Rodale Inc. has promoted Dave Zinczenko to executive vice president and editorial director for the company’s Prevention and Organic Gardening brands, effective immediately. In addition to his new duties, Zinczenko will remain editor-in-chief of Men’s Health — a position he’s held since 2000 — as well as editorial director of Women’s Health, a role he’s held since 2008.

Zinczenko will oversee both print and online editorial for Prevention and Organic Gardening, with Prevention editor-in-chief Diane Salvatore and Organic Gardening editor-in-chief Ethne Clarke reporting directly to him.

Rep. Aaron Schock and Men’s Health have started up a campaign to make us all feel terrible about ourselves and our bodies. Oh, wait. I misread that. They’re actually trying to get Americans “to lose weight and get healthier this summer” as part of the Fit for Life Summer Challenge. Of course, their campaign involves putting pictures of a shirtless Schock, the “Fittest Congressman,” on their cover so side effects may involve us all looking in the mirror and sobbing. Anyway, Morning Joe brought Schock on this morning to discuss the initiative and somehow refrained from force-feeding him burgers so as to bring down the handsomeness curve for the rest of us.

Recently, Men’s Health wrote an article on “The 7 Germiest Places”. Basically it’s a list of things you touch every day that are actually covered in bacteria so that, after you read it, you spend the next week walking around with an industrial-sized vat of Purell (thanks, Men’s Health). After it was published, there was apparently some kind of argument in the MH office with Senior Associate Editor Amy Rushlow arguing that a public toilet was much, much cleaner than anything in the list. To prove…something…she then drank a glass of toilet water and filmed it. Yeah, I’m pretty sure the only thing proven is that you shouldn’t get in a game of Chicken with Amy Rushlow.

You think of “men’s magazines” and you think of Maxim or Men’s Health. Maybe you think of ESPN:The Magazine or GQ or even Out. You probably aren’t thinking about articles that discuss how to be a good dad, what it’s like for a transgender man to shave for the first time, or life inside Tennessee’s execution chamber.

It’s very easy to be skeptical of all the media lanscape-changing hype surrounding the iPad — in fact, we have not been immune to some classic cynicism ourselves. But we just had a fairly comprehensive walk-through of the Men’s Health iPad application, and consider us converted. We have found media’s future religion and thy name is iPad. A more complete write up is forth coming, but consider the following first reaction.

The American Society of Magazine Editors announced nominations for their annual National Magazine Awards last week, and for the first time included a brand new category: Magazine of the year. The official press release from the Magazine Publishers of America, defines the new award as, “honor(ing) publications that successfully use both print and digital media in fulfilling the editorial mission of the magazine.” Let’s take a look at the first time honorees: The Atlantic; Fast Company; Glamour; Men’s Health; and New York.

Men’s Health is providing Mediaite with further clarification about the way they choose cover lines following our post on the similarities between the newsstand cover of their December 2009 issue and their October 2007 issue, which were first pointed out by Perez Hilton.Men’s Health editor-in-chief David Zinczenko has passed along a number of the magazine’s subscription covers, which he says make up nearly 80 percent of their distribution versus the 20 percent comprised by newsstand covers like the ones Hilton discovered:

People who memorize every cover of Men’s Health may have noticed something curious about the December issue’s cover, aside from noted dreamboat Taylor Lautner: almost all of the text and layout is identical to a cover from 2007, which featured Jason Statham. The self-recycling was noted by none other than intrepid media watchdog … Perez Hilton. In a statement to Mediaite, Men’s Health editor-in-chief Dave Zinczenko defends the cover:

There’s a nonstop murmur about the death of magazines and to quiet some of the rumblings, many are counting on additions like iPhone applications to increase brand awareness and eventually subsidize cash flow. Recently, Men’s Health has made a concerted effort in the iPhone game, moving forward with three apps, including “Jimmy the Bartender.” Brand editor Matt Bean recently spoke with Ad Ageabout the company’s strategy and successes.

Facing a surprising amount of resistance to his health care agenda, President Obama has been forced to get increasingly creative in his counterattack. He’s tried his own town halls; he’s tried viral video. Now, the New York Times reports, he’s enlisting the formidable Rodale magazine empire. Could this backfire on Obama?

As we’ve reported before, magazines have been running to build iPhone applications to maintain both revenue and relevance in the digital age. Men’s Health has been a leader in this trend, and appears to have taken the next logical step by porting their very popular “Jimmy the Bartender” column to the iPhone, promising to help users “find Jimmy’s best bars” but also “Meet Women.”

We normally count on graffiti-chic Esquire covers to be the edgiest of the men’s mags . But this month, Esquire tries to hard, leaving the door wide open for the September Details and a brooding, bloodshot Tom Brady — edgy but relatable.