Sunday, November 20, 2011

A note to our readers

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.

And what did we come up with?

Samantha Bee. And her report actually had several we could have used as truests.
Leon Panetta. Mainly picked because the US is still in negotiations with Iraq on US forces remaining in Iraq. Don't believe your liars and whores. Panetta explained it at the hearing. Notice how they all ignored it in their coverage.


How are we supposed to know what's going on with Iraq when the US press -- big and small -- refuses to inform us? The Iraq War is over? Then why is the US press acting as though they need to protect the American people from the fact that the US is mired in the illegal war still?

Ava and C.I. wrote a powerful piece. It wasn't an easy one for them to write for a number of reasons (including the fact that C.I. was friends with Natalie Wood). But they managed to play it journalistically and not whore. Great job and wonderful work done explaining what is real and what isn't.

Dona and I (Jim) are the moderators of this feature. Kat, Wally, Ava and C.I. attended the very important Senate Armed Services Committee hearing last Tuesday. The one that was grossly misreported on. The four of them were correct in their reports. Dona and I streamed the video of the hearing yesterday to be prepared for this piece and we were even more surprised then by what the press had been reporting. This hearing was completely disguised and twisted by the press. In this piece, we try to go over that while emphasizing the big points out of the hearing.
This is the 8th pick. That doesn't mean that on our list of 10, it's ranked 8th. We're providing 10 books, we're not ranking them. But what it does mean is that there are only two picks left in this series.

Who is the person of the year? Next month will be hearing a lot of people and outlets weighing in. Maybe it's Makana, maybe it's not. But he's surely the person of the month.

We analyze the 'scandalous' photo.

While Dona, Kat, Wally, Ava, C.I. and I worked on the piece about the hearing, at Kat's suggestion, I asked the others to figure out how we could note the enduring bases. This is the piece they came up with.

A release from Senator Patty Murray's office.

ETAN.

Mike and the gang wrote this. We thank them for it.

Had we been thinking, we'd have a Workers World repost but we completely forgot. But that's what we came up with. See you next week.




Peace.

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