Free Republic

Goodbye, "Guiding Light." Hello, YouTube. Procter & Gamble Co., whose sponsorship and production of daytime TV dramas helped coin the term "soap operas," has pulled the plug after 77 years. Instead, the maker of Tide detergent, Ivory soap and Olay skincare is following customers online with a big push on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. "The digital media has pretty much exploded," marketing chief Marc Pritchard said in an interview. "It's become integrated with how we operate, it's become part of the way we do marketing." The last P&G-produced soap opera, "As The World Turns," went off the air in September....

Mind you, this is a guy who beat Hannity — a show that airs in primetime — in both total viewers and the demo last Friday at 5 p.m. Every last one of these advertisers is simply biding their time, wondering how long they have to wait until nutroots wrath is appeased and they can start advertising on Beck’s show again. I give it six months. Less if Greta gets dumped and GB ends up moved to 10 p.m. Twenty companies have pulled their ads from Beck’s show in just the last two weeks. The moves come after the Fox...

As anyone who listens to or watches the Glenn Beck radio and television show can attest, Glenn Beck says what he thinks. The constitutional watchdog, talk show host, and entertainer is a firm believer in the American people, our Republic and the principles on which our country was founded. About two weeks ago, in an impassioned statement designed to educate Americans about influences that may have shaped current healthcare reform legislation, the broadcaster connected the dots to make a bigger picture. His argument is if not strong, at least worth serious consideration and thought. Spurred by two proposed offices of...

<p>Glenn Beck fans are fighting back against a campaign led by a black activist organization prompting major advertisers to withdraw from Beck's top-rated Fox News Channel program.</p> <p>Now a husband and wife team of Beck fans has launched a website – DefendGlenn.com – that lists the contact information for advertisers for Beck's and other Fox News programs and provides users with information and suggestions to contact those companies to urge their continued sponsorship. The site also asks users to contact Beck's current patrons to thank them for their loyalty to the Fox News star's program.</p>

CINCINNATI - There's a little-girl memory that Najoh Tita-Reid recounts, as a way of explaining what's behind a new campaign by the nation's biggest advertiser. A young child in suburban Pittsburgh, she goes to play dolls with her neighbors, all of them white. Her doll stands out with its black color and features, and one girl says pointedly: "Najoh, our dolls can't play with yours." Why not? "Because your doll is ugly," comes the reply.

Someone makes a carton of Mohammad and Moslems throughout the world riot in the streets. They burn images in effigy. They burn cars. All because of an "insult" to a religious leader who lived some 1300 plus years prior.... But profane sacred Christian music and no one cares. Well I care. I am sure that others care all throughout the world. You don't have to be Moslem nor Jewish to care about your religion. To care when it is profaned. To care when it is made light of. Messiah, is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel based on a libretto...

Boston might bill itself "The Hub of the Universe", but in the business..

Legendary investor Warren Buffett will earn about $645 million from the Procter & Gamble Co.'s purchase of Boston's Gillette Co. Based on an initial purchase in 1989 of $600 million in Gillette stock by Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway holding company, the investment has seen a gain of more than $4.4 billion, not counting dividends. That works out to about a 14 percent compounded annual return, CNN reported Saturday. Depending on how the calculations are made, P&G's $57 billion purchase price for Gillette is a 14 percent to 18 percent premium over the share price of Gillette stock, meaning an estimated profit...

NEW YORK — Procter & Gamble Co. (PG) is preparing to buy battery and shaving-products maker Gillette Co. (G) for $55 billion in stock, according to published reports. If approved by regulators, the acquisition would create the world's largest consumer-products company, coupling Gillette's Duracell batteries (search), Right Guard deodorant and razor brands with P&G's Tide detergent, Clairol and Pantene hair products and Folgers coffee (search).

They took a bucket of muddy, bacteria-laden water. Added a bit of white powder. Stirred. And within minutes, standing amid 100 refugees in war-torn Liberia, researchers from Johns Hopkins University had produced what seemed like a magic trick: Clear, drinkable water. "I couldn't believe it when I saw it," Hopkins researcher Shannon Doocy said of her work last year. "The people in Liberia couldn't believe it." The powder, developed by Procter & Gamble Co. with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is now headed for its biggest test yet: the tsunami zone. Relief agencies, led by AmeriCares of...

Procter & Gamble, makers of Crest toothpaste, Tide detergent, and Pampers diapers, has publicly thrown their support and money behind the homosexual political agenda. The company recently wrote to all their Cincinnati employees urging them to support the overturning of a city law which forbids giving special rights to homosexuals. In 1993, the citizens in Cincinnati refused to give special rights to homosexuals by a vote of 62% to 38%. P&G is now working to get that law repealed. The company has given $10,000 to help repeal the law. To our knowledge, Procter & Gamble is the first company to...

"It doesn't help when you have a government that denies this is happening just because the street vendors are out there," Herrera said. "It's really Kafkaesque. An open barber shop doesn't make an economy." VALENCIA, Venezuela - Graciela Martinez can't serve Coca-Cola in her small diner, located just around the corner from Venezuela's Coca-Cola bottler in this high desert city. Coke, like many products produced by multinationals in a vast industrial park here, has been virtually impossible to get since Venezuela's opposition began a strike Dec. 2 to demand that President Hugo Chavez call early elections. Officials at Coca-Cola and...