Aisle 27!!!
We also stopped eating their ice-cream as soon as we learned of their anti-Americanism. It's really not that great.
What country would that be? Afghanistan? Remember 9-11? Iraq? Is a direct attack on the United States the only evidence of a threat that must be dealt with? Was Saddam's Iraq a "small weak country?" Ask the Kurds who were gassed, or the Shiites who were slaughtered. You might even ask your leftist media gods, such as Robert Fisk and John Pilger, who carried on constantly about the invincible might of the "battle-hardened" Iraqi forces before that particular big lie joined so many others on the ashheap of media power.
Nazi Germany did not attack the United States at the beginning of World War 2. The very same absurdly loaded question you have asked me was asked by Nazi sympathizers during the war, and by some to this day. How would you personally benefit from having Saddam in power? Did he buy your support, as he did so many others, or do you sell your soul for free?
This is one of the reaons we eat Braum's or Bluebell for ice cream. I can do without Ben & Jerry's, no need to contribute to their lefty causes.
Haven't eaten B&J's for years, even before the war started, because of their leftist shenanigans.
Blue Bell, uummmgh
Um, Ben and Jerry don't make Ben & Jerry's anymore. They sold the name to a big corporation for lots of money. =:-0
Yes, they sold out. And now they're using their wealth from corporate deals to fund their leftist causes.
If this PR guy believes so much in Cindy Sheehan's cause, why isn't he donating his services? Why is he the guy who gets to cash in on this noble cause?
We should be writing to ask this question.
Pinz
Rhetorical and linguistic clues suggest that "Conservative all the way" is not even an American, let alone a conservative. Phrases like "if America can bomb" represent a style of usage and extreme generalization that passed out of common use on this side of the pond some years ago, even on the far left. Nevertheless, they are a staple among the British left and its colonial offshoots in Canada and Australia, to say nothing of Helengrad (aka "New Zealand"). This exact phrase, "if America can bomb a small, weak country", was used many times by pro-Hanoi activists in Australia during the Vietnam war.
'cause Ben is a leftie, of course!
I'm guessing that this gentleman, Ben Cohen, is unaware that the enemy we are fighting would like to create a second Holacaust that would make the first one pale by comparison.
Why is anyone surprised?
I've never bought anything made by Ben and/or Jerry. I don't like hard ice cream. Fortunately.
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