How the news gets made

From Michael Moore's site we find this telling Democracy Now interview with former health insurance industry spokesperson Wendell Potter

AMY GOODMAN: When the film came out and you did the research, did you feel that you actually had contained it at the beginning? I think of a CNN critique that Sanjay Gupta did, Sanjay Gupta did.

WENDELL POTTER: Right.

AMY GOODMAN: Did you have anything to do with that?

WENDELL POTTER: I didn’t. Again, some of the reason you hire these big PR firms is you can do this with a little bit of a hands-off kind of operation. The big PR firms have very good connections with producers of network shows and cable shows and columnists and pundits. And so, you rely on them to be able to get your messaging out. And they’re very, very successful in influencing people about how they write or how they put a show together.

AMY GOODMAN: I mean, he was furious. Michael Moore went on CNN, was outraged, and said that everything they said about him wasn’t true. And in the end, CNN had to apologize.

WENDELL POTTER: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: They were not correct, what they said about Michael Moore’s film, that he had gotten his facts wrong.

WENDELL POTTER: I think CNN and Sanjay Gupta undoubtedly were embarrassed that they had been, frankly, duped by the insurance industry, probably not even aware of the role that the insurance industry was playing in that.

AMY GOODMAN: Did the insurance industry put out to all the networks—you had your chosen producers at all the networks—fact sheets on Sicko?

WENDELL POTTER: Not directly. Again, that’s why you hire these third parties, these PR firms, to do it for you, so that your involvement cannot be traced.