• by John Gaffney , January 3, 2003

Holiday OPRs

“Tom, I Haven’t Seen A Hit Like That Since I Bought That Stanley Hammer At Home Depot:” The home improvement chain will sponsor the set of Fox’s The Best Damn Sports Show Period, next month via a new set simulating a backyard deck, where hosts, including Tom Arnold and Chris Rose, will regularly kick back to talk about sports. That deal, part of a package valued at $1 million to $2 million, could allow for even more product placement. "They can barbecue," said Guy Sousa, executive vice president for advertising sales at Fox Cable Sports, "and do something with sponsors' products on the grill.”

Talk About A Short Shelf Life: Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post has already noticed doom around Sen. John Edwards. “The media, once so taken with Edwards, seem to have grown a bit tired of his fresh-faceness. After a spectacular run of favorable press – including People's "sexiest politician" nod and Time calling him the party's "golden boy" – the buzz on Edwards has not been great lately. Minutes into yesterday's press availability, a reporter asked whether he'd be willing to accept the vice-presidential slot. (Already? On the day of his announcement? Don't you have to tank in the polls before that question gets asked?)

Only Liars Use Statistics: According to the American Journalism Review, Ken Dautrich, director of the Center for Survey Research and Analysis said: "We've become poll crazy as a society. When you look at a few decades ago, there were a handful of polls that had a code of ethics and kind of a code of science and a methodology that was applied to what they do."

Terror In Aisle Three: Bragging about their several rejected commercials from 2002, PETA was particularly proud of its “Turkey Terror” commercial, which features a “turkey” taking over a supermarket and making references to beatings, slit throats, and “deadly bacteria,” was banned by Animal Planet, MTV, CNN, MSNBC, and many others.