Hey --
Fairly early for a Sunday. For us.
Along with Dallas, the following worked on this edition:
The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, and Ava,
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,
Trina of Trina's Kitchen,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ
and Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends.
We thank everyone. And what do we have?
Actually, we may have a piece or two for next week. We couldn't use them this week but they're written (and in print version).
Truest statement of the week -- Margaret Kimberley was the clear choice this week as was . . .
Truest statement of the week II -- Doug Henwood.
Editorial: The simulated 'stimulus' -- Trina helped with the writing of this and we thank her for it. She helped on one other feature and we'll note that when we get to it. We are always thrilled to have Trina's help and if we'd known she was planning to help, we'd have tried to do a roundtable or something to bring her into that. (We did offer, she said she'd help on the editorial but no need for a roundtable.) We're not joking about being alarmed when we saw Krugman's column Monday. C.I., Ava, Ty, Dona and me (Jim) all decided on the topic Wednesday and it had been floated before we decided. (Mike notes it in Thursday's "Barack and his apologists.") Then came Krugman's column and most of us couldn't read it all the way through on Friday, we were too sure he went to the obvious point about how the public is enraged by the first bailout and rejecting others. He covered a lot but, thankfully for us, left that out.
TV: Blustering Boys -- Ava and C.I.'s TV commentary. And we raided it for an Iraq section to use in another article . . . and Ava points out, "That article isn't even up here." No, it's not. Our apologies to Ava and C.I. for that. But this is a fun one that's also a hard hitting one and also includes trade gossip. I could write more about it but pulling Iraq meant pulling a heads up for next week. We can't think of a time when they've offered a heads up in their commentaries before about what they planned to tackle next week. They plan to tackle The Dollhouse. It airs Friday nights on Fox with The Terminator as a lead in. They had this thing about it that actually worked well with Iraq and when we pulled the Iraq section to use elsewhere, they had to redo the conclusion. They DID NOT like the first episode. They have a copy of the second episode that arrived when they called friends to register how much they hated it. Supposedly episode two is better (they haven't watched it, we've been working on this edition all night). So, barring something else coming along, The Dollhouse will be the topic (or a topic) next week.
Sadder Sirota -- Like cheese, Sirota really stinks and molds with age.
Mailbag -- Trina helped with this article. This is the other one she helped on. We thank her for the help. We started to do this in a transcript format but ended up ditching it for the strength of one voice.
The Bronze Booby goes to . . . -- Barack lies and you're a booby if you lie for him.
The Cult of St. Barack -- Top illustration done by Kat and Betty's oldest son. Possibly another adult. This is a photo that they painted over. Second illustration is Isaiah's and we thank him for the permission to repost. (We also thank Betty's son but we're not done with him yet.)
Go ask Phallus, Phallus Walker Red -- Two illustrations. The first is by Betty's oldest son and her daughter. The backstory is that her daughter started the illustration and made a stroke with the paint brush she hated. She started crying and her big brother said he'd fix it and did. It's a good illustration. The second one is Betty's oldest son and C.I. According to Kat. C.I. doesn't remember that. (But also hasn't looked at it.) The article is breaking it down about Alice Walker Red. We returned to it because we agree with DC Indymedia that now is time for a recent flashback.
It's coming . . . -- There will be an action calling for an end to the illegal war next month.
Two things not to miss -- Maxine Waters and Kimberly Wilder. If you missed Maxine Waters, you can catch it online later today. We were working on the edition and this was the first thing posted. Dona looked at the time and yelled that This Week would start in a half hour on the East Coast.
Iraq roundtable -- Repost of the Iraq roundtable a number of the community participated in on Friday night.
Highlights -- Mike, Elaine, Kat, Betty, Rebecca, Stan, Wally, Marcia, Cedric and Ruth wrote this and picked highlights unless otherwise noted. We thank them.
We're planning to fall out now watching The Amazing Mr. X. We'll see you next week.
-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.