My morning started with a bang. Literally. A squirrel decided to eat some electrical wires coming out of the transformer across the street from my house. Needless to say, at 6:20 a.m., I was not impressed.

Today, I am going to do a roundup of stuff — stuff that I find interesting and that is somewhat germaine to what it is the PR Girlz do.

• In today’s Toronto Star, Bruce Campion-Smith reports how the Harper government controls its communication policies. It is the first report in the Secret Capital series from the newspaper. Harper’s communications policies are anything but open and stand in stark contrast to the federal rules for open access to information.
• Festival de Cannes ends today. Norm Wilner from NOW has been blogging the event from the French sea-side town. Check out the reviews now — you might be able to save yourself from wasting time at TIFF. [For the life of me, I don't know what Lindsay Lohan was doing there, though. Beyond Mean Girls (brilliant writing) and Altman's swan song (she was cast well), has she done anything deserving of Cannes recognition?]
• I want to play a bit with a Google lab release called Google Friend Connect. The server keeps crashing on me.
• Grant Robertson at the Globe and Mail reports on Wikipedia’s business plan and its desire to remain not-for-profit.
• Tim O’Reilly had a funny post on the weekend about Microsoft’s obsession with search.

We are on cloud nine around the office all because “our” Terry Fallis has been named the winner of the 2008 Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. Terry, a guy with a biomechanical engineering degree and a love of words, decided to write about what he knows best — politics, engineering and people – in his first novel “Best Laid Plans”.

The thrill of seeing someone you know and work with honoured with this medal is, well, more than we all would have expected. Considering we spend much of our workday dealing with the media on a full range of stories, finding Terry on cbc.ca today after popping up in the likes of the Toronto Star on the weekend is amazing. And we didn’t have to send a pitch or pick up a phone.

This was no mean feat for Terry to achieve. When he couldn’t find a publisher for his idea he podcast the book, chapter by chapter, and then figured out how he could publish it himself. Once he managed to get it into some bookstores and on to Amazon.ca and Indigo.ca he was amazed that people actually bought it. He even seemed surprised to have so many people tell him they found the story charming and interesting.

Congratulations from the Girlz and everyone else at Thornley Fallis. Now, can we get you to sign our copies? Oh, and what about that sequel?

I was at the gym last night in my own little world, thoughts percolating and I was suddenly shocked to realize “hey, this could be a blog post!” Obviously, we Girlz aren’t having so many of those moments lately…

Now to be honest, this isn’t really a PR topic…though maybe you could make the argument that it is in some ways. (Gee Jos, you’re finally writing a post, get to the point, will ya?) So in case you didn’t know, I’m American. Not dual, just American. Now I’ve lived here since I was three and am a permanent resident (so yes, I can work here legally) but my passport is American. And I can vote on Super Tuesday next week in the California primaries. As it happens, I’ll be there then for a family thing so it works out quite well. Here’s where you come in: I can’t decide who to vote for. At first I thought it might seem unethical to ask internet strangers who I should vote for, but upon further reflection I realized that this year’s candidates are waging their battles more and more in the online space. Youtube, Myspace, they’re there. Many of them have blogs on their main site. So why shouldn’t I use this blog as a testing ground?

Here’s what you need to know to help. I’m a card carrying Democrat. Ok fine, I don’t carry a card (do they have a card?) but you get the point. It’s either Hillary or Barack. And I can’t decide.

I think Hillary has more experience. I like her. She’s intelligent, well-spoken and would make a fine leader of a country in need of such a thing. Bill’s indiscretions? Give me a break. He made a mistake, an error in judgment. Did that cost the Americans anything? No- it was personal but because he was the President and he chose an attention-wh**e, it became front page news. Bush’s “errors in judgment” have cost THOUSANDS of Americans and Iraqis their lives and has seriously damaged the US economy. Don’t get me started. Bill, in some ways, is a huge asset for Hillary. In other ways, I see him as a liability. He will have to stay out of the limelight while she’s in office so as not to take the focus off of her. I think he can do a lot as “First Laddie” but it will have to be under the radar and I don’t know if that’s possible. So that concerns me.

Barack is charismatic and I like him too. Goes without saying that he’s also intelligent and when I see him in interviews, he comes off very well. I like his wife. I think she could do a lot more as First Lady than Bill could in the role and you really are voting for them as a team. Having a great President is all well and good but if they don’t have strong support at home and a partner who’s willing to get out there and improve America, then the “great” President isn’t so effective. I don’t like Oprah’s endorsement of him. Not because she should have supported the female candidate, but because I think she made it more about race than it had been prior to her getting involved. Here’s my main concern with Barack and it does not make me proud of my country: they’re not ready for a black president. It’s not his time. Yes, most Americans would embrace the idea and don’t care what colour he is. But the ones that do? Look out; they’re the dangerous ones. If I were Michelle Obama, I would be afraid for the life of my husband and the father of my young children every time he ventured out. That’s the sad reality of it. Like I said, it pains me to think this, but there it is.

John Edwards? No thanks and here’s why: his wife is dying of breast cancer. Not right now and maybe not even in the next four years. And while I think it’s admirable of them to continue with their lives as though everything was fine, I think it’s dumb. Because at some point, she’s going to be very sick. And his focus would and SHOULD be on her and their very young children. But it wouldn’t be on America and that’s a problem to me.

So there you have it. Barack or Hillary. I go back and forth. Who gets your vote?

As most Canadians have probably heard, Conservative MP Garth Turner was ousted from caucus yesterday for maintaining his own blog and revealing what Stephen Harper deems to be private matters. I’m not really sure where I stand on this, or if I really have a strong opinion one way or another, but here are my thoughts.

First of all, I heard Turner’s press conference yesterday afternoon, as well as a snippet of his interview with Peter Shurman on CFRB. This is a man who has embraced social media. He basically told Peter that the “internetization” of politics is the future. And he may well be right. There will be many who find his openness refreshing and his honesty a welcome change to Harper’s notorious secrecy. I’m not a huge Harper fan. I don’t agree with many of his policies or side with him on most issues, but I do think that as a Prime Minister, he’s doing alright. And he has a right to keep his MPs quiet, even if it’s annoying and borderline weird. We pay you, we deserve to know what’s going on behind closed doors. But only to a certain extent.

I never read Turner’s blog before today. I didn’t read the posts that got him in trouble, but from what I’ve heard, he maybe went a little too far. There are risks to revealing too much about government. It could hurt future plans or in extreme situations, even put Canadian lives at risk. Look at the trouble the miliary got into for posting images from Afghanistan- it could show the Taliban where the soldiers are hiding and reveal too much about their plans. So mayby Turner went too far. Maybe this social media stuff doesn’t really belong in government. Of course it’s great to have access to your MP (and he does allow comments on his blog, which I commend), but maybe using a phone or letters, or just an email address is enough for some positions.

The Star reports that it was Turner’s opposition to some Conservative policies that got him turfed. If that’s the case, I see both sides on that. If Turner was so opposed to so many of the policies, maybe he should have left voluntarily already. Harper is someone who values privacy above all else, so it would stand to guess that he probably doesn’t like dissent in the ranks (and really, what boss does). It’s important that the caucus appear unified to be strong and powerful, so having someone express his opposition certainly wouldn’t help the cause.

So in summary (since I wasn’t all that cohesive in thought), I applaud Turner for his honesty and I respect his stance on social media and politics. But I think I actually side with Harper on this one. He was totally within his right to protect his MPs and the Conservative caucus, even if his privacy policy is a tad ridiculous at times.

Does social media belong in politics? Or does it have it’s boundaries? What are your thoughts on the matter? I would be interested to know where you stand on this issue. But if expressing your view may get you fired, please think twice before sharing….

Our very own Mary Ellen is “chuffed”. Research from her 2004 dissertation has been used by British author Nicholas Jones in his new book Trading Information: Leaks, Lies and Tip-Offs. The book examines the role politicians and ministerial aides play in leaking government information to the news media in the hopes of gaining positive coverage.

While studying for her M.A. in International Public Relations at Cardiff University, Mary Ellen published her dissertation which studied the tactic of leaking information and its relationship to government news management.  Mary Ellen contended that selective leaking and briefings had become “common place” inside the British government (specifically within the Labour government), an arrangement that had become advantageous for both government and specific on-side journalists. She distinguished between rare genuine leaks (delivered via plain brown envelope) and the more common authorized leak (selective media briefings).