A Note to Our Readers

Hey --

We're back. C.I.'s going through the e-mails at The Common Ills and passed on that a lot of people aren't seeing the note we came back and filled in. It's a Blogger/Blogspot problem. Closing your browser and re-opening it won't fix it. But it does give a chance at a second note! After we've all had some sleep.

First off, this is who took part in the writing of this edition:

The Third Estate Sunday Review's Dona, Jess, Ty, Ava and Jim,
Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,
Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,
C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,
Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),
Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,
Mike of Mikey Likes It!,
Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz,
and Wally of The Daily Jot

And Dallas was link locator and sounding board, plus C.I. got Dallas to go on record for one story. We thank Dallas and we thank Rebecca for help with the visuals.

This was an interesting edition and it needed to be a strong one. By last Monday, it was pretty much decided that we would be doing our fiction edition this weekend. Ava and C.I. prepped by watching a show they hoped they could fit in (they don't have to, remember that next weekend -- great if they do, but it's not required). Then came the thing that everyone knows about and this had to be a strong edition.

Truest statement of the week -- Elaine saying it loud and clear. A lot of times with our picks, there are several we could go with and debate back and forth. On Tuesday, Elaine posted and her post was amazing but these lines took on a life of their own as they were echoed in the gina & krista round-robin (and today in Polly's newsletter and Miguel, Maria and Francisco's newsletter) and in e-mails. To be honest, many of us were also quoting those lines back and forth to one another throughout last week. It really was the truest statement of the week.

Editorial: Iraqis & Benchmarks -- we try to note war resisters every week. We almost didn't this week. Thanks to Ava and C.I. for the save in another feature. But I (Jim) had thought we needed to drop the fiction edition on Thursday. I shared that with C.I. and why and C.I. was on board. (C.I. and I were on the road speaking to students last week.) We e-mailed Cedric because we saw something in a paper we knew he'd be interested in. But it really wasn't going to happen until everyone got to weigh in. We presented it Friday night and why and there were groans but everyone agreed. Rebecca, Wally, Mike and Elaine were all attending a conference in Chicago and part of the reason we were decided on a fiction edition was it would mean less research work (more writing work), so with that out the window we were all scrambling. No one remembers who came up with the idea for this editorial but we were all on board with it.

TV: A down and up week for women -- Scramble? When you've not only decided on the show, as Ava and C.I. had, and spent the week tossing ideas at each other on it and how to fit it into the planned theme (fiction edition), what do you do when the theme gets tossed out the window? They weren't sure. They said they'd have something. What? They didn't know. They put out calls to friends asking what they thought needed addressing? Obviously, the continued trashing of Katie Couric. And another thing as well. They don't often write about soaps, but when they do, it's popular. This was so insta-popular that when we couldn't get the editorial to post for over 20 minutes and Ty was noting e-mails, they decided to go back in and add more to it. (They didn't take anything out.) If you're not, for instance, seeing Nola, Kelly and Morgan mentioned, you're not seeing it all. Again, closing your browser and re-opening it won't fix it. You might try clearing your history because that's working for some. What did we think? We've never seen them so tired or so frantic or so sure that they would have nothing. This time we believed them. (Partly due to Ava being sick and C.I. stepping on broken glass.) And then we read it. We love it. We laughed throughout but loudest as the "camera ready" line.
The photo of Genie Francis and Doug Sheehan is not a professional photo. It's also been cropped. They advised that by posting it online, it could pop up elsewhere. If it does, a link to the piece it appeared in would be nice (probably more than nice after last week's rip off). Again, the picture's cropped. Meaning? We'll know full well if it pops up everywhere with people claiming they didn't swipe it. (And that's the main reason it's cropped. Rebecca thought that up.)

The Dirty Politics of Barack Obama -- Something's are news and somethings get little comment. The narrative is "Even Obama's had to turn to dirty politics." That's the popular narrative. The reality, as we've repeatedly pointed out, is that Obama's built many a campaign on dirty politics.

Precedent is again tossed out the window -- This is another thing that should have been much bigger news. How many times is the five majority on the Court going to toss out precedent before we start hearing some serious concern about this? Apparently, it's going to have to happen a few more times before people really start paying attention.

Independent media -- "Naval gazing," C.I. dismissed the suggestion with. Ty countered, "Do you know how many e-mails came in on this topic?" (C.I. had also received many, many e-mails on this topic all last week.) C.I.'s attitude was fine, everyone else could write it. We pointed out we needed everyone's participation. The original line was all C.I. was going to say publicly. Through pestering and persistance, we got more. Some have asked about others not being quoted in it? Wally wanted the piece written (everyone but C.I. was on board immediately) but noted he wasn't saying anything for the piece. He would work on it and suggest things but he was putting up a wall. Betty elected to do that as well. Cedric stated that, in terms of a quote, we'd have to use too many "*" to replace letters in order to make work friendly. (This edition had to be because C.I. had no time to do a mass e-mailing to members who only read on their work computers.) Elaine, probably echoing C.I.'s feelings, chose to participate but give no quote.

Ed Oakley -- This was done early on. And features Dallas contributing for the record! But while we were waiting on the illustration (Billie sent us a great one but it wouldn't upload to Flickr. We e-mailed her early this morning and she sent us a smaller version of it), C.I. checked the e-mails for The Common Ills and three members had suspected we'd be writing about this and forwarded letters they had received from New Voices. We include one in them. We thank Billie for allowing us to interview her for the piece.

Dumbest Headline of the week -- Two types of e-mails have come in on this. One group thinks it needs a link to some story on Jolie. We don't. It was an attack on the press and we're not going to reward it by linking. Another camp seems to think that Jolie's movie has been attacked. We really don't get into the movie but if you're looking for a prediction, Ava and C.I. say Jolie uses a voice that would work for a fictional character but doesn't work for the real life person she's playing, that the story received saturation in real time and most people aren't willing to relive it, that it's coming out in an action summer (there are barely any comedies, for instance) and will likely be buried, and that Jolie really needs appealing actors to help with the box office. Translation, this will not be one of summer's big films.

Peter Pace fired -- Wally said we needed to do this because Ruth's report had posted here indicating that our stuff was posting. Isaiah, due to the problems at The Common Ills, was given the day off and Wally said we needed to note that to help out (cut down on e-mails asking "Where is Isaiah?"). We all agreed.

Highlights -- Mike, Cedric, Wally, Rebecca, Betty and Elaine wrote this and we thank them for it. (The credit is rotated in the feature every week and we also try to rotate it in the note. We're more likely to mention Mike first because he usually insists -- in the credit within the feature -- that he go last.)

Ruth's Report -- Ruth posted her report and it would not show. She called C.I. who tried to see what was going on. Blogger/Blogspot issue. We added it here a) to get it online and b) to make sure we weren't having the same problem. It's a great report and thanks to Ruth for permission to repost.

And that's it. It was really important we have a strong edition. That we all focus at a time when many were wondering "What's the point?" The point is always, and this is something C.I. used to stress when this site started, the people who respond. Yes, rip-offs hurt. Yes, it's rude and it's theft. But we've got passionate and informed readers and, in the end, that's more important than the fact that others are so untalented or ill mannered that they conduct themselves in the manner that they do. We actually had another feature idea but didn't have time to finish it. Cedric pointed out that we covered race "kind of" in the Obama feature. His feelings were, we've got Iraq, we've got the Supreme Court, we've got race, we've got feminism, we've got it all! (That's a paraphrase only because I was really tired and can't remember the exact wording.) I'd agree with that. Thank you to everyone who reads and those who shared the outrage over last week. Thank you to everyone who came together and got the work done this edition.

-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.