Labor

AMPTP Gets Punked

Posted by on December 11, 2007 at 8:36 pm. NO Comments :

A website satirizing the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has been launched – no doubt by some enterprising and idle writers. They commandeered the domain AMPTP.com and produced a near copy of the producers site. It is absolutely hilarious. Some excerpts:

“While we’re not going to point fingers or assign blame, we do feel justified in saying that they [the writers] are entirely at fault.”

“It is now absolutely clear that the WGA’s organazis are determined to advance their own personal ideologies, political agendas, sexual preferences, barbaric tribal customs, canine wardrobe choices, religious beliefs and blood rituals upon working writers…”

“…we’ve got enough reality shows to choke a horse. Literally – one of the shows is “Can You Choke This Horse?” And for the fall, we’re already working on “Can You Choke This Horse With the Stars?”

I hope I never have to fight these guys. They are brutal.

Dems Sign On For AMPTP Image Makeover

Posted by on December 7, 2007 at 1:02 am. NO Comments :

Just when you think the cynicism meter is off the scale, you read an article like this in the Los Angeles Times:

“Seeking to shore up its flagging public image, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has turned to veteran political advisors from both sides of the aisle to guide its public relations battle with Hollywood’s striking writers.”

It’s not particularly surprising that greedy producers want to mount a campaign to make themselves look more sympathetic to the public, but the guns they’ve hired should raise an eyebrow or two. Mark Fabiani and Chris Lehane are veterans of Democratic political campaigns. Lehane has been seen recently slinging for Hillary Clinton.

What I want to know is why have Democratic consultants signed on to serve as strike breakers? This seems a bit inconsistent with the mission of a party that represents itself as worker friendly. I can’t help but wonder what Clinton and their other clients would think of this new association. But if I were a Democrat running for office, I would look elsewhere for PR advisers. And I hope the writer’s kick their butts.

Update: Lehane and Co. will pay for their betrayal. Their contracts with unions SEIU and ChangeToWin have been canceled. I don’t know what the producers are paying them, but it will have be a small fortune to make up for what they will lose on these contracts and those in the future from Democratic enterprises who will no longer do business with these strike breakers.