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News Management
Spin doctors and other sources
Whose words are you going to take? Those of a cabinet minister
or that of a whore?
Downing Street spokesman
Said to the editor of the 'Daily Mirror' in 1963, when attempting
to
kill the as-yet unpubilished story of the relationship between
the
Minister for War John Profumo and Christine Keeler, good-time
girl. The Mirror sat on the story, but within weeks Profumo
had admitted all and resigned.
Nothing travels faster than light, with the possible exception
of bad news, which follows its own rules.
Douglas Adams
English novelist
Never believe in anything until it has been officially denied.
Otto von Bismarck
(1815-1898)
German statesman
[I want] minimum information given with maximum politeness.
Jacqueline Kennedy
Giving instructions to press
secretary Pamela Turnure
[He was] as uncommunicative as a vending machine.
Lewis H Lapham
On White House press
secretary George E Reedy
1965
Press Agents
A telescope will magnify a star a thousand times, but a good
press agent can do even better.
Fred Allen
US comedian
(1894-1956)
The proud man counts his newspaper clippings; the humble man
his blessings.
Fulton J. Sheen
US religious leader
(1895-1979)
Press conferences
[You reporters] should have printed what he meant, not what
he said.
Earl Bush
Press aide to Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago
It's a weird scene. You win a few baseball games and all of
a sudden you're surrounded by reporters and TV men with cameras
asking you about Vietnam and race relations.
Vida Blue
US baseball player
1982.
There aren't any embarrassing questions-just embarrassing answers.
Carl T Rowan Jr
US Ambassador to Finland
On press conferences
1963