Jim: Okay, a transcript piece. What makes this one different? I'll tell you in just a minute. Remember our new e-mail address is thethirdestatesundayreview@yahoo.com. We're going to plug that change for two more weeks. Okay this is a small discussion group. Participating are The Third Estate Sunday Review's Ava, and me as moderator, and C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review. Readers have loved Ava and C.I. from the beginning. Just briefly, most of the features hear are written by a group. We do community writing. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. In January 2005, this online magazine started. Our first weekly edition included TV and only because I insisted that college students -- which I was then and which was our target audience then -- always have the TV on. Either watching front and center or background noise. You couldn't not cover TV. It's eight years later and our TV and media coverage is what we're known for. It's always the most read pieces. And guess who was against that back during that first Sunday in Janaury 2005? Ava and C.I. And yet now they write all these pieces -- just them. What happened there was the readers, in the e-mails, were strongly agreeing or strongly disagreeing with the input that Ava and C.I. offered. Their points and their writing stood out. This was clear before the month ended. So Dona, Jess, Ty and I said, "You two need to write these alone. We're holding you back." And we were. Because they immediately exploded. Only people didn't know it was them. And we started hearing from relatives telling us how much they loved X in this TV piece or that. And we were happy about that and would say thank you but then add, "Ava and C.I. wrote that." It was happening in e-mails too. So about six weeks after they were writing them by themselves we got them to agree to let us note that here. TV and media is them. We offered a byline but they felt that was against the whole nature of the project. It's hilarious to think that they excel, that's they're huge online, because they are writing about a topic that they didn't want to write about.
Ava: And that you twisted our arms to get included. Yes, I think we got the point. I think everyone did. Praise be Jim.
Jim: Let me note that we're all laughing. Every week, tons of e-mails come in on their commentaries and about their commentaries. They don't see it unless Ty's taking a break from the e-mails. If he's taking a break, they work the e-mails to give him time off. But there are all these questions -- personal ones, topical ones -- that readers always want answered. Now both of them have sat with Mike for an interview --
Ava: I think Mike interviewed us both over the phone.
Jim: Okay. But they've allowed Mike to interview them but that's it. C.I. will do interviews as herself but not as "C.I." And Ava and C.I. turn down all interview requests which used to piss me off because I would say, "If you went on ____ radio program, this site would explode." They said the site would grow to the level it needed to be -- which is either very Zen or very lazy. But they've turned down interviews over and over and that includes my requests.
Ava: Let me note that we are the ones transcribing this. It's a roundtable piece but we're transcribing -- C.I. and I. And I bring that up because I'm rocking my little girl to sleep and about to hand her off to her daddy, Jess, and then I'll be able to help C.I. But that's why I'm jumping in. C.I. can't speak and transcribe all this. So let me clarify that we did Mike's because it was Mike and because it allowed us to talk about issues. We're not trying to be mean to the press and we're fine with Ty giving a statement for us. But we feel we have our outlet here and say what we need to hear. We also don't feel we need to become media gasbags and, though you didn't grasp it, that will be what this discussion is about. I'm handing off to Jess. Give me a second to grab a pad and paper before you speak, Jim.
Jim: Okay. I can go now? Okay. One of the big topics in the e-mails in the last ten or so days has been media critic Howard Kurtz. He hosts the CNN program Reliable Sources. He's on an internet program as well. He used to be a media critic at The Washington Post and then he moved over to The Daily Beast. When NBA player Jason Collins came out, Kurtz wrote a piece that was wrong about what Collins had said. The Daily Beast pulled the piece and announced Kurtz was no longer with them leading to coverage that he was fired. Kurtz states that it had been an ill fit for some time and that the day he left was a planned event, that there was a meeting that had been scheduled in advance to talk about his leaving. He wasn't happy, he says, and they weren't happy. He was also criticized for using Twitter to issue a correction on the Collins story and for doing so in what some regarded as a light handed manner. C.I., your thoughts?
C.I.: On what?
Jim: Howard Kurtz's dismissal.
C.I.: I'm not friends with Howard, I do know him. I know his work at The Post. I don't know his work at The Daily Beast. When he moved, I was trying to follow him to include him in snapshots -- as a favor to Tina [Brown]. I couldn't find him. They needed to create a special folder, a Kurtz page. If he didn't make the front page -- or didn't make it obviously -- you had to search and the search engine wasn't adequate. So I can't speak to Kurtz's work for The Daily Beast because I missed 99% of it. Any time I was asked to highlight him at The Common Ills I did so you can see what stories of his I read by searching that. But I'm not qualified to speak to his output at The Daily Beast. Again, I don't know him intimately, but I would say overall he's been a forthcoming person. If he says there was a meeting planned, I'd have some reason to believe it. I'm also aware that it can be embarrassing to be fired so a person might fudge that or lie outright. Anyone.
Jim: So you're saying you don't think he'd lie but he could have lied?
C.I.: I'm saying you've asked me a question beyond an area that I'm able to speak to so I can't answer your question.
Jim: Okay. Next question, for Ava, It emerged last week that the IRS was targeting the Tea Party and other conservative activists groups with regards to the 501 tax status. And then on Saturday, it turned out that despite the IRS saying it had taken place last year, it has actually started, according to the AP, it had actually also gone on in 2011. So what's your take on this issue and that was asked for by reader Blythe.
Ava: Well, hello, Blythe, thank you for asking my opinion. I'm sorry I have none to give you. I could spit back out what Jim just said but in different language. That's about it. I haven't followed this topic. Last week, we spoke to 14 -- 15? -- groups about the wars and about veterans issues. Because we speak on those issues, I can talk about developments on those issues because we stay up to date -- or try -- meaning we're reading about Iraq, Afghanistan, The Drone War, the aftermath in Libya, you name it. That's where my reading time's going. In addition, we attended four Congressional hearings -- two of which we reported on -- and we also tried to figure out what we could cover this week for the media. This is when networks make their last decisions. So no one wants us to cover their show. Not this week. Not last week. We get people asking for us to cover their entertainment programs all the time -- either people with the show or with the networks -- but not during this period. So we knew we'd be covering news programming. And we spent the week discussing that. C.I. wrote "Lt Kelly McEvers enlists in The Drone War" on Friday and only did so after we both agreed that we had something else we could cover here, that we didn't need to save that for Third. As it turns out, later Friday morning, it turned out we had something else to cover that was more important than what we thought. But we had to listen to a lot of programming last week and watch a lot of TV news programming to figure out what to cover. I believe the story Blythe's asking about broke on Friday. Friday, the only new development I was following was Benghazi.
Jim: So you have no answer to the question?
Ava: That's what I said.
Jim: I'm a little lost.
Ava: Well, as I told you before you didn't grasp why we agreed to this. I'll let C.I. wrap up.
C.I.: In our pieces this week -- we have two media pieces -- we're talking about someone destroying their reputation by becoming a gas bag. Jonathan S. Landy was admired for his pre-Iraq War reporting. He's taken that to mean he's an expert on every topic. He's not. He flat out lied on radio or showed extreme stupidity on Friday's second hour of The Diane Rehm Show when he declared all US troops are out of Iraq. Not only is that not true, the opposite true. US troops remained in Iraq and now Barack has sent more in. We've covered this over and over until we're blue in the face. I'm quoting from the US Congressional Research Service report by Kenneth Katzman from last month entitled "Iraq: Politics, Governance, and Human Rights:"
General [Martin] Dempsey's August 21, 2012, visit focused on the security deterioration, as well as the Iranian overflights to Syria discussed above, according to press reports. Regarding U.S.-Iraq security relations, Iraq reportedly expressed interest in expanded U.S. training of the ISF, joint exercises, and accelerated delivery of U.S. arms to be sold, including radar, air defense systems, and border security equipment. [. . .]
After the Dempsey visit, reflecting the Iraqi decision to reengage intensively with the United States on security, it was reported that, at the request of Iraq, a unit of Army Special Operations forces had deployed to Iraq to advise on counterterrorism and help with intelligence, presumably against AQ-I. (These forces presumably are operating under a limited SOFA or related understanding crafted for this purpose.) Other reports suggest that Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) paramilitary forces have, as of late 2012, largely taken over some of the DOD mission of helping Iraqi counter-terrorismf orces (Counter-Terrorism Service, CTS) against AQ-I in western Iraq. Part of the reported CIA mission is to also work against the AQ-I affiliate in SYria, the Al Nusrah Front, discussed above.
Reflecting an acceleration of the Iraqi move to reengage militarily with the United States, during December 5-6 2012, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy James Miller and acting Under Secretary of State for International Security Rose Gottemoeller visited Iraq and a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed with acting Defense Minister Sadoun Dulaymi. The five year MOU provides for:
* high level U.S.-Iraq military exchanges
* professional military education cooperation
* counter-terrorism cooperation
* the development of defense intelligence capabilities
* joint exercises
The MOU appears to address many of the issues that have hampered OSC-I from performing its mission to its full potential. The MOU also reflects some of the more recent ideas put forward, such as joint exercises.
C.I. (Con't): It was never just The Third Estate Sunday Review or just The Common Ills saying this what was happening. So for Jonathan S. Landy to go on NPR Friday and declare that all US troops were out of Iraq? That's outrageous and it goes to the fact that he's not qualified to speak on everything.
Jim: Okay, I'm feeling sucker punched and set up. But Ty gave me a print out of your April 30th Iraq snapshot and highlighted a section to work into the discussion:
December 6, 2012, the Memorandum of Understanding For Defense Cooperation Between the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Iraq and the Department Defense of the United States of America was signed. We covered it in the December 10th and December 11th snapshots -- lots of luck finding coverage elsewhere including in media outlets -- apparently there was some unstated agreement that everyone would look the other way. It was similar to the silence that greeted Tim Arango's September 25th New York Times report which noted, "Iraq and the United States are negotiating an agreement that could result in the return of small units of American soldiers to Iraq on training missions. At the request of the Iraqi government, according to [US] General [Robert L.] Caslen, a unit of Army Special Operations soldiers was recently deployed to Iraq to advise on counterterrorism and help with intelligence."
Jim (Con't): I get now why that was.
Ava: We've talked before about The Power of No. Sometimes it's the only power you have. Along with "no," there's a phrase that's very helpful: "I don't know." What our goal was with this, C.I. and mine, was to answer any issue you asked about that we weren't up to date on by noting that and noting that we weren't qualified to comment. You'll note I'm still breathing. So is C.I. Admitting that we don't know everything did not kill us. If you're going to be a media guest, it's especially important that you learn the phrase "I don't know." Otherwise, you're not a guest, you're a gas bag, like Jonathan Landay. And, like him, you will quickly embarrass yourself by speaking on topics you are not qualified for. Readers get upset, and we understand that, that in many of the roundtables we don't speak. First, we're usually tired from the week before. And I've already told Jess that the weeks he's taking off, he's staying in DC at C.I.'s house. I'm mainly flying back here every weekend because I've got our baby on the road and I don't want Jess not to be able to see her. But we're usually tired. We've usually already written our media piece. We just want the thing to be over so we can go to sleep. And also, a lot of times, we don't have anything to say. Either the topic is one we're not familiar with or we're thinking, "Wow Betty, Stan, Mike, Elaine, Rebecca, Ruth, Cedric, Ann, Wally, Dona, Ty, Jess, Trina, Kat or Isaiah really said that better than we could." And now I'm tossing to C.I.
C.I.: It's really not necessary for us to weigh in on everything. That's actually true of everyone.
Jim: Before you go on, can you give me a program you watched or listened to that you ended up not covering.
C.I.: Sure. Doug Henwood's Behind The News. It was idiotic and then some. Doug was all thrilled to have on a lefty who could explain how the right thinks. The lefty had never been right but Doug just knew it was wonderful. It was lousy radio and it was lousy information. It was a man who defines "the other." Which on the left we call out repeatedly until we do it to the right and then it's okay. If you want to understand the right, as Doug insisted he did and that we on the left needed to, then you talk to the right. They are not an exotic and rare breed. They are people so stop making them the other. And it's not necessary to weigh in on everything, I was saying. Tying it to that program -- I think you're upset we tanked your discussion -- Tying it into that Doug Henwood broadcast, Doug started going on about how, on the right, you have reactionaries. On the right? Yeah and on the left and in the center. But Doug couldn't make that point, he just insisted they were on the right. As a general rule a media gas bag is the most reactionary creature on the face of the planet regardless of where they lean politically
Jim: Okay. Thank you for the Behind The News critique. I'll claim that as a victory even though you hijacked my planned discussion using it instead to make a point -- instead of providing a discussion -- and you certainly worked your Iraq issues in, no surprise there. We'll close with this is a rush transcript and Ava and C.I. do not type these features up, that was a question Ty kept getting. He was also asked why Ava and C.I. are the only ones who transcribe? Ava and C.I. can transcribe. The rest of us would be saying, "Okay, could you hold on?" In extreme cases, we record. But that's a hassle and a half to stop the recording, type up five or seven words, play, stop, type up five or seven words. It takes forever. For our readers, I had planned to squeeze in 15 of the topics you were asking about. My apologies to you, I tried.
