The $30,000-a-month PR contract: What's it Worth?

Public relations is the business that boondoggle aficionados love to excoriate. It seems -- well -- so useless. And for all their vaunted skills, flacks often seem incapable of defending themselves well.

So perhaps it was no surprise that the California stem cell agency's PR and the huge Edelman PR agency came under fire this week. But there is a tad mor…