Bill Clinton got a hard lesson recently in a new rule of politics. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL), meanwhile, tried to make some new rules of his own.

I've been friends for a long time with a guy we'll call Marvin Blotnick. He was flying home from Chicago the other day after two tough days at a corporate senior management meeting. Marvin was stressed. He said every executive there was asked to do scenario planning, which meant Marvin had to come back with two new budgets, one reflecting a 10% cut, the other 20%.

John McCain would keep American troops in Iraq for 100 years. Barack Obama thinks white working class voters cling to their guns and religion out of economic frustration. Hillary Clinton thinks the 2008 Democratic nomination battle could end as horribly as the one in 1968. What do these statements have in common?

I recently joined 30 colleagues from the academic, agency, and corporate worlds for a symposium co-sponsored by the Arthur W. Page Society and the Institute for Public Relations, groups on which I serve as a trustee. The Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College hosted the event for the third year.

The now-famous story of Megan Meier, a 13-year-old Missouri girl who killed herself after receiving cruel messages from what she considered an online MySpace friend, is a tragedy for her and her family.

Companies seeking to expand their investor base these days often face a tough question with no single correct answer: Should senior management make time to meet with hedge funds?

Tis the season where politics and politicians are scrutinized like foreign animals newly donated to the local zoo.

Why do many CCOs I meet lately express frustration that the people at their companies are viewed as tacticians, not strategists?

Mark Penn needs no introduction. Worldwide CEO of Burson-Marsteller and former chief strategist for Sen. Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, he has been making a lot of news lately - most of it negative

Even before protesters started disrupting the Olympic Torch relay on several continents, the Games had long since lost its luster as anything but an extremely big-time professional sports meet. Now it's turning into a big-time PR disaster for the host nation, China, and the feckless International Olympic Committee.