Originally Posted by dizzy
I guess my biggest peeve isn't that the bars/clubs are offering them, it's that newspapers/websites are bothering to cover it. It is just a publicity stunt that has obviously worked recently. I just don't thing taking $50 in liquor (or less in the case of the latest martini (Bombay Saffire is nice, but it isn't as lavish as others available) and adding $200 jewelery to make a $1000 drink is newsworthy.
Well, newspapers/tv/radio are for-profit by and large. They need to fill up space/airtime with something. Instead of going out and actually investigating something, they print up press releases because they don't involve any effort/expenditure on the part of the media outlet. One of the contributing factors to the rightward shift politically in the US is because right-wing think tanks, since about the late 70's, have built up infrastructures based on this knowledge about the media to their advantage by issuing PRs and reports that the media can use. Why go out and verify claims, when you can just have some group give you free information that involves no work/expense on your part (this doesn't begin to deal with corporate ownership/advertiser interests, but that argument is a bit more involved. Same basic principle. (Somehow I guess you probably already know this, but thought I'd put it out there for those who don't.)