240: Between Spin and Wag the Dog: Uncovering the Dark Arts of PR and Perception Management

A tail. Wagging a dog is an idiom that describes the act of something powerful being.

Controlled by something less so.

It also happens to be similar to the name of one of my favorite.

Movies, 1997, Barry Levinson's Wag the Dog with Robert De Niro, the late Anne Heche and Dustin Hoffman.

And it contains one of my favorite lines that I think perfectly sums up the topic of this week's episode. All about wagging the dog and PR spin. If you have kids in the car.

While you're listening, you may want to turn it down a notch. Enemy line.

It's all, you know, thinking ahead, thinking ahead. That's what producing is. It's like being a plumber. Yes, like being a plumber. Do your job right, nobody should notice when you up.

Everything gets full of his elite military.

Welcome to the Indestructible PR Podcast where we use current events and tested media.

And PR strategies along with dated movies.

To help prevent or manage a crisis and build an indestructible reputation. In the realm of public relations, the term PR spin brings us into a debate mode. Is it something that is needed in public relations or is it a necessary evil?

Is it positive or negative? So let's talk about the definition of.

PR spin, what it means and talk about the positive aspects to it and the negative.

Is it all that bad?

Now, I started the episode talking about a movie and it's a dated movie given that it came out in 1997.

So only certain people probably listening now remember that movie.

But you can rent it.

I don't think you can rent it.

Free anywhere, but I know that you.

Can still rent it.

But it is an excellent movie and it is funny and it really looks at in a very comical way about the art or the dark art of PR spin as it, as it involves a president.

Now I'm going to read the description to the movie.

So after being caught red handed in a scandalous situation days before his reelection, the President of the United States decides to make up a conflict to divert attention from press and media. One of his advisors contacts a Hollywood producer, Dustin Hoffman, to create a smokescreen, a war in Albania that the President can heroically end before the television cameras. Note, no social media whatsoever. And that's why it would be almost impossible to pull off the scenario in Wag the Dog nowadays because of social media and the amount of people out there who can under, who can unravel any type of scheme. And that's what's really changed today in this whole environment of public relations. And PR spin, it changes on a dime and it also changes due to these just outside influences. Now, another movie that happens to be one of my favorite movies that I recognized when I was putting this, this episode together rather quickly, that it has a similar, has a similar storyline, and that is Argo with another favorite of mine, Ben Affleck. We'll return to him in a moment. But Ben Affleck, it's the movie and he. I just want to make sure I get this right. He directed, produced and star in it. He didn't write it. I think he may have been a co writer without credit, but it's really Ben Affleck's movie. He won an Oscar for that movie. And Argo, same thing. It's where he, as a CIA agent, created a ruse to be able to take the hostages. No, they weren't hostages. The Iranian hostages. There were U.S. employees there from the.

Embassy and he needed to get them out via the Canadian embassy.

And that movie, you know, involves another.

Layer, you know, of spin.

They weren't necessarily dealing with the press. Wait a minute. No, they were. They were pitching the movie and they pitched it to Variety. Yes. So absolutely that movie involved PR spin as well, you know, with the movies now tying it into Ben Affleck. So the reason why I wanted to do the topic this week is because it's around two, you know, two little things that came up on TikTok. I had posted a tick tock about yet another movie star, Kevin Costner, who's.

Now a television star starring in Yellowstone.

I had noticed by looking at articles online, I was watching along and his divorce. And no one likes, you know, no one likes hearing stories about divorce, particularly people who've been married a long time, they have kids. No one likes to see the unraveling.

Of relationship, particularly of beloved people.

You know, people love Kevin Costner.

I'm sure people, you know, his wife, Christine Baumgartner is a civilian, as it were.

But Kevin Costner has a lot of.

Fans out there, me being one of them.

You know, I came on my Kevin Costner walls. I'm gonna play. Let me, let me play the tick.

Tock for you right now. Take a listen.

Kevin Costner is getting divorced. The Yellowstone actor was apparently left stunned when his wife Christine filed for a divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. Now, we here at this account take no joy nor glee anyone getting divorced. But we at this account also like to look at narratives, particularly when it relates to media statements. In most divorces, in the hoi polloi Land you don't have PR reps that can, you know, spin divorces for you.

So people are left wondering on the.

Sidelines, like who did what. And usually there's one side that did something and then the other one's left screwed. Not saying that this happened here, but let's just take a look at a timeline and a media statement, just for kicks. Costner was perhaps also stunned when this photo showed up on Instagram on Sunday, one day before his wife filed for divorce. Page Six reported it on May 3rd. Kevin Costner wears wedding ring as he cozies up to two women ahead of divorce. But here, right here, he didn't know.

He was getting divorced.

Let's take some leaps here. Maybe the wife saw this. Maybe the wife was alerted to this. Maybe Kevin Costner wasn't supposed to be in Las Vegas. Maybe Kevin Costner had no idea that people take photos and they post it to Instagram. Who knows?

It could be a red herring. It could be absolutely nothing.

But Page Six has it, so it's.

Part of the story.

Here's the statement via representative. It is with great sadness that circumstances beyond his control have transpired which have no comma, resulted in Mr. Costner having to participate in a disillusion of marriage action. Dissolution of marriage action is legalese and also distancing language. So perhaps Costner did not want to attach the word divorce again to his name. This is not his first divorce. His first divorce was one of the most expensive Hollywood divorces ever for an actor. But also distancing language can indicate distancing from something. So Costner is already dealing with a.

Lot of this, a lot of cheating allegations.

Then there's the Yellowstone factor. So before all this divorce Bruha happened, there was reports over dispute over Costner's contract. And his attorney said that the fact that Kevin was only willing to work.

One week on the second half of.

Season five of Yellowstone is an absolute lie.

It's ridiculous.

And anyone suggesting it shouldn't be believed for one second, which makes it totally believable. And then reported in TMZ today.

So I think the reason why we.

Saw that messaging and we'll see future messaging of distancing a lot more Lieutenant Commander Tom Farrell and less Yuri.

All right, so that is the tic tac that got me thinking about PR spent. Now, there were some people in the comments who, who felt that I should.

Not be talking about people's divorce.

You know, it's a private issue. And that's where I say no, that's where I'm putting pushback because what I was quoting was a source. Now, the video that I put up.

In the TikTok was from the Daily Mail.

But the Daily. And some people in the comments had mentioned, oh, it's a Daily Mail. You know, they're a rag. They're a tabloid. You can't believe them. But the Daily Mail was quoting People magazine where a source from Kevin Costner's team or camp relayed that information. Okay, so that is public relations. That is for. That is information for the public, thereby making it very much our business and everyone else's business and my business. Because I'm a fan of Kevin Costner. And if something is happening with Kevin Costner, I have every right to know about Kevin Costner if he's in the.

Middle of a divorce.

Now, if I'm thinking about Kevin Costner and I'm thinking about paying money to.

See a movie or renting a movie.

I may be someone who watches Bull Durham frequently. I would love to see no Way Out, Commander Farrell.

Oh, it's one of my favorite movies, the introduction to Kevin Costner.

But we're investing in him. And if we're investing in the product or the commodity of the actor Kevin Costner, we have every right to know about it. People want to know celebrities.

They're just like you and me.

So this is why PR spin exists, because Kevin Costner needs to spend, why.

He'S getting a divorce. I don't want to say this in.

The TikTok because you don't want to spread misinformation, but I will say the rumors that were picked up on TMZ and other places was that he has, you know, some connection to producer from Yellowstone. And there were claims out there, rumors not proven, alleged that there could be a pregnancy involving Kevin Costner.

If this were true, that's not his.

First time to that rodeo.

He had a child with. I don't know, even if they were a girlfriend. I think it's a son named Liam. And then he had kids with his first wife, Robin. Was that her first name? No, that was Mel Gibson's first wife. I get first divorces, first wives. Confused. No Lily. Sister, I can't remember.

No, Lily I think is Chris.

What's his name? He was in. Oh, gosh, he was in with Mini Driver. Now I'm losing it. The Circle? No, the Irish movie. I'm not even going to Google it. I'm not even going to Google it.

Because it's going to Circle Friends.

See, there you go. I was going to say it was.

Going to come to me. I'm getting all of my actors from.

The 90s mixed up.

But anyway. But when it comes to the topic, you know, of PR spin, now I also mentioned something that triggered.

This is going back to Ben Affleck. I haven't done a tick tock on Ben Affleck.

Now again, I love Ben Affleck. Ben Affleck married to Jennifer Lopez. JLo, what happened with them over the weekend? There was some video, video leaked on social media of Ben Affleck, you know.

Walking JLo into the car and then.

He slams the door.

So we've all seen that.

And then there was also video of Ben Affleck at last week's mother premiere where they exchanged tense words in the red carpet poses.

Now I saw an article mentioning, and.

I don't remember, I would love to source it, but I read so much.

Stuff, I don't remember where I saw it.

Sourcing a lip reader. So maybe it was one of these tabloids that now, gosh, everybody's into lip reading. After the coronation, everyone now hires lip readers to find out what people are saying. We all knew what King Charles was saying in the Coach with Camilla, how.

He was upset that William and Kate were a little late getting to the coronation and he was upset about it.

But the lip reader had said that Ben Affleck and J.

Lo were talking about walking the red carpet. That really was just conversation. Even though Ben Affleck looked incredibly tense and stressed.

And if we were looking at the non verbals would look like a very heated argument on the red carpet. But we are being led, if you look at other articles.

That, oh no, there's nothing to look at here, nothing at all.

This is just normal day to day operations. And I pulled out one tabloid that said that JLO now is saying, oh, here it is a body language expert. This was in the Mirror talking about Ben Affleck and Jennifer's interactions. That the outburst could, could be an indication that the couple might be doomed. But another article was saying it's just two couples that are under siege because of paparazzi.

Barazzi. That to me is spin. Who knows?

This could just be made up by the tabloid. But if I were JLo, I would.

Be spinning this right?

So her team has to spend and JLo is the queen of spin. So what are you gonna, what are you gonna spend?

If video clearly shows the look of just pained anguish on your husband's face.

What, what is the art of spent?

The art of spend is distraction. The Art of distraction. What are you going to distract from? What are you going to say?

Well, naturally, why would Ben look annoyed.

If people are filming him with JLO getting in the car and he's slamming the door like that? Okay, well, it's the paparazzi, naturally, filming that, which is reasonable, right?

So that's all about PR and spin. It's what can be reasonable and what people will reasonably believe. Now, personally, I think there's two things at play. JLo and Ben Affleck. I mean, we're talking the same age. So JLo's a couple months older than me. We're the same age. She might look a little better, but she's got the funds to look a little better than me. But, like, JLO is kind of my watermark in life. You know, I look at what JLo's.

Doing and how she looks, and I always.

And I don't compare in a very envious way, but I look at her and think, okay, jlo, you're looking good. But JLO is all about.

Perception, okay? She's young, she's hot, she's always in love.

Oh, JLO is love.

And the Ben Affleck relationship, most people know it's doomed.

It just is doomed. Because to be with JLo means you have to be a part of that.

JLO circus, and you have to.

You have to go and buy into all of it. And whenever you see Ben Affleck walking around looking smart, if he's wearing clothes with layers, that's what I noticed. If he's wearing layers of wool in all these fabrics, JLo's telling him how to dress. But when you just see him in a. In a Red Sox ball cap and a T shirt with his dunks, that's. That's Ben being Ben. So there is definite perception at play there. So there's a lot of PR spin.

Involving JLo and Ben Affleck. But I think, though, that there is tension.

And not because there's tension in the Hollywood sense. I think there's tension just in the second marriage sense or JLo.

She's been married, so third marriage, you.

Get tired, you know that you have the glow and you have all the paparazzi, but I don't think they got all the spin they wanted from that wedding. And then there was a little pushback about that. Used to be on a plantation, and Jlo just did not get the buzz.

That she wanted from it.

And. And they're tired, you know, like, I couldn't be. We're the same age.

If I was walking around, I wouldn't.

Be looking good all the time. I possibly be, you know, annoyed and.

Showing stress in public.

They have families that they're trying to, they have, they have Jennifer Garner, which.

You know, Jennifer Garner makes JLo crazy.

Because JLo is supposed to be the hot siren, you know, the spicy hot siren singer.

And, and Jennifer Garner is supposed to be the sweet everyday mom.

But now the COVID of the magazine, I forget. Maxim.

No, not Maxim. I don't know what magazine she was on.

We'll pop it up here in the video.

She looks, she looks fantastic. A little jlosque, a little jlo esque. So that's not going to make you happy either.

So there's going to be, I just think there's going to be tension.

There is enough for divorce, I don't know. But you know, Ben Affleck, he has struggles.

That guy's in recovery and recovery. And I know this from people close to me is day to day, that's a struggle and that's work and that's, that's going to catch up.

So if we see anything with them.

But let's just talk about understanding public relations.

Spin.

So if you look at spin, you know, I always do associate it with.

Negative, with, with a negative.

I'll just be perfectly transparent in that when people call me for a consult offer, hourly consults. Now because of TikTok, a lot of.

People come to me with these just kind of quick hits like, oh, oh geez, oh, here I open up with an expletive and I'm going, oh, geez.

Yeah, I got a problem here. But I'm getting a lot of those.

Like, oh, shite moments.

Okay? And, and some will say, I need.

You to spend this for me.

And I tell them I don't spin. I'm not, I'm not a spin doctor. I do not spin.

I do not fix. That's not my job.

My job is to use the truth to get through it because we have to have ownership.

We have to acknowledge what happened.

Now, I am not. What I won't deny is that there is perception. That is a huge part of what I'm doing in public relations. It's the perception and what public. In setting public opinion, I am looking at reasonable people. I'm not looking at your fans, your zealots, and I'm not looking at your biggest critics either. I'm paying attention to them, but I'm not writing to them. I'm not planning around them. We're talking about reasonable people. I want, we're talking about press coverage. If the press picks this up, what is the perception that the press is.

Going to pick up as we move forward while keeping an eye on what's happening?

Now, let's just look at some positive aspects of public relations spin, you know, so, yes, okay, I don't like the term spin, but if we're looking at spin as it involves public perception, you know, here we go. You know, one, there's just the reputation.

Management piece of it.

When a PR crisis happens, or scandal or we're worried about the reputation, we need to manage that reputation. Reputation, to me is always aligned with trust. It's just another word for trust, how people trust you. If there's a PR scandal, people are going to lose trust in you or they have lost trust in you. And what you need to do is strategically present information to retain or regain the trust.

And how we do that is messaging.

How we do that is strategizing.

This is what I do.

This is what I'm doing right now. As soon as I finish recording this.

I'm going to be going to work and doing this.

You might see this reputation management from an example, you will see this. If there's a corporate crisis, there could be some serious damage. If this crisis spirals out of control. It could be investor relations. It, you know, it could be something like even looking at the pandemic, you know, if people aren't. If there is a pending, you know, scandal or misuse of something or the numbers, or there's just a perception that something could be worse that could cause, you know, the public to be terrified about something. Or if this, if this information gets out, it could be taken out of.

Context and we could cause widespread panic.

So let's let us use a persuasion.

To let people know, to focus on the truth as opposed to the scare.

So you might, you know, unite massage.

Messaging to downplay that.

There's also just crisis communication.

You know, if there is a scandal and they're trying to mitigate any type of.

Fear. You know, in my podcast last week, I talked about, you know, the fear.

Of management or leadership when you are.

Being trashed, you know, online. And I opened with FDR talking about.

His inaugural address of the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. It's the fear of fear. So in a crisis communication situation, we might use persuasive messaging to alleviate fear. We don't want people to be unduly scared about something. We want them to focus. So think about disaster communications. Think about the pandemic, hurricanes, storms, we want to keep people calm so they don't panic. Even if things aren't great, you know.

We'Re going to do that. And then there's persuasive advocacy. So if there's causes, ideas or policies where we want to show the positive.

Aspects of it, we are going to.

Write persuasively so people can see parts of the argument that they may not see before. Now, some may call that PR spin, I don't. But if you're looking at the spin of it, like you're creating momentum and movement, so people look in the other.

Direction and look for something that is.

More positive, then all right, we'll call it, you know, PR spin in that sense. So those could be the, you know, the public aspect or the positive aspects to PR spin. But for the most part, when people talk about PR spin, they're talking about.

The negativity of it.

They are talking about an aspect where it is, there's some aspect of misleading the public. So the first three positive elements, you could look at it as protecting the public. And the second piece of it is, would be, would be misleading the public.

Which we don't want.

So if you look at the first aspect of misleading the public, you know, where you can think about when people have misled the public in the past. Now, something that I dove into on TikTok and podcasts and all was former governor Andrew Cuomo around the pandemic. If you remember, he was the golden.

Boy of the pandemic.

He was all over the media. People loved him. He was on Ellen, he got a book deal. People were watching his press conferences just to see him masterfully manage the press, which meant managing the public. He was persuading people that in New York, Albany, he had it locked down, he got it. And I was one of the people impressed. I remember tweeting about him like, this is how you do it. This is why you have a press conference. I love transparency. I love people getting out there and talking about it. He was magnetic. You know, people were drawn to him. Television cameras were drawn to him. Local. They were all. Everybody was taking in the Andrew Cuomo.

Show and people loved it.

But the person who loved it the.

Most made it a problem, and that was Andrew Cuom and his assistant, who was assistant Melissa Derosa. Is that her name?

The two of them were in cahoots to spin. Misleading the public by suppression of data. They were not being honest. There were certain aspects of the COVID up of the COVID deaths, particularly as.

It related to nursing homes.

So he was he was unreporting the numbers of people who were dying in nursing homes. And he was trying to keep so much of that tragedy hidden from the public.

He wanted to manipulate it so he could still give the impression that everything was under control, that Andrew Cuomo had it.

And he also was manipulating reporting criteria. So he was omitting deaths in nursing.

Homes when patients were moved to hospitals. So he's fudging the numbers.

And he was fudging the numbers for.

A reason that I believe that I see often in this realm of public relations and media.

And it's something that gets.

You've also seen it in life. And that's when people have an ego.

And when that ego is more important.

Than truth and transparency, they want to.

Come out looking good.

Their reputation matters more than the truth.

And that's when you get into trouble. But also that's when you get into PR spin. Another part of peer spin is just.

The lack of transparency.

It's when you do not want to be forthright and you want to tell.

People what's happening, you don't want to.

Be fully transparent on it. One of my least favorite, so that I have two examples in crisis communication, whenever I hear them, whenever I hear people talk about it, I think it's such a hack answer to it.

Because when, when someone will interview someone for a podcast or an interview or a talk.

Give me an example.

The best communication response you've ever heard. And the worst, and the best is always Tylenol, you know, Johnson and Johnson in Chicago. And the worst is always the BP oil spill. I want my life back. And here I am doing it. I'm being a hypocrite.

But those are two that we can remember.

The BP oil spill.

I want my.

I want my life back. CEO Hayward, Andrew Hayward, when he said I want my life, clearly was not being transparent in what was happening during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. They had interests, they had economic interests.

There were reasons why they wanted to mislead the public. So they sent the CEO out there, the camera ready, British CEO camera ready. Because he looked it, but he wasn't.

Prepared to speak about it. And it was one of the most.

Ill timed and ill planned messages that.

You could have for that response.

He wanted his life back when there had been, there had been deaths and the countless, you know, the deaths of so many animals and wildlife. And also there's just the cost to.

The Gulf coast that had happened there.

So that cost him his job and cost the reputation of bp. Another, another piece when we think about lack of transparency.

I'm going to throw back on this, but Harvey Weinstein, the whole, you know, me too.

The guy's still in jail, you know, to this day. But there was a lot of lack of transparency when it came to the press because Harvey Weinstein was so entwined with the press.

So there were.

When Ronan Farrow, you know, had his.

Expose, when he was, when he was.

Reporting, he found that, that there were networks there, particularly NBC, there was allegations that they were covering up stories about Harvey Weinstein because there was, you know, mutual working relationship there. And all of a sudden they didn't want to roll out, you know, these me too claims because Harvey Weinstein was so incredibly powerful. But two women at the, at the New York Times and also, you know, Ronan, Ronan Farrow in their coverage and. Okay, now I have to pause because I don't want to just say two women because I believe they won. So the movie.

Oh, gosh, was it me too. I have to say who it is.

Wallace, the movie is, she said, which, speaking of movies on planes, that was.

The last movie that I watched on a plane, which she said, and it was very good.

New York Times reporters Megan Tuohy, Jody Kantor, I want to give credit where credit is due. It was their reporting and reporting, like Ronan Farrell, that was finally able to uncover that. So that's an example of PR spin. Harvey Weinstein and the last piece of it too, which is the most damaging, I believe. And that's damage to your credibility when it's exposed or perceived as disingenuous. Disingenuous. It can lead to reputational damage. If you're using it in PR for your client, you are risking the most important aspect that you need. It is equality. A commodity, whatever you call it in a crisis, if you've lost it, you have lost the crisis.

And that is trust.

PR spin can damage that. And in the day of social media, in this day and age of not.

Just social media but video, but where.

Everyone is a citizen journalist out there, people are filming their own video. People are out there showing the story. And you can't spin a story with reporters anymore. Your friendly reporters and, and Harvey Weinstein and that timeline, you know, proves that the big media, legacy media, they were the last ones to protect him. But it was people finally telling their voices. That was a. That was our really big last hat, last hashtag scandal.

But now we're in social media scandal land you.

It's. It's all about video. So let's just bring it back to Ben Affleck. Now the video of him slamming the door, it was posted by Backridge, which.

Is a paparazzi firm.

And so anything that you see from.

Background is usually photos that are staged, typically stage.

But this could be a video, you know, because the paparazzi was there. So that was a paparazzi video. But it's not typical PR spin, paparazzi video.

Okay. Because Ben Affleck was looking bad.

So JLo, this is just Molly thought.

You know, JLo could be the one.

Who put the paparazzi there.

And maybe that's why Ben Affleck was mad, like, oh, here we go, you know, it's paparazzi again. So maybe they were arguing. Oh.

Or not, we don't know.

It's all about spin.

But PR spin, it is multifaceted. It has both positive and negative aspects. Yes. So if someone is telling you, oh, let's do this spin, don't completely dismiss that PR person, that they only deal in the negative.

It's a wishy washy term.

Me personally, I don't use it because I do associate it with, with a negative term. But spin in general, it's about shaping public perception, managing reputation and advocating for causes. And those are all very power, the.

Positive aspects of public relations and the.

Positive aspects to the work that people like me do.

And that's how I look at it.

But when you wield it unethically, when you're doing it for manipulation and deceptive.

Purposes, then you are getting into the.

Sketchiest of territories, and it is the riskiest of territories. Because I don't think any PR spin nowadays, someone, someone sitting online is going.

To get to the bottom of it.

Because believe me, if there's not one, there are a million people who have truly nothing better to do than to.

Be Internet social media spies.

They will sit all day and get dopamine hits after uncovering all of the.

Things that they can.

Reporters have sometimes eight hours in a workday. But people, if they're sitting at their desk and they have a phone and they have Google, then they're going to spend a lot of time to try and prove something.

If, if people are trying to spin.

All right, in every episode I include one indestructible tip. This is an easy leave behind, easy.

To remember takeaway about the topic, public.

Relations spin if you want to get involved in it. If you are dealing with some type.

Of.

PR problem, perception problem, if you have some initiative and you feel that you can't be fully, fully transparent with whatever that issue is and you're trying to. You're just trying to change minds. Remember when you get into the spin.

Aspect of it, because the more you spin, the more you're overlooking an important aspect, and that is trust and that is truth. And you need truth. Spin usually is spinning so fast that it doesn't. You can't even see the truth, you know, in that spin. PR spin is a slippery slope. Once you go down, it is really, really difficult to come back because someone is going to bring you down. That's all for this week on the podcast. Thanks so much for listening and watching. Bye for now.