The Ad Council is the organization responsible for littering the internet and other advertising venues with banners and billboards promoting various "charitable" causes. Like this one:
This carefree, unshaven, progressively and literally leaning hipster in an American Apparel style t-shirt with a "hey let's grab a latte and then head up to the Bronx to hand out voter registration forms to the homeless and information about federal job training programs to new immigrants" really irks me. What a self-righteous, myopic fool this guy looks like. And yes, I recognize he is a model and that I am being judgmental. I am sure there is an Ad Council program out there someplace to correct my behavior.
Why am I sure?
Because the Ad Council is everyplace and no one and nothing is everyplace these days without the blessing of the USG.
Again, I do not have the time, but if I did I would probe the Council's funding. On their website they list solely corporate donors. I would wager federal agencies are directly subsidizing the Council, especially since its mandate forbids it from advocating for specific candidates or legislation. And even if there is no direct cash transfer from an agency to the Council, then there are some sort of tax breaks out there.
One conclusion I have no reservations about throwing out is that Ad Council ads are never "free." True, many of the ads you see are on rarely visited websites or heard late at night on the radio, but there are still production costs to these things. And certainly there is some cost to running them, even in less than ideal advertising slots. Heck, if advertising is that cheap, I will hire that do-gooder to wear a USGWaste.com t shirt and pose for a photo to be stuck up on a billboard.
What is most disturbing about the Ad Council though is not that it might be federally funded to some degree, but the fact it works closely with the feds to impart social messages upon the country. Look, I agree people should brush their teeth and not swear all the goddamned time but I do not think government should be shoving those (or any other social mandates) down anyone's throat. The Ad Council started out as an industry self-regulatory group. One article I perused suggested it was founded by major corporations to promote a social cause under the reasoning that, post-Depression, many Americans were out to get big business. In other words, the Ad Council was throwing a bone to the masses. This much I can confirm: it started as "The War Advertising Council" and led the propaganda campaign with such advertisements as "Loose Lips Sink Ships" and "Rosie the Riveter."
Beating the Japanese Empire and the Nazis is a noble cause, but government encouraged propaganda frightens me almost as much as government sponsored propaganda, particularly when the "cooperation" might be imposed out of fear of regulation. The most dangerous kind of censorship, as it is said, is self-censorship.
I mean, what next, is the Ad Council going to tell me what it means to be American?
And what about causes I do not agree with? Here the Ad Council promotes "child passenger safety." I certainly support safe travel for kids, but if you read my thoughts on car seats, you will understand that there is not yet unanimity on the issue of car seats for children over two years of age.
Well, at least the Making Home Affordable program has been a success. Right here in Reno homes have become some 50% more affordable in recent years. Can they do a 180 with this program, please?
Here are the questions I would like answered:
How much of the Ad Council's funding is from the federal government?
What tax breaks or other federal benefits does the Council receive?
How much of funding received from the private sector is compulsory in the sense that companies must contribute or the federal government would tax such corporations (ie, how much of its funding is a way of buying off Congress from acting)?
What are the salaries of the top thirty executives at the Ad Council?
What are ten campaigns the Council has turned down recently because they seemed too politically slanted?
Who will bet me ten to one that the guy in the white t shirt in the photo above voted for Obama, uses Group On, and has over $30,000 in student loans?