Hey --
Another late Sunday.
First up, we thank all who participated this edition which includes Dallas and the following:
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,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Trina of Trina's Kitchen,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ,
Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends,
Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts,
and Ann of Ann's Mega Dub.
What did we come up with?
Cindy Sheehan explaining the need not to be co-opted.
Glen Ford also explaining the need not to be co-opted.
Bruce Dixon. Our apologies because he should have gone with last Sunday's edition. We had planned to explore Democracy Now in a feature and note Dixon's remarks there. It was one of the features that never even get worked on and then we didn't think of the quote for truest. This was an important article by Dixon and when we realized we'd not noted it in any way, we'd just posted the note so it was too late. We include it this week and urge you to read Dixon's article in full. For those keeping track of truests, with this one, Dixon becomes the first one to ever be included after the week has passed. He will probably be the only one with that achievement.
Susan Faludi pops up all over this edition. That wasn't planned. Dona, Ty, Ruth and Marcia were assigned to pick this week's book out of our list of 67 books from the last ten years that mattered. They worked on that Wednesday through Friday. They made the decision Friday but didn't share it. In the meantime, Mike, C.I., Wally and (via phone) Ann were running (Ann was walking) Saturday morning when Wally and Ann were talking about journalist I.F. Stone having both just finished a collection of his writing. After they finished it, C.I. noted that "all journalists lie" was only half the story, the other half included a lot of people want to be lied to. Mike hollered, "That's an editorial!" And it was. We all got on board with the idea when Mike pitched it. Another note on this editorial. I had a long piece on Danny Schechter that needed a major edit. C.I. asked if we had time for an edit? She also said I might want to condense it to one paragraph and drop it into this editorial. Due to time limits, I did just that. I am aware that a paragraph is not an article and that, intentionally or not, C.I. rescued Danny's fat ass yet again.
Next week, Ava and C.I. would like to take on the program featuring a performer with the worst eye make up on all of prime time. Barring any other developments, they will. They were planning to hold off on Charlie's Angels for a few weeks more but then came the announcement at the end of last week that it was being axed. So they grabbed it instead. Jody e-mailed wondering about other planned pieces? Don't hold them to it because there are things that come up -- they almost chucked Charlie's Angels to take on last night's dreadful Saturday Night Live -- but they have plans for Prime Suspect, The Secret Circle and Pan Am in the next few weeks.
This week's pick for the ten most important books of the last ten years. For those keeping track, this is book four. There are six more picks left. This is the first pick of a book that we'd done a book discussion on previously.
Our only Iraq feature. First off, the questions are from real advice columns and, except for changing "Abby" to "Mooki," we made no changes. The links go to their appearance in real advice columns. We'd planned this feature and two others on Iraq. What happened? AP keeps insisting that all troops are leaving Iraq. Even though the White House and Pentagon are denying it. C.I. shared at The Common Ills what her friends in the White House, State Dept. and Pentagon say, that the deal is not off (deal to keep US troops in Iraq). She also insisted that we not cover that here saying, "I'm happy to go out on limb on this but I don't want to have it here."
As she rushed to call others racist, Canadian Marie Josee Godbout didn't seem to grasp the racsim she was expressing herself. It was deeply, deeply offensive and especially to Betty who hails from Georgia.
Law & Disorder did what everyone should have been doing. As the week continued, you saw other programs copying Heidi Boghosian and Geoff Brady's lead.
US Senator Patty Murray on veterans employment.
A Workers World repost.
Mike and the gang did this and we thank them for it.
Peace.
-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.