I'm delighted to announce the launch of Global Motherhood, a new section within HuffPost Impact dedicated to the health and well being of mothers and babies around the world, and sponsored by Johnson & Johnson.

It goes without saying that it's a bad idea in general to have a corporation in the health industry sponsoring health coverage; the potential for conflict of interest is obvious. But given that these kinds of special sections are typically created to meet an advertiser's need--an impression strengthened by the fact that the second paragraph of Huffington's announcement focuses on Johnson & Johnson's efforts to "use technology to improve the lives of mothers and babies"--one has to ask, why this section for this advertiser?

You don't have to dig very far back into the Huffington Post archives to get a clue. On November 1, HuffPost Parents posted this AP report:

The piece described a boycott launched against the Johnson & Johnson by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, which "has unsuccessfully been urging the world's largest healthcare company for 2 1/2 years to remove the trace amounts of potentially cancer-causing chemicals--dioxane and a substance called quaternium-15 that releases formaldehyde--from Johnson's Baby Shampoo, one of its signature products."

After Johnson & Johnson reached an agreement with the campaign to phase out the chemicals in the U.S. market, HuffPost Healthy Living (12/28/11) ran this post by Samuel Epstein, an expert on cancer at the University of Illinois School of Public Health:

Epstein's post pointed out the geographically limited nature of the company's agreement and the fact that its shampoo contains a third chemical, nitrosamine, that is also a potential cancer risk.

To be sure, as Jezebel (1/20/12) pointed out, there are numerous health concerns with Johnson & Johnson products--from birth control patches to insulin pumps, from the anti-psychotic drug Risperdal to Tylenol and Motrin. But if your news outlet reveals that a product might be giving kids' cancer and then the makers of that product offer you a sponsorship deal, it's a good bet that they aren't doing so because they're grateful to you for keeping them on their toes.

All-American Muslim is a reality show described by TLC, the cable channel that airs it, as "a look at life in Dearborn, Michigan--home to the largest mosque in the United States--through the lens of five Muslim American families...an intimate look at the customs and celebrations, misconceptions and conflicts these families face outside and within their own community."

But the Florida Family Association, a right-wing group leading the charge against the program, saw it as part of a sinister plot:

The Learning Channel's new show All-American Muslim is propaganda clearly designed to counter legitimate and present-day concerns about many Muslims who are advancing Islamic fundamentalism and Sharia law. The show profiles only Muslims that appear to be ordinary folks while excluding many Islamic believers whose agenda poses a clear and present danger to liberties and traditional values that the majority of Americans cherish.

Note the parallel between this argument and a complaint that Jersey Shore doesn't depict any of its Italian-American cast members as members of the Mafia.

Mobilizing its members to send emails calling on advertisers to boycott the show, FFA scored a victory. The company responded to the group (Hollywood Reporter, 12/9/11), "While we continue to advertise on various cable networks, including TLC, there are certain programs that do not meet Lowe's advertising guidelines, including the show you brought to our attention. Lowe's will no longer be advertising on that program."

Lowe's decision prompted an outraged response--one activist wrote, "Will you next consider KKK's demands to pull ads from BET?" (Hollywood Reporter, 12/9/11)--leading to an explanation of sorts posted on the company's Facebook page:

It appears that we managed to step into a hotly contested debate with strong views from virtually every angle and perspective--social, political and otherwise--and we’ve managed to make some people very unhappy. We are sincerely sorry. We have a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion, across our workforce and our customers, and we’re proud of that longstanding commitment.

Lowe's has received a significant amount of communication on this program, from every perspective possible. Individuals and groups have strong political and societal views on this topic, and this program became a lighting rod for many of those views. As a result we did pull our advertising on this program. We believe it is best to respectfully defer to communities, individuals and groups to discuss and consider such issues of importance.

Unfortunately, pulling your ads from a television show because it depicts a group of people as normal Americans is not a way to "respectfully defer"--it's taking the side of bigots who believe that that group must always be portrayed as frightening and dangerous.

Lowe's concluded its message:  "We strongly support and respect the right of our customers, the community at large, and our employees to have different views. If we have made anyone question that commitment, we apologize." One might well question the commitment of Lowe's to the right of people to express the viewpoint that Muslims are human beings when it withholds its advertising from programs that make that point.  The calculation that it's safer not to associate oneself with groups that are hated by a vocal minority highlights the danger of relying on corporate sponsorship to support a media system that one hopes would actually embody the values that Lowe's pretends to have.

The piece is written by Dorian Benkoil, who "handles marketing and sales strategies for MediaShift, and is the business columnist for the site"--a job description that suggests that PBS has already torn down the wall between business and editorial, since those responsibilities would seem to put you in a constant position of conflict of interest. (He earlier worked as "a liaison between the sales and editorial sides" at ABCNews.com.)

The piece is a primer on "how to blur the lines in an intelligent and ethical way," in the words of MediaShift managing editor Courtney Lowery Cowgill. It offers such tips as "If Sales Influences Editorial, It's OK," and insights like:

It's easy to demean "link bait" such as "Top 10" or "How To" lists, but if your users like and share them, and they generate profitable page views, is there really harm? If there's sponsor interest, all the better.

To be sure, the piece includes caveats, like: "You do need core principles that can't be bent--even if that means the business doesn't meet payroll." But it seems completely oblivious to the dangers of basing your business model on giving the sponsors what they want. It's hard to maintain a line in the sand when you've started out with the intention of blurring that line--ethically, intelligently or otherwise.

The most striking thing about the column is its celebration of profit-making as a liberating force:

Profit is what lets you not only continue another day, but also gives you the freedom to determine your own mission.... The more profit your company makes, the more leeway it has to do its work, to remain independent of government or other interference, and the more freedom to do good work.

Well, no. The point of a for-profit business is to make money, not "to do good work"; the more profit your company makes, the more it will strive to make in the future, so it can show stockholders an ever-expanding return on their investment. The pressure this puts on journalists to warp their copy is why the wall between business and editorial was made one of journalism's "core principles that can't be bent."

And the difficulty of maintaining such principles in the face of the profit imperative is why PBS was set up in the first place, to provide a home for journalism free from the obligation to please sponsors. But when PBS has sales and marketing directors who also double as business columnists, I guess that kind of journalism needs to find a new home.

The 60-second Romney ad quoted Obama as saying, "If we keep talking about the economy, we're going to lose."

It sounds like Obama is talking about his own chances in 2012. But it's actually a clip of Obama mocking his 2008 opponent, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz), for not wanting to talk about the economy in the final stretch of that election. McCain's response to the collapse of the financial sector in the fall of 2008 is widely cited as a contributing factor to his loss.

That's a pretty astounding bit of deception. It's good that Ward is doing this, because when I read about the Romney ad in this morning's New York Times, I saw a headline that read, "Romney Heats Up Campaign in New Hampshire With an Ad Attacking Obama."

The Times' Ashley Parker wrote that the Romney campaign was heading into "a more combative phase," and that the commercial represented "a step up in the intensity of the campaign for the Republican presidential nomination."

The ad actually projects strength, according to the paper:

By focusing his message on the president, Mr. Romney is trying to show Republicans that he can take on Mr. Obama aggressively, an attribute that conservatives are seeking in a nominee.

To be fair, Parker does have a piece on the Times website today that discusses the ad's inaccuracy. We'll see if there's something in the paper tomorrow.

But for some reporters the inaccuracy of the ad doesn't amount to much. At the Washington Post, Aaron Blake's piece explains the context of the quote, but then seems determined to argue that it's not going to matter:

And how many of Romney’s supporters or other Republicans are going to be truly offended by the use of an out-of-context quote in an ad? We're wagering not many. In fact, Romney's willingness to take Obama on so directly--no matter the means of doing so--will likely accrue to his benefit among GOP primary voters who want a fighter next fall.

It's also worth noting that a lack of context in a campaign ad is nothing new. Just last week, in fact, GOP candidates including Romney mischaracterized Obama’s quote about how America had been "lazy" about attracting foreign investment, by suggesting that Obama was calling all Americans "lazy." (Texas Gov. Rick Perry even ran an ad based on this premise.) And the furor over that lasted all of two seconds.

Going from a political press that doesn't care about factchecking candidates to one that believes factchecking doesn't really matter is not exactly progress. Or is this just the rule that's applied to Republican presidential candidates?

UPDATE: It's worth noting that ABC's Jake Tapper slammed the ad on Twitter, and did a report on World News saying that the ad is "so out of context it's false."