foreign imports. The trouble is that very few readers believe what corporations say. In 1979-80, the Media Institute studied the image of businessmen as they are portrayed in television programs. Two out of three are portrayed as foolish, greedy or criminal. They are seldom shown doing anything socially useful. (I know many businessmen who devote so much time to ‘socially useful’ things, it’s a wonder their stockholders put up with it.) This campaign emphasized IBM’s involvement in people’s daily lives – in this case, how IBM helped speed up traffic in New York’s rush hour. Click here for hi-res image and text. Most senior executives are curiously unaware of what goes on in the liberal community. As a recent article in the Harvard Business Review said, ‘While businessmen were minding their own business, intellectuals were busy developing a powerful case against capitalism.’ Political and social naïveté can be a handicap when companies run into political difficulty. Some advertising campaigns seem to have been successful in influencing legislation. Bethlehem Steel, for example, used advertising to win public support for their position on imported steel. I am told that it helped the passage of a bill protecting the steel industry.