Astroturfing is a word in English describing formal political, advertising, or public relations campaigns seeking to create the impression of being spontaneous “grassroots” behavior, hence the reference to the artificial grass, AstroTurf. The goal of such a campaign is to disguise the efforts of a political or commercial entity as an independent public reaction to some political entity—a politician, political group, product, service or event. …Astroturfing may be undertaken by an individual pushing a personal agenda or highly organized professional groups with financial backing from large corporations, non-profits, or activist organizations. Very often [...]]]> http://scottdiatribe.canflag.com/2009/07/06/conservative-astroturf-on-a-monday-updated/feed/ 3 http://scottdiatribe.canflag.com/2008/08/18/team-kovach/ http://scottdiatribe.canflag.com/2008/08/18/team-kovach/#comments Mon, 18 Aug 2008 18:28:31 +0000 Scott Tribe http://scottdiatribe.gluemeat.com/?p=1877 Just as a followup to my last blogpost, look what Jeff Davidson of the blog “Where’d That Bug Go” found at Guelph Conservative candidate Gloria Kovach’s website. Take a look at the picture titled “Team Kovach”, and look who happens to be in that picture and part of Gloria’s team:

Why, it’s “average Guelph citizen” Barry Osmond! Do you still consider his website to be evidence of “grassroots opposition growing” to the Green Shift, Mr. Nicholls?

I think we can put that bit of spin to rest.

Apparently, Gerry doesn’t read blogs much, because if he had, he’d know the progressive blogosphere has shown that Gerry Osmond is anything but a “average Guelph citizen”; he’s a Conservative partisan, as the blog Skinny Dipper showed a [...]]]> http://scottdiatribe.canflag.com/2008/08/18/memo-to-gerry-nicholls-a-cons-partisan-isnt-to-public-grassroots-opposition/feed/ 2