How apt that Bozoma Saint John is a sort of protege of Arianna Huffington, but with better hipster credentials . Ms. Huffington lost her ‘Progressive Credential’ with the sale of her website, with the whine that it was just a business, when it was part and parcel the Obama Evangelism, that gripped the American electorate, in answer to eight years of Bush The Younger, and his puppet masters Karl Rove and Dick Cheney and their War on Terror: the realization of Huntington’s ‘Clash’. That Obama Evangelism became the third  and fourth term of the dreaded Neo-Liberalism of the Clinton’s Reaganite political nihilism. Note that Obama never praised FDR but only Reagan:

http://www.nytimes.com/ref/us/politics/21seelye-text.html

Spying, lying and compromised customer data are the hallmarks of the Uber Neo-Liberal con. It is not ‘a ride hailing service’ but is, in fact, a taxi service, and as such must be regulated by the municipalities in which it operates, in the public interest!  What a perfect place for Huffington, an adept in the art of the con, to practice the grifters business model. A kind of riff on Rovian politics in a corporate setting. With the vivacious and winning person of Ms. Saint John. Yet…

At Uber, her first big ad campaigns have featured tie-ups with the National Football League and the National Basketball Association. “Utilising these channels in pop culture is really important. People love the product [of Uber]; they don’t necessarily love the brand,” she admits. Uber has previously been seen as a utility, she explains, rather than a service that elicits an emotional connection with its users. “Pop culture . . . is a very effective way to add more, and to talk about the narrative,” she says. In Uber’s recent NBA campaign, sports journalist Cari Champion poses as an Uber driver, interviewing the young basketball stars he is ferrying around.

Ms. Saint John proves to be just another huckster running the con via Pop Culture! Featuring the linchpin of  ‘Brand’ as part of the Madison Ave. campaign to save Uber from its own incompetent, indeed malfeasant ‘self-governance’. Using ‘sports journalist Cari Champion’: What journalist do you know who drives a cab? How much did they pay Ms. Champion for her endorsement? What about a real NFL or NBA player? Or was the bribe to represent Uber not quite high enough to place a career in jeopardy?

Myra Breckenridge

https://www.ft.com/content/0fefb486-da16-11e7-a039-c64b1c09b482