All in Politics
The Tim Cahill campaign corruption case is an interesting thing to follow. You can point the fingers in a lot of directions, but I personally point the finger to Hill Holiday, the advertising agency.
As counselors, it's our job to provide our clients with smart, creative and business-moving ideas. However, it's not our job to do unethical things just to help our bottom line.
In my opinion, that's what happened here.
The Boston Globe has a story today about a women, Maria-Helena Knoller, who was playing matchmaker, but was taking it to a whole new level:
Knoller, it turned out, was a matchmaker of a special kind. For fees as high as $12,000, she would pair illegal immigrants from Brazil with Americans, arrange their marriages - and, in some cases, their subsequent divorces - after they received status as “lawful permanent residents’’ of the United States.
There are a zillion stories out there like this and it's a stark reminder that whatever you publish on the web -- either by blogging, Tweeting, Facebooking, etc. -- will always live on then web.
My disdain for politics is well-known (at least by my friends and those that read this blog). My feelings toward the folks that run the City of Revere are also pretty well documented. To cut to the chase, read the post where I tell the powers that be to STFU and get back to work.
So you can imagine my disgust when I read this article from the Revere Journal.
The Readers Digest version goes like a little something like this: an unnamed source says that one of the mayoral candidates tried to get the cops to arrest another candidate for drunk driving -- actually, catch them in the act, then having them arrested.
The person being accused is George Rotondo. In my STFU post, I mentioned that he has been the only politician I've talked to that gave me the impression that he actually cared about the issues that are important to me:
This is what I want the Revere City Council to doI was reading the Revere Journal this morning and specifically a story with the headline, "Conflict resolution - Meetings are marked by fighting, chaos."
Basically, the Revere City Council is spending taxpayer money to fight like little school girls, call eachother names, tattle tail, etc.
Actually, the Journal sums it up nicely in their opening graphs to the story:
The Globe wrote a piece today about the plight of Corey Abrams, who announced last month that he was running for a seat on the Revere City Council. Specifically, the piece is about a caller who threatened Abrams to post pornography on a website he had created and called coreyabrams.com — unless the candidate paid him for the domain name.
This doesn't shock me whatsoever. Local politics can be a brutal sport and in the case of Revere, it's like mash-up of rugby, lacrosse, football and street fighting -- only in this case, the threats are real.
I was going to write a post about Ted Kennedy, his passing and the impact it'll have on the media over the next few days and months. But my boss beat me to it with a great post about Ted's communications legacy. It's a great round up for any brand, leader or porofessional (anyone for that matter) who wants to be seen by their peers as a trusted resource. The key to any communications program -- no matter what you're selling or who you're selling it to -- is trust.
Here's the Ted Kennedy, communications "to-do" list:
I've lived in the city of Revere for nearly seven years now. We picked this location because the neighborhood is nice, the school system is good and the house was perfect for us. We are not ones to poke our noses into our neighbors business nor into the inner workings of the city, especially a city like Revere that has a rap for being lead by corrupt politicians and a seedy underworld.
Over the past few years, I've gotten to know my neighrbors to the point where it's more than just a hello and goodbye. We've been invited for BBQs, pool parties, neighborhood meetings, etc. One such neighbor I've gotten to know is George Rotondo, counselor at large.
Now, George is known as a pot stirrer in the city as he's always challenging the policies and moves being made by the mayor (who, as far as I can tell, isn't well liked in this town, according to the folks that have lived here longer than me, but keeps getting elected for some reason). I like politicians like George; the ones that like to stir it up but have their constituents best interests in mind. I've dealt with politicians enough in my day as a reporter working at the state house for the Globe and in my PR profession that they are a strange breed.
This brings me to the point of this post - yard waste and a call to the bullpen for help.