A Note to Our Readers

Hey --
Sunday, Sunday.

Here's who participated on 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,
Ruth of Ruth's Report,
and Wally of The Daily Jot

And Dallas who hunted down links and was a sounding board to all. Thank you.

Here's what we've got.

Truest statement of the week -- If you read that and think, "Yeah!" Great. If you read it and think, "Well Betty should have gone a Truest II," we agree with you. Betty's attitude is she has already gotten attention for her statements at length and she has her own site. She said she wanted Keesha to "stand in the spotlight" and get the deserved attention.

Editorial: Kumbaya -- Jess didn't participate on this. He's with his family and participated on some features by phone. This week, we didn't have an editorial and were exhausted. Ty pointed out we still hadn't written about "Kumbaya" and Dona and I said, "Let's make it the editorial." Ty heard about the song's history in passing and asked C.I. about it? C.I. said, "Yes, that's correct, it was one of the anthems of the Civil Rights Movement." Ty pointed out how this song that was being trashed and distorted by the left and right. He and C.I. started doing research for a feature. For at least three weeks, we've postponed and postponed that. We didn't really go into their notes and notes and notes. They can tell you everything about it. Ty, furious that the anthem is being robbed of its historical significance and mocked, was the leader on this piece.

TV: Democracy Sometimes? -- Ava and C.I. Need we say more? This is brilliant, amazing and will even make you laugh. Ava points out, "When we do entertainment, we don't have to write epics." That is true. But while the networks suffer from a writers strike, we all benefit from Ava and C.I.'s commentaries. We all support the striking writers who have every right to be paid for their work. But I will always see the strike as the time I was proven right! From the start, I've asked them to tackle 'news' and news programs. When they would review one, they would then immediately go back to an entertainment program because, as Ava notes, "We're always 'serious' and 'professional' to outsiders when we're covering public affairs and news programming. That's a biased opinion and one that undercuts and devalues the work we're trying to do." Agreed. But look how great the commentaries on news programs have been. Talks are supposed to start next week and Ava and C.I.'s reaction is one of relief. (That's not their saying, "Let it end!" They're in it for the long haul. C.I. notes they may do PBS next week and, if so, will be regional because they've been passed an episode that airs in one markets -- only one as far as they know -- next Friday. The cover note indicates someone's selling the war.) But I will always see this period as the period where I was vindicated. For how many weeks now, they've covered these 'news' programs and look at what they've examined, what they've revealed and how many amazingly written pieces, how many epics they've done. (C.I.'s looking at the note on the public affairs program and already has a funny joke about it, about the host's fake voice.) It's been amazing. And this one stands up proudly among their best.


Roundtable -- Jess didn't participate on this. He noted the roundtables go on forever. This is a time constrained roundtable and C.I. notes: "The point I never got to was that the Green Party needs to have a transcript up after the Feb. 2nd debate. I talk around it but I never got to that point." It's a strong roundtable and we semi-managed to stay to a strict schedule for it.

The Truth About Gloria -- When the undereducated don't know realities, you might think the Katha Pollitts could help them out -- but what woman has Katha Pollitt ever helped out who didn't have the initials "K.P."? A lot of lies went up this month. A lot of people lied because they were stupid, some lied because they wanted to. We could care less: They lied.

Talking with Isaiah -- As promised, we interviewed Isaiah. This was the problem feature. (Jess participated, but that's not why.) Putting in the comics took forever. Flickr was so damn slow. Finally, Dona said, "Let's put things up out of order." So we did, just to get stuff up. We thank Isaiah for his time and for allowing us to re-run his comics.

Memo to Cindy Sheehan -- If a debate is scheduled, look for another memo since we know what they'll try to use against Cindy Sheehan (which C.I. explained they would months ago and we didn't note it then and won't now). They think, if they have to debate (which they don't think they will), they have the perfect "comment" to make that will make people recoil from Cindy. It won't. And we've got the perfect response to it (which will make Pelosi look foolish).

Hillary wins Nevada, The Nation magazine spins & sobs -- Our short feature this edition. We should have had more.

Highlights -- Mike, Kat, Betty, Wally, Elaine, Cedric and Rebecca wrote this and selected the highlights, we thank them.

That's it. We'll see you next week.

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