A note to our readers

Hey --

Sunday, Sunday and, had Isaiah's comic not taken so long for C.I. to upload to Flickr (we think two hours) and caused so many problems, we'd be done earlier. We proofed as best we could while we waited and also did one more feature. On proofing. Expect more typos than usual. Spell check was used by Ava and C.I. for their TV commentary and the result was? The last third of their article was messed up and they had to spend forever fixing it. As a result, we all avoided spell check and, guess what, everyone will live.

Big thanks to Dallas who worked his butt off with links in addition to being a sounding board and much more throughout. Here's who else worked 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,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
and Marcia SICKOFITRDLZ.

And here's what we got:

Truest statement of the week -- File it with Prince's "Sometimes it snows in April . . ." We never would have thought a conservative would get truest but so cracked is Panhandle Media that no one from it could even come close to rivaling Scarborough.

Editorial: Damn or defend? -- Jeremiah was a problem, was a good friend to Obama, and every where that Wright went, Bambi said "amen" to damn the United States. Damn the United States, all the boys and girls, damn to the fishes in the deep blue sea, damned is you and me. Again, we return to the topic which is not a light topic. It's not a topic that's going away. This is a longer editorial than usual and you can thank Ava and C.I. for that because they touch on the topic in their posted commentary; however, the original version contained more and they gladly let us raid it for this editorial. It's one of the longest we ever did. As it should be, it's an important topic.

TV: A very strange week -- Ava and C.I. note first that Medium was added to the our permalinks during the writers strike. They couldn't review the show then, as they wanted to, due to the strike. So when it started airing new episodes, it got added to the links. You can stream episodes online by using the link. This was just going to be a review of Medium. All week, I asked them if they could work some news and they said "no." Then they caught Gwen's act on Washington Week, where she called Hillary "that woman," and felt they could do an article that was both a review of an entertainment program and a think piece. In coming up with the title, I was stymied until I noticed how often they used the word "strange" in their commentary. Ty's checking the e-mails and already three have written including Josie who hails it as "out of the park! Home run!" The commentary, that is, not my title. As Mike would say, ":D."

Quick Talk -- Went on a little bit longer than planned but still not a roundtable. By going a bit longer, we got things such as Betty's statements near the end which are sure to be a crowd pleaser as she offers what Cedric's affectionately dubbed "Deep Wisdoms from the South." In this feature, you'll find topics we had planned to write about this week. We also planned to run together C.I.'s commentary on Basra throughout the week. We didn't have time. It is what it is, Kat would say. Jess just hollers breakfast is almost ready. (He has breakfast duty this morning.)

Our problem with Jeremy Scahill -- The title. Dona said, "This feature is going to result in e-mails asking what everyone's already asking, 'What's your problem with Jeremey Scahill?'" She wasn't objecting to the article, just noting what was in store. Good, I said, let's call it that. This is our problem with Scahill. This is why he didn't get highlighted for his applause lines at Winter Soldier. This is why the piece he co-wrote with Naomi Klein last week was ignored by all community sites despite the fact that when Naomi writes about Iraq, we highlight, we link. We actually think the problem is Jeremy Scahill, but the title's there for any who need an out.

Idiots -- C.I. and Elaine objected to this title. "Do you want to suggest something or wait for me to come up with another title?" I asked them. We were all tired. Some titles are to the point. I agree with the title and you know Jess does.

Crackpot Stephen Zunes expressing Hillary Hatred -- Why would a publication give an editor billing on an article to begin with? Who knows. But having billed someone as 'editor,' you'd think the 'editor' would actually want to do the work. Zunes certainly didn't do the work. Then the 'editor' didn't. Then Foreign Policy in Focus didn't. And we all know Common Dreams will repost anything without any concern over facts -- remember when they posted a slam at CBS when it was actually NBC that is owned by GE?

Highlights -- Mike, Kat, Betty, Elaine, Rebecca, Wally, Cedric and Marcia wrote this and we thank them for it.

And there you have it. Except for "Quick Talk" all the features ran in the print edition. They had two articles covered in "Quick Talk" that never fleshed out well enough to rate being included here. We're eating and going to bed. (C.I.'s actually posting to The Common Ills first.) We'll see you next week.


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

Added: Maya Angelou's provided a Women's History Month commentary on Tuesday at Hillary Clinton's site and we've added it "Maya Angelou for Women's History Month."