It’s hard to prove that something hasn’t happened because of your efforts. But a lot of high-powered Wall Street types are quick to thank George Sard and his PR firm Sard Verbinnen for all the stories  that don’t get written about them.

Both Sard and Verbinnen (Paul is his first name) declined to comment, but Bloomberg Businessweek wrote a profile that names the following clients: SAC Capital Advisors, Dell and Air Products and Chemicals (both involved in multi-billion-dollar deals), and Goldman Sachs’ Fabrice Tourre. The quote in the headline comes from the story, which says “the man with the gray wavy hair” was virtually the only person in the courtroom during Tourre’s trial not to get any media attention.

For its efforts, the article notes that the firm is the number one M&A firm by deal count, according to Mergermarket, “lending its expertise to 45 transactions worth $71 billion in the first half of 2013.”

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For a minute, we were all paying attention to Newsweek again. But just as quickly as our heads whipped around when we heard that the title had been sold to IBT Media, the company that owns International Business Times, our heads whipped back the other way because Jeff Bezos bought The Washington Post.

Newsweek, which was meant to be revived by its association with Tina Brown’s site The Daily Beast, instead seems to be even more of a shell of the notable newsweekly it once was. For one, it stopped printing seven months ago and went all digital. Then, a number of notable staff left, including CEO Baba Shetty and editor Tunku Varadarajan. Finally, you had Newsweek owner Barry Diller saying publicly, “I wish I hadn’t bought Newsweek, it was a mistake.” Diller’s point was that a newsweekly’s time had passed at the rise of Twitter and other instant news. Sales pitching at its finest!

But the companies involved here would have us believe that this is a great sale and a great brand.

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Jeff Bezos‘ purchase of The Washington Post reconfirms that the newspaper industry is hurting, that the media industry is still in a state of flux, and that no matter how digital content gets, we still have a soft spot for ink. A venerable, old school newspaper that was founded in 1877 was bought by someone who has made their fortune in e-commerce and the news took over Twitter, with “WaPo,” “Washington Post,” and “Jeff Bezos” all trending at some point in the past 24 hours. It truly shows how mixed up and tremendous the media is right now.

As with any change at a media outlet, we wait to see if there will be shifts in the newsroom. Publicists who pitch WaPo are likely preparing for any changes to their media relations strategy. And we can’t forget that there are other properties impacted by this sale. The Root, Slate, and a number of other newspapers and properties are being separated from their anchor, which could also affect their futures. Though we can’t forget that the anchor lost 44 percent of its operating revenue in the past six years.

Clearly, this deal gives The Washington Post the opportunity to not just hover on the edge of survival, but to actually thrive. For Bezos, the paper’s success would reap more than just monetary fortunes.

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New FDA rules now say that food marked “gluten-free” can’t have levels of gluten that exceed 20 parts gluten per million parts of food. In addition, these foods can’t contain rye, barley, wheat, or any crossbreeds of those items. According to Business Insider, this is the lowest level of gluten that can be detected and the new rule puts our gluten-free standard on par with those in other countries.

This is the first time we have legally binding rules about gluten-free foods in place. They come along with new high standards for foods marked “sodium free,” “sodium free,” and “sugar free.”

For people who suffer from celiac disease, it must be a relief to know that what they’re getting is actually following the most strict guidelines available. There are three million people suffering from celiac disease. About 18 million are gluten sensitive. And then there are those who are going gluten-free to lose weight through regimens like the paleo diet.

This is a $4.2 billion market.  For brands, there’s good and bad with these new rules.

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Because nothing about Anthony Weiner’s campaign for mayor is sane, of course his communications director went on a profanity-laced tirade with a Talking Points Memo reporter about a former intern.

ICYMI, here’s a link to that story, in which the comms director Barbara Morgan completely loses it over a New York Daily News tell-all cover story written by a college student and former intern for the campaign, Olivia Nuzzi. According to the Nuzzi, a number of people joined Weiner’s campaign to get closer to his wife Huma Abedin and, by extension, Hillary Rodham Clinton. And she goes on to say that Weiner had trouble getting high-level people to work on his campaign. She dismisses comms director Morgan’s prior experience, saying she “last worked as the press secretary for the New Jersey state education commissioner.”

She adds, “There were a lot of short résumés around the office.”

On the NSFWCORP blog, Nuzzi also says that Weiner’s campaign manager Jeremy Kedem resigned because Weiner wasn’t honest about the “timing” of his sexting scandal.

“It’s all bullshit,” Morgan tells TPM. “I mean, it’s such bullsh*t. She could f**king — f**king tw*t.” Oh.

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M Booth PR’s blog Word. went live this week with a Google Glass edition, filling a Pinterest board with clips and commentary that’s entirely Google Glass created or related.

Lauren Martiello was the firm’s “Google Glass Explorer,” and she visits everything from gardens in the skies of NYC (above) to art exhibits and the workspaces of various creative types. Check it out for yourself and see what you think.

I also had the chance to take Google Glass for a test run and found it to be a bit too much. I get the hands-free nature of it. But do I want to have a device on my face and a screen in my peripheral vision in order to achieve that hands-free-ness? Not really. Of course, technology has a way of becoming necessary once it’s out in the world for a bit and its utility is fully sussed out. As for PRs, you can probably get a few cool stunts out of it. Clients would certainly be happy.

If you have thoughts on Google Glass do share. After the jump, ICYMI, Google’s own clip about the experience of using the device.

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The cast of “The Game.”

The Hollywood Reporter got an exclusive this week: BET is being sued by a fan of one of its shows, The Game, over a Facebook fan page.

Stacey Mattocks was an avid viewer of the hit show The Game back in the days when it was on The CW. It has since been cancelled by that network and picked up by BET.

In 2008, Mattocks created a Facebook fan page that went on to reach 750,000 “likes” by the time BET decided to bring the show back to life. With Mattocks building buzz for the program in the lead up to its January 2011 re-debut, The Game premiered on BET with 7.7 million viewers, the second highest number in the network’s history. The Facebook page, at one point, was gaining 100,000 “likes” per week.

“Therefore, on December 15, 2010, BET submitted a proposed contract to Mattocks that would have paid her a maximum of $85,000.00 over a one year period,” the lawsuit claims. “Mattocks declined this offer because it was unreasonably low, would have stripped her of all rights to the FB Page, and, moreover, could have been terminated at any point by BET, with or without cause.”

After maintaining it for years, Mattocks’ Facebook page for The Game had 3.3 million fans.

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President Obama is spending a lot of time this week focused on reaching out to different demographics in an attempt to get back to the business of advancing his plans. Today, he returned to the scene of his first big speech as a new Senator, Galesburg, IL’s Knox College, to talk about his economic program (preschool, new energy sources, and spending on infrastructure, for instance), the needs of the middle class, and raising the minimum wage. It was an hour-long speech that brought back the familiar Obama voice — earnest, determined, passionate.

On the healthcare front, the President is speaking with a different voice. Actually, it’s not his voice at all that you’ll hear. To reach younger Americans with information about the Affordable Care Act, he’s turning singer Jennifer Hudson, Amy Poehler, Kal Penn and other celebs to give voice to the benefits of the new law and the insurance exchanges that will open up on October 1. Read more

Hooray everyone! We have a new prince! Release the publicists!

With #RoyalBaby trending for most of the day on Twitter (along with some reference to Buckingham Palace, the Royal family, or David Cameron), it’s only fitting that marketers raced to social media to try and tap into the excitement with some sort of play on the big news.

Out in front as they were for the Super Bowl was Oreo with a cookies-and-milk joke. Cute. OK, we’ll take that because that’s what they do. Also, and making perfect sense, Pampers had a sweet clip about how every baby is special to their mom and dad. Check it out after the jump.

Then there’s the desperate madness that happened. Hostess did something weird with a man cradling a Twinkie in a blanket that fell as flat as their big re-launch day. MAC smeared some lip gloss. Lululemon… I don’t know. And Starbucks (UK) slapped some crowns on coffee cups. Really, I can’t. Buzzfeed has a round up if you need more. But really, you don’t.

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Any chance we have to ooh and ahh at our favorite celebs and over our favorite entertainments is welcome, particularly as we recover from the cavalcade of distressing news we got this week. Enter the Emmy award nominations.

But these noms should also inspire some amount of awe for putting on display the tremendous shifts happening on the boob tube.

First, we have the talk of the town: Netflix. The one-time snail mail DVD service (and Qwikster… remember that?) has made history with a best drama nomination for its original series House of Cards. In fact, it earned a total of nine nominations, including recognition for acting. It helps when you’ve got Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright in the cast. The fact that a Netflix series can attract that kind of talent speaks to the depth of broadcast entertainment and the willingness out there to try something new.

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