Weekend Digest: The Stealthy Starbucks Edition

For our weekend business and political readers.

TV SHOW PREVIEW
On this week’s edition of Talk Business & Politics, Second District Democratic candidate Pat Hays discusses life on the campaign trail and the suddenly nasty TV ad wars in the race.

Our political roundtable discusses the constant curveballs facing GOP Attorney General candidate Leslie Rutledge and her voter registration. Plus, we’ll preview Tuesday’s upcoming KATV Governor’s debate between Asa Hutchinson and Mike Ross. KATV’s Janelle Lilley and Elicia Dover join host Roby Brock for this week’s political discussion.

And this week in Arkansas history, we pull from the archives a late 80’s interview with editorial cartoonist George Fisher. What motivated him to draw the piercing commentary that he did?

Tune in Sunday morning at 9 a.m. on KATV Ch. 7 for Talk Business & Politics.

TOP ADS
Mashable reviews the most buzzed about ads during Advertising Week. Some of these ads are generation-defining, heartwarming, or just plain weird.

If there was one message that came through loud and clear from this week’s Advertising Week, it’s that story matters. Ideas come first. And creativity is still king in the business of selling cars, soda, burgers, smartphones and grocery store products.

Whether a 30-second spot launched during the highest profile TV event of the year or a short video lived primarily online, its concept, images, stars (established or breakout) and, ultimately, message loomed large. And the effect still reverberates.

Read about and watch some of these ads at this link.

THE TOURIST TRAP
Mount Rushmore is an American icon. It also has a great backstory for those in the marketing and tourism industry. AllDay.com takes a look at how the faces of the famous American Presidents became America’s greatest tourist trap.

Once upon a time, no one in their right mind wanted to go to South Dakota.

It was distant, snowy, and full of rightfully angry Native Americans. Its turn-of-the-century tourism industry despaired. But then a clever historian and his artist friend came up with a marketing ploy so grandiose and patriotic it started pulling all the punters in. They called it Mount Rushmore.

In honor of the 87th anniversary of that first chip off the mountain on October 4, 1927, this is the true story of the greatest tourist trick in history.

Read the full story at this link.

THE STEALTHY STARBUCKS
Did you know the CIA has its own Starbucks inside its federal building headquarters?

As you might imagine, CIA agents are a pretty caffeinated bunch. But working for and managing a Starbucks inside the world’s most sensitive and protective intelligence agency presents a whole new set of challenges.

The new supervisor thought his idea was innocent enough. He wanted the baristas to write the names of customers on their cups to speed up lines and ease confusion, just like other Starbucks do around the world.

But these aren’t just any customers. They are regulars at the CIA Starbucks.

“They could use the alias ‘Polly-O string cheese’ for all I care,” said a food services supervisor at the Central Intelligence Agency, asking that his identity remain unpublished for security reasons. “But giving any name at all was making people — you know, the undercover agents — feel very uncomfortable. It just didn’t work for this location.”

What else separates this stealthy Starbucks from other retail locations? Read more here to find out in this Washington Post report.

FACEBOOK’S NEW AD STRATEGY
Another week, another new Facebook strategy. This one, however, may have legs, says Marketplace.

Facebook is rolling out an advertising tool that the company claims will be a real game changer. It wants to merge data from its over 1 billion active monthly users with their travels across the Internet on computers and mobile phones alike.

The end result is that advertisers can use the tool to buy ads outside of Facebook.

In its efforts to compete with Google advertising, Facebook’s new strategy has a lot riding on it.

If the service is as good as the company claims, Karen North, a professor of digital social media at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School, says it could help Facebook better compete in its ad wars with Google.

“Where Facebook has struggled in the past is that people don’t go to Facebook to buy things,” she says. “So now they’re deciding, ‘Well maybe the whole Facebook ad idea isn’t the right answer.’ Maybe it’s, ‘We’ll just be the place to come to buy ads for wherever you are.'”

Read the timeline feed for how this Facebook effort may play out at this link.

THE ARKANSAS (AND MORE) PLAY
We’ve been writing, speaking, and discussing for months how Arkansas is the center of the political universe when it comes to control of the U.S. Senate. The heated race between Mark Pryor and Tom Cotton is being watched closely by many national observers.

A handful of other states – notably Alaska and Louisiana – are also on the short list.

It’s been the most remarkably enduring story line of Election 2014: three Democratic senators defying their states’ deep red complexion and their president’s abysmal approval ratings to stay competitive in races that should have, on paper, been lost long ago. The question all along has been, Could it possibly last?

Now, a month out from the election, Republicans are seeing subtle but perceptible signs that contests in Alaska, Arkansas and Louisiana — all three pivotal in the battle for the Senate — are finally breaking their way.

What are some of those positive GOP signs and what do Democrats see aiding their cause?

Republicans point to a pair of polls by the left-leaning polling firm Public Policy Polling that show Cotton improving his standing among independents from a 19-point lead in April to a 33-point advantage in its latest Arkansas survey.

Democrats point out that the same poll showed that just as many voters, 41 percent, have a unfavorable view of Cotton as a positive one.

Democrats believe they’ve successfully made the races about local and state issues, as opposed to a referendum on Obama and Obamacare.

Read Politico’s full analysis at this link.

THE CLINTON BRAND: CENTRIST POPULISM TO CELEBRITY
On the anniversary of Bill Clinton’s announcement in 1991 that he’d seek the Presidency, Politico looks at how the Clinton political brand has shifted over the years.

With Hillary Clinton’s favoritism for the Democratic nomination in 2016, her potential run may be the polar opposite of her husband’s more than 20 years ago.

It was a sunny, warm day, still more like summer than fall, in Little Rock in 1991 when the Arkansas governor, after staying up all night fussing over his speech, went for an early-morning jog and then over to the Old State Capitol for the announcement that would shape American politics for the next generation: He was running for president.

Bill Clinton’s declaration — the 23rd anniversary is on Friday — was covered with curiosity by a small corps of political reporters but met with a shrug by the rest of the world. It was a modest beginning for what is now, amid widespread anticipation of another Clinton presidential run, the world’s most celebrated political brand.

The Clinton Brand of 2014 is missing three key elements that vaulted Bill Clinton to power in 1992. First was new ideas. Second was an authentic populist connection. Third was the idea of generational change.

Read more of this interesting analysis at this link.

THE BEEBE TOUCH
The New York Times’ Amy Chozik has spent considerable time in Arkansas assessing the political atmosphere and character of the Natural State. In her latest piece in the New York Times, she studies Gov. Mike Beebe’s centrism and how it has been the blueprint for political success in a once-blue state that has reddened considerably in his nearly eight years in office.

Mr. Beebe has won votes among the Walmart millionaires in the northwest part of the state around Bentonville and among the poor row-crop farmers in the southeast corner. He has won among those who hunt elk or alligator, and Arkansans like to brag that they can do both thanks to the state’s biodiversity. And he has won among those for whom President Obama’s name is an epithet.

In 2010, the year the Tea Party pummeled the Democrats in congressional elections and the state legislature in Arkansas, Mr. Beebe won re-election, taking all 75 counties. While Mr. Obama’s approval rating here is 29 percent, Mr. Beebe’s at 72 percent makes him the most popular Democratic governor in the country, according to an NBC News/Marist poll conducted in September.

How is he regarded? As one female political operative here put it, “He talks like molasses, and I want to have his babies.” What is his philosophy? Centrist. “You could fall on your sword, but if it kills you, what good are you going to do?” Mr. Beebe often says.

Read the full story at this link.

MOST OBESE STATES
Huffington Post has compiled a list from the least to most obese states in the U.S., and sadly, reports obesity is on the rise.

Obesity has been rising over the last few decades. Thirty years ago, no state had an obesity rate above 15 percent, while in 1991, no state had an obesity rate above 20 percent. In 2000, no state had an obesity rate above 25 percent. Now, two states have obesity rates over 35 percent.

Huffington Post says, “Adults with a body mass index of 30 or more are considered obese.”

What are the least obese states? Which ones are the fattest? And how does Arkansas rank? Go to this link for the full story.

HAS JACK THE RIPPER FINALLY BEEN REVEALED?
He is perhaps the most famous serial killer of all time and now has the mystery of the Jack the Ripper case finally been solved?

In a newly published book titled “Naming Jack the Ripper,” amateur historian (and Ripper tour operator) Russell Edwards says he’s certain that the DNA findings have solved a long-mysterious string of murders that terrorized the seamier streets of London starting in 1888. “Put the case to bed,” he told ITV News. “We’ve done this.”

So who does Edwards say was the madman, and what is the key piece of evidence?

Go to this link from NBC News to find out.

COUNTRY MUSIC ICON’S NEW RESTAURANT VENTURE
He is considered the highest paid entertainer in country music, and now he wants to use Spam and fried baloney sandwiches to get richer.

The Clinton, Oklahoma native, who already has his successful “I Love This Bar & Grill” restaurant chain, opened the new concept spot with an “old classic Texas Ice House feel” this month, just in time for Oklahoma University’s first home football game on Aug. 31.

Who is this star and what’s on the menu? People has the story at this link.