A new report authored by five prominent marine scientists provides a powerful contradiction of the government's recent report that only 25 percent of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon disaster remains in the Gulf of Mexico. On August 4, the government issued a news release that stated, "The vast majority of the oil from the BP oil spill has either evaporated or been burned, skimmed, recovered from the wellhead or dispersed using chemicals -- much of which is in the process of being degraded." The group of scientists who authored the contradictory report estimate that 70 to 79 percent of the oil that gushed into the gulf still remains. Samantha Joye, a professor of marine sciences at the University of Georgia and a co-author of the report, points out that the huge amount of methane that also gushed into the gulf has been completely ignored. Charles Hopkinson, professor of marine sciences in the University of Georgia Franklin College of Arts and Sciences says, “One major misconception is that oil that has dissolved into water is gone and, therefore, harmless ... The oil is still out there, and it will likely take years to completely degrade. We are still far from a complete understanding of what its impacts are.”

The new documentary "Psywar," featuring CMD founder John Stauber, explores corporate and government use of propaganda and public relations to manipulate American people. The movie explores how the U.S. government staged events to manipulate public opinion about the Iraq war, like the rescue of Private Jessica Lynch, the supposedly spontaneous mob that pulled over the larger-than-life statue of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. It also discusses the Pentagon pundit scandal, and the hidden activities of the Rendon Group, a PR firm specializing in spinning war. The film exposes government and corporate activities to blur the lines between real news and fake news, as well as the development over time of public relations misinformation campaigns, strategic corporate campaigns to generate goodwill and the perception of good works, the use of staged photo-ops, and other manipulative PR tools that have turned the land of the free and the home of the brave into a place where citizens are now manipulated with great efficiency, and on a massive scale. Watch the entire film for free online here.

David BartonFox News Channel opinion show host Glenn Beck has teamed up with Texan Christian right activist David Barton in an online seminar series called "Beck University." Beck fans who want to attend the "University" need to pay fees ranging from $6.26 to $9.95 per month for "insider extreme" access. Beck's Web site says Barton is a "Professor," but Barton does not have any advanced degrees, nor does he teach at any legitimate institute of higher learning. He has a bachelor's degree in Christian education from Oral Roberts University. While Barton is not an actual historian, he has posed as one since the 1990s, and has written two books that are both studded with errors. His first book, originally titled "The Myth of Separation," argues that the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation, and the Founding Fathers never intended to have separation of church and state. Barton argues that constitutional division between church and state was imposed on an unwilling nation by the Supreme Court in 1947. Amid criticism over inaccuracies, Barton withdrew the book and retitled it "Original Intent." His other book, "America: to Pray or Not To Pray?" is a self-published collection of charts that Barton uses to "prove" that a 1962 Supreme Court decision striking down school-sponsored prayer led to increased crime, higher rates of venereal disease, alcoholism and other ills. None of his factual inaccuracies have slowed him down, though. Barton, Beck and Sarah Palin are scheduled to join forces at an event August 28th at the Lincoln Memorial called "Restoring Honor."

The PR debacles of BP, Toyota and Goldman Sachs show the limits of what public relations can do for companies in crisis. These three companies all made the same fundamental mistakes in handling their crises. Letting CEOs ad-lib during a crisis can lead to Sound-Bite Hell, as with BP CEO Tony Hayward, whose list of gaffes sank the last of the company's tattered reputation. Toyota blew it by waiting so long to address reported problems with its vehicles, then by stonewalling, and then offering what looked like false reassurance by pinning their cars' reported acceleration problems on floor mats. Goldman Sachs dismissed allegations of fraud by arguing that, in effect, that it had been running a giant casino, in which it had inside information. A crisis management expert at M.I.T.'s Sloan School of Management, Howard Anderson, compared Goldman's conduct with the sexual abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church. "The priests thought they should be protecting one another rather than the children in their care," he says. "Goldman now has the same problem. It turns out it's, 'We make money for ourselves first, and our customers second,' when it should be the other way around. This is going to hurt them for years." All three companies broke basic rules of crisis management: They didn't have a crisis plan ready in advance, they tried to minimize the extent of their problems, and their hit-or-miss approaches showed they had no real understanding of the situations they were in. In the long run, the best course for an embattled company may be to quickly own up to its errors. Then again, sometimes a company's bad acts are simply so unpalatable that it's reputation is beyond the cleansing power of spin.