Head-To-Head

I know, it has nothing to do with communications, but I was struck by the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity Justice Department press release writers were given Friday.OK, I can play six degrees of Kevin Bacon on this one and relate it to communications for the sake of argument.

In the wake of questions from Rep. Maxine Waters to Attorney General Jeffrey Holder this week about Jsutice’s lack of forced divestitures or merger blocks, particularly as related to Comcast/NBCU (gee, that wasn’t so tough), the Justice Department Friday announced that Alberto-Culver and Unilever had agreed to divest two hair care brands to preserve “head-to-head” competition in the low cost shampoo, conditioner and hair spray lines.

For “head-to-head” to be not only the defensible, but the most logical, term for competition in hair-care-products is the moth that draws writers to the twin flames of journalism and PR (OK, maybe not, but they are days you live for if you have gotten yourself in either racket).

I was reminded of my favorite headline opportunity, which involved, as I recall Disney and News Corp. in some legal squabble over the Anaheim Hockey Team, The headline: “Fox Attacks Mouse in Duck Suit.” You never forget your first love, your first, well, more love, and your first really clever (to me, anyway) headline.

That was “back in the day,” as the Old Man on “Pawn Stars” would say, where every headline did not have to be search optimizable or contain a reference to a top 10 list or Charlie Sheen.

These days, the ideal Washington story would be one about Matt Drudge topping Lindsay Lohan in a Huffington Post poll of people least likely to appear in a Washington-related headline on communications-related stories.