Full Frontal Scrutiny: exposing front groups

Hey, you're probably already aware of front groups, which pretend to represent grassroots efforts, and are actually run by suspect politicians or shady corporations. They're sometimes called "astroturf," since they're the opposite of honest grassroots efforts.

More bluntly, the purpose of a front group is to deceive consumers or voters.

Well, Consumers Union WebWatch and the Center for Media and Democracy have just launched Full Frontal Scrutiny, the purpose of which is to expose consumer-related front groups.

The Full Frontal Scrutiny site is debuting today with an investigation of front group activity on Wikipedia. The information includes a guide to help consumers get the most out of that site and other information sources on the Web, and with a history of front groups and their nefarious activities. Full Frontal Scrutiny will also publish selected content from WebWatch and from the CMD's SourceWatch site, as well as aggregating news about front groups from other reliable sources.

I've taken a good look at all involved, and they're for real, CU and CMD have outstanding records for integrity and accuracy.

Note that CMD does excellent work regarding political front groups, which is not part of the Full Frontal Scrutiny mission. Check out their report on Freedom's Watch.

Disclaimer: I'm on the board of Consumers Union and on a related group, Sunlight Foundation.

Follow Craig Newmark on Twitter: www.twitter.com/craignewmark

Comments

[ShawnMichel]

11:00 PM on 01/31/2008

Front groups should be illegal, period. When we finally get around to making them so, our country will improve overnight.

SMdM

[soylentgreenleftovers]

12:19 PM on 01/29/2008

Fantastic public service being performed by this website, I will certainly link to it on my blog.

My fear, however, is that not only will not enough people ever be exposed to this information, but that the people that need to read it the most will never see it.

[cktirumalai]

11:19 AM on 01/29/2008

Front groups, sometimes covertly funded by the Government, were one aspect of the Cold War. But they exist in many forms. For instance, a partisan person turns up at a political meeting, and pretending to be an impartial observer, aggressively expresses his support for a point of view. We have recently had planted questions at press conferences. In reading blogs and blog posts I discount comments which strongly savor of a hidden agenda. It is a different matter of course if a person makes his affiliation or preferences plain.