Sunday, August 16, 2009

Woo Hoo!

I'm writing from the Aran Islands (pictures later), the first time I've had internet service in nearly a week. We return to Seattle on Tuesday. In the meantime...

Clifton wishes he could take A Long Walk with Jill Scott...

Looks like all those letters and emails had an effect:

By Kenneth Hein

NEW YORK (Nielsen Business Media) - Some of the nation's biggest advertisers are distancing themselves from Fox News host Glenn Beck after he called President Obama a racist during a July 28 broadcast.

Geico has pulled its ads from Fox News Channel's "The Glenn Beck Program." Lawyers.com, which is owned by LexisNexis, also has vowed not to advertise during the program, according to Color of Change, an African-American online political organization that has been urging advertisers to stop supporting the show.

Additionally, Procter & Gamble, Progressive Insurance and SC Johnson all said their ad placements during the broadcast were made in error and that they would correct the mistake.

The controversy stems from Beck's comment that President Obama is a "racist" with "a deep-seated hatred for white people."

Geico spent more than a half-billion dollars on ads last year, according to the Nielsen Co. It spent more than a quarter-billion dollars in the first half of 2009.

A Fox representative noted that Geico is dropping its ads from the show but was quick to note that it was shifting dollars to other programs. "The advertisers referenced have all moved their spots from Beck to other programs on the network, so there has been no revenue lost," the rep said.

Beck's show pulled in an average of slightly more than 2 million viewers for each of its 19 telecasts in July, according to Nielsen.

Progressive Insurance representative Cristy Cote said that there has been a lot of confusion surrounding the company's involvement with the program. "We had not bought advertising on the show in the first place," she said, "so when we learned that our advertising had appeared on the show by mistake, we contacted the network to correct the error."

She said Progressive tries to "avoid programing that we believe our customers and potential customers might find extremely offensive."

A Procter & Gamble representative echoed that sentiment: "At times our ads are run by mistake on shows that they were not meant to ... Any of our ads that ran did so by mistake, and we'll try to make sure that doesn't happen in the future."

6 comments:

Roy said...

I notice that while those guys may be pulling their advertising from Beck's show, they're still keeping on Fox in general, and most of Fox's news programs are just as offensive as Beck's. So it's all really just for show and means nothing in the end,

Frank Partisan said...

Beck took different positions, when he was with CNN. I question whether he believes what he says.

K. said...

Most of the letters asked them to move from Beck to other Fox programming. That showed outrage over the comment while remaining politically neutral. In terms of an accomplishment, it was the most probable outcome. How did you like P&G's song and dance?

Ren, I'm with you. Look at Lou Dobbs -- once the stereotype of a boring financial reporter. If these guys would get better ratings by going liberal, they'd go liberal.

RobinB said...

Amen to that, and good to see you back online, K!

Annette said...

Keith Olbermann stated that very thing one night.. that Hannity and all of them were only doing it for the money, I believe it was on Bill Maher's show.. However he said he was actually doing it because he believed it.. and I think he means it.. He gives too much of his away.. look at the amount of money he donated due to Palin's lies, and for Hannity to be water boarded, then Hannity backed out and he went with Mancou.. yet, Beck and Hannity spew the filth all the time and think nothing of it.. Beck instead of backing off from his racist remarks after starting to lose sponsors.. doubles down..
Dobbs.. sees the others getting ratings and goes after them by getting all crazy.. and when KO calls him out on some of his crazy talk, attacks KO instead of backing off... CNN instead of telling Dobbs to back off.. has backed Dobbs.. I quit watching CNN long ago.. just because of that kind of crap.. most of their announcers are just shills for the GOP it seems like and I don't like the way they never seem to challenge the guests and let them go.. MSNBC is getting about that bad anymore..

Wal-Mart pulled out on Beck yesterday.. so he is up to around 20 now.. that was the best.. and biggest to pull out.. it is wonderful.. we have done it.. yeah they went to other shows on Fox.. but that is something and it is taking a toll.. there are all kinds of websites to try to get them back and it isn't working...lol

Ima Wizer said...

excellent!