Isaiah's latest The World Today Just Nuts. Karl's in stripes and cuffed. Bully Boy asks, "Karl, why ain't the spin working this time? Karl?"

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

Editorial: Time to Head On Home

To quote the Beatles "I read the news today, oh boy." A quick scan of the headlines on BuzzFlash reveal what we already knew, the Bully Boy's not made us safer. We see links to stories on the feelings of the British. (Similar to Pru's feelings expressed at The Common Ills.)

C.I. and Dallas go international and end up with Tony Allen-Mills and Andrew North's "Downed US Seals may have got too close to Bin Laden" (Sunday Times of London) about "the worst incident in the history of the Seals." Not a credit the Bully Boy needs right now after dragging his feet for almost four years since Sept. 11th. What was "Wanted Dead or Alive?" A provocative personal ad? It certainly wasn't anything with meaning.

Then there's Michael Smith's "UK in talks to hand Iraq role to Australia" (also Sunday Times of London):

BRITAIN is negotiating with Australia to hand over military command of southern Iraq to free up British troops for redeployment to the front line in Afghanistan.
An announcement is expected within weeks that several thousand British soldiers are to be sent to Afghanistan.

The coalition of Operation Enduring Falsehood continues to shrink.

And folks, we're just getting started. Still sticking with The Sunday Times of London, check out Hala Jaber's "Allawi: this is the start of civil war:"

IRAQ’S former interim prime minister Iyad Allawi has warned that his country is facing civil war and has predicted dire consequences for Europe and America as well as the Middle East if the crisis is not resolved.
"The problem is that the Americans have no vision and no clear policy on how to go about in Iraq," said Allawi, a long-time ally of Washington.
In an interview with The Sunday Times last week as he visited Amman, the Jordanian capital, he said: "The policy should be of building national unity in Iraq. Without this we will most certainly slip into a civil war. We are practically in stage one of a civil war as we speak."

Occupations will lead to civil wars. No surprise there. To resentment, to anger and to violence.Or how about this UPI article linked to at Iraq Coalition Casualties? The link's bad(
they don't have the full web address in the link) but look at what you can read:

07/09/05 upi: Iraq war results in at least 254 amputees
Army hospitals treated 254 amputees from the Iraq war...Nearly 19,000 soldiers have been medically evacuated ...There were 2,527 evacuated with battle injuries, 5,444 with non-battle injuries and 10,758 with disease.

At The Independent, Andy McSmith's "Leaked memo shows Iraq pull-out plans" only makes the point more clear about who's still wanting to dance with Bully Boy and who's called a taxi for the ride home:

Almost two thirds of the 8,500 British troops in Iraq will have been pulled out by the end of next year, under plans drawn up in Whitehall to hand over two provinces to Iraqi control.
The plan set out in a leaked memo written by the Defence Secretary John Reid, hints that the Government is keen to cut the heavy cost of patrolling southern Iraq.
The memo calculates that the current cost of the British presence in Iraq, around £1bn a year, could be halved if the number of troops were reduced to 3,000 during 2006. The memo implies that the British would formally hand over control to the Iraqis of the four provinces currently under British control by April 2006, but that it take another eight months before what the memo calls the "UK military drawdown" has been completed - and 18 months before the money comes through.

Are we starting to get the picture yet? The public is. They want the troops home. Polls show that. It's just the media and our leaders that are too timid to address it. "Stay the course!" they chant. This "cakewalk" has now lasted over two years. Donald Rumsfeld says twelve is a possiblity. "Cakewalk?"

How do you define "success" in Iraq? That's difficult since the reasons for the invasion/occupation constantly shift. But it's not been a cakewalk, this war of choice. And we haven't made the world safer for anyone. Iraq's not safer. We're not safer. The London bombings prove the fly paper theory was crap.

Now we're supposed to let the ones who brought us this war go back to the drawing board to . . . think up new excuses? They had no planning other than (as Naomi Klein pointed out in "Baghdad Year Zero") to have a tag sale on the Iraqi assets. Even the Operation Happy Talkers seem to have a case of cat got their tongues. (Sadly, we're sure this is a momentary condition.)

If sane people can agree that the illegal occupation is a disaster for everyone involved (outside of those profitting from the war), how much are we willing to give to "stay the course?" We want the body counts to double? When do we reach the point that we say enough?

We steer to you to "Should This Marriage Be Saved?" and ask at what point do we take a realistic look at what's going on? Pig-headed is not a virtue. It's not sane. It's not logical. And it's only going to get more people killed.The Bully Boy has sullied this nation's name. He's trashed treaties and conventions. He's had a five-year frat party at our expense. At some point, we need to roll up our sleeves and do some cleaning. And that means tossing in the garbage the notion that after two years of the "cake walk" this is anything like what was sold to us.

"Stay the course?" We say "head on home." Head on home to what America is supposed to stand for. On what America is supposed to represent. This invasion/occupation isn't what America's supposed to be about. So let's all grow up, sober up and realize that the Bully Boy's taken us on a two-year bender. Comes a time when you gotta head home. It's past time for that.

Iraq had no WMD. It was not a threat to us ("mushroom cloud," Condi?). Someone lied us into war. They took us off course. It's time to get back to what America's all about and it's time to realize that drunk slurring his words and telling us he knows another bar that's still open isn't anyone we want to get a car in with. We're ready to head on home and return to the lives we should be leading. Lives that don't involve wars built on lies. Lives that don't involve trying to impose a system on a people who didn't ask for us to be there. Lives that don't involve falling for the latest Operation Happy Talk. Lives that are reality-based. Bar's closing, let's all head on home. At least the ones who still have that option, the ones who didn't give their lives to a war of choice, one that should have been avoided.

[Note: Since these editorials tend to get reposted elsewhere, we'll note this was written by The Third Estate Sunday Review crew of Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess and Ava as well as by C.I. of The Common Ills, Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude, Kat of Kat's Korner, Mike of Mikey Likes It! and Betty of Thomas Friedman is a Great Man.]
posted by Third Estate Sunday Review @ Sunday, July 10, 2005

Twenty years ago, two French secret service frogmen attached mines to the hull of a ship owned by the environmentalist group Greenpeace as it lay anchored in a New Zealand harbor, and the explosions ripped large holes in it.
The sinking of the Rainbow Warrior before it could set off to protest French nuclear tests in the Pacific killed a Greenpeace photographer on board, provoking much embarrassment in Paris and the resignation of top officials.

The above is from "Report Says Mitterrand Approved Sinking of Greenpeace Ship" in this morning's New York Times. Online, the article is credited to "The New York Times." In print, it's credited to "Marlise Simons."

Not really sure who wants to grab credit here, but we're not really sure that this is an article to be proud of. It's on A3 in the print edition and difficult to find online. (Once again, thank you to Dallas for hunting down the link.) That's partly due to the fact that it's not credited to the author it's credited to in print. It's also not a story displayed on the website's international home page. Click on "Europe" there and, Dallas reports, it's not a main story with a photo. It is listed, number twelve of fifteen stories they only offer headlines to. Someone decided that it was important enough in print for the bottom of page A3. Apparently, it's less important online.

And someone should figure out who wrote the article because there shouldn't be an inconsistency in the byline for the print version and the online version (which are exactly the same -- thanks for copying and pasting, Dallas).

Had this article run prior to June 26th, we'd read it and think, "Hmm." But we read it today and wonder why there's no mention of Fernando Pereira? The concluding paragraph beings "The sinking of the ship led to" and goes on to list arrest of two people (French agents, they were sentenced in New Zealand but got off easy). It tells us France had to pay fines. But nowhere in the concluding paragraph or anywhere in the story is Fernando Pereira mentioned.

Who is Fernando Pereira? Did you miss the entry entitled "Who was Fernando Pereira?" from June 26th?

Fernando Pereira was killed in 1985 by French agents, the story tells us. The two agents ("Saboteurs Dominique Prieur (left) and Alain Mafart"?) pled guilty to manslaughter and were "sentence to 10 years in jail" but were in two. The two aren't identified in the story (the names in the parenthetical come from the captions to the photos). Pereira's daughter Marelle feels the two got off easy because they copped a plea of manslaughter and she feels her father was murdered.

The "sinking of the ship" that the article (by "The New York Times" or by Simons, we don't know) refers to? Pereira died on it. That's kind of an important detail that should have been included in this article.

It's important that "23-page handwritten report written by Admiral Lacoste" was turned over to Le Monde. It's important that the report asserts that then President of France, Francois Mitterrand, authorized the sinking. But if you're going to discuss the subject, merely noting that the Rainbow Warrior was sunk, that two French agents were arrested (and convicted) and that France had to pay damages isn't quite cutting it.

(Any member who reads French, including French members, are welcome to go the Le Monde website and try to locate it. C.I.'s French is a haze from lack of use and Ava's French consists of one course in conversational French, but we aren't finding it online. Click here to look for yourself.)

We'll move over to The New Zealand Herald, "Papers show Mitterrand approved Rainbow Warrior bombing:"

The sabotage of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior 20 years ago in Auckland was carried out with the "personal authorisation" of France's late president Francois Mitterrand, documents showed today.
Le Monde newspaper published extracts in its Saturday edition of a 1986 account written by Pierre Lacoste, the former head of France's DGSE foreign intelligence service, giving the clearest demonstration yet of Mitterrand's direct involvement in the sinking of the campaign vessel. Portuguese photographer Fernando Pereira died in the attack on the ship that was leading Greenpeace's campaign against French nuclear tests on the Mururoa Atoll in the Pacific.
"I asked the president if he gave me permission to put into action the neutralisation plan that I had studied on the request of Monsieur (Charles) Hernu," Lacoste wrote. Hernu was defence minister at the time.

The above is a Reuters story. Note that in the third paragraph, they mention Fernando Pereira.
Was "Simons" or "The New York Times" under a harsh deadline? Was no one familiar with the story? Or was a decision made that Fernando Pereira's death isn't "important?"

We don't know. We think it's an imporant topic. We think the story would have benefitted by acknowledging that this wasn't just a ship being sunk, it was also an attack that led to someone dying. Regardless of the reason behind Pereira not being included (or motive if it was intentional), he needed to be included. He is part of this story. This wasn't just vandalism and leaving the reader with the impression that only property was damaged doesn't cut it.

June 26th, the question was raised here, "Who is Fernando Pereira?" Check the link for what the Times forgets to tell you.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

Military officials have agreed to free Cyrus Kar, an aspiring American filmmaker who has been imprisoned without charge for nearly two months at a United States military detention center in Iraq, lawyers and relatives of Mr. Kar said Saturday.
The news of the planned release came as government lawyers prepared for a hearing on Monday afternoon in federal district court in Washington, where they had been ordered to show cause for his continued detention.
Last week, after his lawyers sued the government for his release through a petition for habeas corpus, Defense Department officials said Mr. Kar, 44, had been detained on May 17 with his Iranian cameraman, Farshid Faraji, on suspicion of involvement with the Iraqi insurgency.
The two men, who relatives said were in Iraq working on a historical documentary, were arrested after a search of a taxi they had taken from a Baghdad hotel turned up dozens of washing-machine timers of a type sometimes used by Iraqi insurgents to make improvised explosive devices, the officials said.

The above is from Tim Golden's "U.S. Says It Will Release American Held in Iraq" in this morning's New York Times. It's a strong story and one worth reading. The site doesn't comment on or link to Robin Toner's stories. (Members are free to read and make their own comments which, with permission, will go up here.)

We're doing another spotlight. It's not easy to find online (thanks Dallas for tracking it down) which is strange. But we'll credit the writer of the piece which is something the Times doesn't do online.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

The number of farms on which estate tax is owed when the owners die has fallen by 82 percent since 2000, to just 300 farms, as Congress has more than doubled the threshold at which the tax applies, the Congressional Budget Office said in a report released last week.

All but 27 farmers left enough liquid assets to pay taxes owed, the budget office found, although it hinted that the actual number might be zero. The study examined how much in cash, stocks and bonds these farmers left to pay estate taxes, but the report noted that no data existed on how much life insurance the farmers had put into trusts. Virtually all wealthy farmers own life insurance in trusts, say estate tax lawyers who specialize in working with farmers.
These findings come as the Senate is poised to vote this month on repeal of the estate tax. Advocates of repeal have begun showing commercials criticizing senators who oppose repeal, like Maria Cantwell, Democrat of Washington. Many of the criticisms focus on a supposed threat to family farms.
The estate tax raised an estimated $23.4 billion last year. Repeal would shift part of the burden of taxes off the fortunes left by the richest 1 percent of Americans, some of whose fortunes were never taxed, onto the general population. The lost revenue could be made up in three ways: through higher income taxes; reduced government services; or more borrowing, which would pass the burden of current government spending to future generations.

The above is from David Cay Johnston's "Few Wealthy Farmers Owe Estate Taxes, Report Says" in this morning's New York Times.

We (Ava and C.I.) feel this is the most important story in the paper this morning. If you subcribe to the paper or purchase it, we suggest that you read this article. If you use links, we suggest you click on it. If you're not reading anything but the excerpt, we think you've got a handle on the basics.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

First, music news.

Carole King's double disc, live CD, The Living Room Tour comes out July 12th. The following week, Carly Simon's Moonlight Serenade comes out. (Simon's is an album of standards.)

I know there are Carly fans in the community (including me), so here's her upcoming appearences:


CNN - People In The News
7/16/05 - 5 PM
7/17/05 - 5 AM
7/17/05 - 2 PM
7/17/05 - 7 PM

(Some of the above are rebroadcasts of the same segment.)

ABC's Good Morning America
7/20/05
7/18/05


ABC's The View
7/22/05
7/19/05


CBS's The Early Show
7/27/05
7/20/05

FYI, posts will probably start late tomorrow morning. I'm not in a great mood currently because we just lost "Five Books, Five Minutes." In publishing, it just wiped out. Right now no one's in the mood to attempt to recreate it. If we do, it will be another all nighter. If we don't, I'm honestly in the mood to sleep in for a change.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

It's Saturday afternoon and there's an entry going up here! What???????

Yes, I'm working with The Third Estate Sunday Review. We're on our first break. And this entry could have gone up Friday but I was too tired and this will provide an entry for those who feel this site goes dead on Saturday evenings. This is a link fest of items members sent it. [Note: The linkfest does not happen. I'll leave this in because I'm pressed for time and also it underscores that these are rough drafts.]

We'll start with The Daily Howler which Stephanie sent in. This is Friday's Daily Howler (which wasn't up in time to make it into the Democracy Now! post) where Bob Somerby is addressing standardized testing as well as the fright wing. We'll excerpt from the critique of the fright wing:

GO BACK TO ARUBA: Last night, Joe Scarborough was plenty upset about those London bombings. Indeed, he offered a "special edition of Scarborough Country"--and quickly began to let us know who was at fault for this mess. For his first guest, he brought in "terror expert Steve Emerson." And he began to lay out his great thesis:
SCARBOROUGH (7/7/05): Now let's bring in terror expert Steve Emerson. Steve, you know what? You listen to Kelly [O'Donnell]'s report, you see what they're, they're concentrating on at the G8 conference--I understand anti-terrorism hardly made the list of the agenda of the eight most powerful leaders in the world.
Have we taken our eyes off the ball again on terrorism and instead focusing on things that aren't as important? Have we "taken our eyes off the ball again?" Have we begun "focusing on things that aren't as important?" These were superlative question for this host to ask. Sadly, here was his list of segments from the previous evening. On that program, he had started with: "Tonight's top headline--outrage in Aruba, as protesters target Natalee Holloway's mother!"
Full list of segments on Scarborough Country--July 6, 2005:
*Interview with NBC’s Ron Blome in Aruba.
*Bullying interview with John Merryweather, former Aruban diplomat.
*Interview with Linda Allison, aunt of Natalee Holloway.
*Interview with Paul Reynolds, uncle of Natalee Holloway. (The program was now half over.)*Interview with Tim Miller, who is searching for Natalee Holloway in Aruba.
*Video clip of Steven Groene, speaking about his kidnapped daughter, Shasta Groene.
*Interview with "legal expert" Stacey Honowitz about the Shasta Groene matter.
*Interview with Bernie Goldberg about his latest liberal-bashing book.
*Live pictures of Hurricane Dennis.
That was it. More than half the program came from Aruba, where Scarborough has been rubbing his thighs every night since June 1. None of the program concerned hard news. But one night later, Scarborough closed his special edition by letting us know who's been failing the country. Our question: Is there a way to be more phony? Has anyone ever achieved it?

Bob Somerby's also addressing the standardized tests. Hopefully, we'll grab from that tomorrow but when Somerby's critiques are to the point and humorous, I can't resist highlighting them.

They also bring up an issue that two members e-mailed about. Should we speak of the bombings or do a breather? That issue was raised Thursday. Obviously, it's one I ignored. One of the two even wondered if Pru's statement (wondered ahead of time, when it was noted Thursday morning that she was working on one) should go up?

Absolutely we should weigh in. The other side was going to try to make political hay out of it.
And they were going to do their usual distortions.

I don't know that on an issue like this we hold our tongues. Others may feel differently. That's their right. But as Somerby notes, Joe Scars wasn't holding his breath and counting to ten. That's, my opinion, how we lose out. We don't make our case early on. When we do make it, the fright wing's already got their own spin out there and we're left with responding to it.

If someone wants to clutch the pearls and say, "No, no, no! We must not talk about this!" That's their business and they don't have to come here while we do. (Or ever, if they don't feel like it.) But waiting on the sidelines doesn't accomplish much. It does allow the echo chamber to get their talking points out and stake dominance to how the story will be told.

When Susan Sontag wrote her brief essay (three paragraphs?) for The New Yorker, there was nothing wrong with those paragraphs. She was making the point that we needed to be rational.
(Which is why she said " Let's by all means grieve together. But let's not be stupid together." And shame on The New Yorker for pulling that essay.) But if we're not stupid, if we're not a blubbering mass of fear and uncritical emotion, we can't be manipulated?

Oh, wait, we don't want to be manipulated. Right? So why did some join in the attacks at the time (some from the left or "left") and even a year or so later some felt the need to draw a line between themselves and Sontag's reasoned comments? (Cowardice is my bet. And one certain overly hyped, majorly disappointing book that wants to make it into the left cannon will always haunt the author who presents as an intellectual but revealed cowardice, when strength was needed, by distancing himself from Sontag over a year after the essay was published.)

The fright wing went into overdrive. Here was an intellectual critiquing the immediate coverage -- coverage which did nothing but appeal to fear and make you feel powerless (which works well with the desire on the part of some for the "Tough Daddy"). The coverage was awful with few exceptions. A psychologist told me at the time that the smartest thing anyone could do would be to turn off their TV.

There was Sontag, while we were supposed to rally around fear and the Bully Boy and the inane and incessant coverage that told you nothing but appealed to your emotions by rerunning the attacks endlessly, making an argument for rational thought.

The Bully Boy couldn't take us to where he did if we'd thought rationally. So shut her down, came the cry and it's shocking how many chose to participate in that. (Including some on the left.) Pru's statement is something I applaud. And it should have been how we responded. The Toby Keiths want to portray this image of how "tough" America is.

We didn't see a lot of strength or thought in mindless responses (or in Bully Boy playing Bunny Fu Fu scampering around the nation that day). We saw a lot of "Oh my Gods!" (Ani DiFranco's "Self Evident" is a track worth listening to). We saw a lot of people running scared. And the media aided that. They pushed every false rumor they could.

This wasn't America grieving from strength, this was America showing the worst traits of a daytime TV talk show.

Maybe it's a myth (I'm not old enough to have lived through it) but the response to Pearl Harbor, as I understand it, was to grieve, to show strength and to use your mind. Almost sixty years later, the fright wing pushed us into being soft, stupid and scared. Instead of an approach that said the attacks were awful but we will get through, we went into non-stop feelings checks. Blubbering around the clock, whimpering. If they were the Greatest Generation, they certainly put us to shame because we didn't possess (as a nation) the rational thought or the quiet strength to take in the events.

And the clampdown ensured all that followed. On the right, they attacked anyone offering some perspective or urging strength in a hideous time. On the left, we saw a lot of wimps who felt that nothing should be said because "we're in mourning." (We weren't mourning. A day of grief, a national day of grief, might have helped us. Constant scare tactics and appeals to base emotion did nothing to help us. And shouldn't be mistaken for mourning which requires something far less superficial.)

So the notion that we'd be part of the clampdown here is a false one. We won't do that. We won't look to the Toby Keiths to put the idiotic into song and lead us further into unthinking.

We could have used more Jewel in the immediate aftermath and far less "Oh my God!"s. I'm speaking of her song "Hands" (off Spirit):


If I could tell the world just one thing
It would be that we're all OK
And not to worry 'cause worry is wasteful
And useless in times like these
I won't be made useless
I won't be idle with despair
I will gather myself around my faith
For light does the darkness most fear
My hands are small, I know
But they're not yours, they are my own
But they're not yours, they are my own
And I am never broken

We were broken because we allowed ourselves to be. We allowed ourselves to be scared children looking for "Tough Daddy" to come in and make everything better.

And we turned on our TVs and listened and watched day after day there was no new information offered, only heated rhetoric. Sucking up to the nipple of the 24/7 news feed that offers not news but sensation (and "footage"), we were reduced to something far worse than the right can ever accuse the left of doing, wanting or seeking. The right controlled the media, they controlled the message. (Assisted by "moderates.") The fact that we were reduced as a nation to a bunch of cowering children reflects how damaging they are. But they're a fear based people. They leave in fear of the boogey man that's always out there. Maybe it's Communism, maybe it's feminism, maybe it's gays and lesbians, but they need their straw man and they need to believe, really believe, in that straw man. And they need to believe that the entire world is out to get them and that only they (via their whimpering apparently) can save us.

They can't save us. We could have used some tough talk. Tough talks not "kick some ass!" Tough talk is, "This was horrible, but look around you, the country's still here. Grieve, but know we're still here and we made it through."

Instead it was "the next attack might" which quickly lost a qualifier because there was no "might" there was only constant fear.

There were people who lost loved ones. And they should have been acknowledged, no question. There were also a lot of "people in the street" who didn't know the first thing they were talking about but wanted to jump on the fear wagon and our media was happy to present them while shutting down any voice that didn't speak out of fear.

In dark times you need courage and that wasn't to be found. What was it, two, three days later when Bully Boy finally grabs a bull horn and tries to grandstand? That is and was unacceptable.
He is not a great leader, he is the one who went fleeing. When the nation needed him, he was hopping around the country. He was completely useless in a time of crisis.

And "logic" of "Oh, well he had to be protected" falls apart not just because there was nothing to be protected from during his Bunny Fu Fu play. It also falls apart because guess what? George W. Bush is not our king. The safety of the person is not as important as the role he was supposed to be filling. He wanted the title, he used every trick he could to get it (in court and out). But when he had it, he didn't use it in a time of crisis to do what a real president does. He used it to protect his own ass.

We don't elect someone to the position of Protect Your Own Ass. We elect them to the position of President and they're supposed to provide leadership. That is their role. He provided none.
His actions were shameful. And a far cry from the tales we're told of an earlier George who held the position. (I'm referring to Washington, not Poppy.)

As he scampered around the nation his actions furthered the fear. And we saw attacks on anyone who called Bully Boy's actions for what they were, blatant cowardice. The Tough Guy, the Big Man, couldn't do what a leader does which is lead the nation. He could only flee. Repeatedly.

And Woody can churn out all the dime store psychology books he has in him (an apparent reservoir that will never dry out) and speak of nonsense like "calicium of the backbone" but the reality is there was no backbone in the Bully Boy. History should make that point plainfully clear.

After the nonstop mocking of Bill Clinton's "I feel your pain" (an acknowledgement, not a wallowing in despair) there was no mocking of the coward who couldn't even address the nation as a rational adult. There should have been. There damn well should have been.

And what nonsense did we get with the London attacks? Idiots saying it was time to rally around the Bully Boy once again. Why is that?

Every damn thing in the world that happens does not just to happen to the Bully Boy. He is not our king. He needs to do his damn job. (That'll be the day.) He is our elected official (make that "elected") and he is there to do a job, to work for us. A lot of us seem to have forgotten that.

We live in a country without royal titles (though notice the hacks that grab them up when they visit foreign countries and ask yourself how they can still get away with claiming to be "patriots" -- yeah, it's just an "honorary" title and it goes completely against what this nation is supposed to stand for). In America, respect is supposed to be earned not granted by royal decree.

But the wack jobs will rush in to suck up to power and to betray the people -- we the people hold the actual power. So to suggest that we should ever lay off remarks out of "respect" . . . What happened in London happened in London. Why it happened goes beyond London and rational adults are allowed to note that we aren't any safer as a result of occupying Iraq.

We're allowed to point out that the fly paper argument is as ludicrous as it always sounded. And we're allowed to say that a strutting bantam rooster isn't a leader no matter how Woody pimps Bully Boy At War or other pundits rush in and obscure what was obvious to our own eyes.

When we were attacked, the national dialgoue was reduced to a never ending feelings check, with highs and lows cited (highs usually created by the likes of Peggy Noonan, out of thin air, with remarks of the manly nature of her pin up that had no basis in reality).

If you're a domestic member (or visitor), this is your country. Act like it. Don't bite your damn tongue for fear of being called names. Use your free speech. And if for some reason you're watching the likes of Joey Scars (not a slapdown to Somerby, he watches all that junk to critique it and let you know the lies that are being shaped), watch with a brain -- an active one, a critical one.

Somerby's showing us that yet again when a tragedy strikes, the fright wing's not interested in "healing the nation." They're interested in spinning and lying. Demonizing the left. And they'll offer any lie to make the point (over and over in their echo chamber). Now the G8 is the great left summit! Weeks ago it was knock the protestors as the "looney left" but now the G8 itself is evidence of the "looney left." They move the goal post every damn time and if you're silent, you're not just letting them do that, you're helping them do that.

Actions have consequences. And we're on year five where the fright wings denies that in terms of their Bully Boy. They'll go into overdrive creating scapegoats to try to prevent people from realizing what is going on. So self-styled moderates need to realize they're acting like appeasers, not rational, thinking beings. (And yes, I'm thinking of an idiot on the Times' op-ed pages.) "Don't say anything critical in this time" might be good manners at a funeral, it's no way to run a country. (It can, however, ruin a country.) Democracy means participation so when the gatekeepers of moderation start tut-tutting remember they can preach from on high only because they're heads are so full of hot air that they naturally float up there. (That's not a cloud they're resting on, it's their own giant egos.)

The nation, the world, needs more critical thought, not less. And the echo chamber of the fright wing never stops, never pauses. It's endlessly vomitting out distortions and lies. Telling someone to be silent in the face of that is not only idiotic, it's undemocratic.

We'll close with Pru's words which are wise and which I support one-hundred percent. (And obviously this didn't turn out into the link fest I'd planned. Hopefully, I'll pick up the other things members wanted to call attention to in a later post, on another break. A hope, not a promise.) While some were playing Tiger Beat and trying to figure out if Tony Blair's emtpy words meant "we love him now" or not (I'm not making that nonsense up, which sadly came from the left, but I won't provide a link to it), Pru wasn't trying to shut off the thought process.

Pru on the bombings:
Pru: Maybe we're better informed by our media? Maybe our proximity and awareness of other nations prepared us? While yesterday's attacks were nothing like the attacks on the United States on September 11th in terms of scope or damage, they were attacks none the less. We, as a country, have suffered a great loss.
But as I looked around yesterday, I saw grief that was mature and reasoned. There was no need to question, "Why us?" It's perfectly obvious why us. We have engaged with and supported the policies of the United States not limited to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. This has been done despite the large objection coming from the people of our country and despite the fact that the objection has only grown as we have been confronted with the reality that there is no "win" in Iraq, not for us, not for the States.
"Why us" does not trip off our tongues because the answer is obvious and frightening.
Equally obvious has been the answer which is that we must pull out of the illegal occupation. Thursday's events make that quite clear and, all around me, that was the sentiment most often shared.
Prime Minister Tony Blair did not shirk the way the Bully Boy did. He was present and accounted for. However, what he had to offer were empty words that, while more eloquent than anything that tumbles out of the Bully Boy's smirking mouth, said very little. Terrorist attacks. Check. Empty words supposed to warm us. Check. The reasons for the attack? Silence.
All around I heard people asking the hard questions and supplying the tough answers that the Prime Minister refused to address. We've grown to expect that from him and there is a sense among some that what is in the best interest of England is not the primary concern of our current Prime Minister.
There was also a sense that for all his posturing and playing poodle to the Bully Boy, Prime Minister Blair has done very little that has truly protected our country. Possibly there is no way to protect one from the events of today; however, Prime Minister Blair has asked for outlandish powers and even those granted him have been ineffective as was demonstrated before our own eyes.
We are a determined people and the determination we share now is not one of vengeance but one of addressing the events that led to the attacks. What Prime Minister Blair clearly wishes to avoid is not being ignored by the people of my country. Our determination to withdraw from the Bully Boy's illegal war of choice has only grown stronger.H
earing reports that the insect known as Fox News in the United States was bragging that the attacks had taught us something caused me to recoil. Then I realized that they were correct about the teaching, just incorrect about the lesson itself. What it has taught us, the lesson, is what we already knew: an illegal war of choice leaves us all at risk, an illegal occupation that provides the window dressings of success but no real improvement is as meaningless as any words our Prime Minister could muster. The lesson confirmed what we already knew. The occupation must end and troops must withdraw. Until that happens safety is a myth that will destroy us all.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

BuzzFlash has a new interview with Joseph Wilson (husband of Valerie Plame). Here's an excerpt:

BuzzFlash: Again, let's put aside the legal investigation for the time being. At the time that this became an issue -- due to David Corn's reporting and repeated editorials on BuzzFlash -- Bush demurred from taking any personal action to find out who on his staff endangered national security. For two years, whoever did this has presumably still been working at the White House. Hasn't Bush left us vulnerable, by having senior administration officials still on staff, who betrayed the citizens of the United States of America? Hasn't this made possible another potential security breach? Couldn't Bush just have called his senior staff into his office and said: "I have taken a solemn oath to protect every American. Whoever did this, come forward, you're fired"?
Ambassador Joe Wilson: I have made the same arguments repeatedly, most recently in my statement yesterday. We are where we are because of the culture of unaccountability that is pervasive in the White House. The President must assume responsibility.

Let's emphasize something again:

BuzzFlash: Again, let's put aside the legal investigation for the time being. At the time that this became an issue -- due to David Corn's reporting and repeated editorials on BuzzFlash -- Bush demurred from taking any personal action to find out who on his staff endangered national security.

Throughout the Plame (and Miller) entries, I've repeatedly credited David Corn (who deserves credit). I have not credited BuzzFlash. Why is that? I'm a moron more often than not. I'm a print reader and more likely to register (in terms of credit) what I'm holding in my hands. My apologies to BuzzFlash because I seriously doubt they've ever received the credit that they deserve here. As a BuzzFlash reader, there's no question that I saw their coverage on it. My apologies for not remembering it. Or for even noting that via links, they steered their readers to this topic by noting every story (big or small) on this topic. You couldn't be a BuzzFlash reader and not know something was happening from their headlines alone, even if you didn't click the links.

If they were a newspaper, their coverage would be termed flooding the zone because consistently for two years, they've followed this story. That's via their own contributions and links. Hopefully anyone else noting the driving forces behind this story noted their accomplishments and efforts. But I didn't. Their efforts kept the story alive and kept people informed. They've earned a piece of the bragging rights on this story as much as David Corn and my apologies to them for not noting it (or remembering it until I read the e-mail Dallas just sent). The Times would call this a FOR THE RECORD CORRECTION.

Note that at the bottom of the interview is Wilson's statement on Judith Miller.

Click here for their 2004 interview with Wilson. Click here for their July 23, 2003 editorial "Some Dare Call It Treason."


And we'll quote from their October 1, 2003 editorial " How Do You Parse Treason?" because Dallas picked it as his favorite on the topic:

In July, we were proud to pick up on David Corn's commentary in "The Nation," which was the first piece to identify the significance of the July 14th Bob "I Am the Spigot for Karl Rove Leaks" Novak column [LINK]. BuzzFlash immediately contacted Corn and wrote two scathing editorials, "Some Dare Call It Treason" [LINK] on July 21st, and "The Integrity and Dignity of the White House Become a Scum Pond of Betrayals and Gutter Smears Under Bush," [LINK] on July 23rd.
In the July 21st BuzzFlash editorial, we were the first to support Corn's outrage at how the White House had betrayed the nation and our national security. Despite Robert Novak's attempts to backpedal now with "parsing language" about how he was leaked or the damage done by the leak, remember this: Whatever comes out of Novak's mouth is what Rove wants him to spin.
Also remember this: Valerie Plame, the CIA operative who was outed by the White House with the assistance of Robert Novak -- as we pointed out in our July 21st article -- specialized in tracking the illegal trafficking in Weapons of Mass Destruction! This is the perverse, horrifying truth. We were led into a war on the trumped up lies that Saddam Hussein had WMDs and then two senior administration officials -- one of them assumed to be Karl Rove by almost anyone with knowledge of the White House -- render a CIA operative virtually useless -- and her specialty is finding out who is buying, selling and trading WMDs. And her outing by senior Bush administration officials, in all likelihood, ruined her network of contacts and put her and her contacts at risk. She was, allegedly, operating "under cover" in what would be perceived as a non-CIA affiliated position.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]

From the Air America Radio home page, here's the weekend lineup:


So What Else is News
Saturdays 3pm-5pm ET
Guest: Dr. James Rosser, the creator of a video game that trains real-life surgeons.

Ring of Fire
Saturdays 5pm-7pm ET.
Journalist Wayne Madsen discusses the noose of truth closing around Karl Rove's neck. David Brock of Media Matters delivers the "top ten" stories the media have slept through in the past five years, and corporate watchdog Robert Weissman examines the verdicts of high-profile white-collar crime cases.

The Laura Flanders Show
Saturdays and Sundays 7pm-10pm ET
The Young Turks fill in for the Laura Flanders Show. This group of three is a funny, smart, irreverent and entertaining look at politics, sex, news, pop culture, current affairs and personal stories. As they say, "We Don't Make the News, We Make the News Sexy."

The Kyle Jason Show
Saturdays 10pm-Midnight ET

Ecotalk
Sundays 7-8 am ET
Dr. Michael Dorsey shares info about his "G-8 Alternative" conference in Scotland, and Dr. Michael Gelobter discusses sustainable economic and environmental solutions. Talking Point: To what extent did the London tragedy knock the environment off the agenda?

Mother Jones Radio
Sundays 1pm-2pm ET
Patty Prickett and journalist Sara Catania discuss whether authorities are doing enough to stop domestic violence. Peter Byrne and the Constitution Project's Joseph N. Onek talk about the Pentagon's rapidly expanding ability to spy on everyday citizens.

Politically Direct
Sundays 2pm-3pm ET
It's a Retrospective Edition this Sunday on Politically Direct. Segments: Massacusetts Congressman Barney Frank, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer, Howard Dean, and Senator Clinton. And Rachel Maddow delivers the latest political buzz...who says Sunday is a day of rest?


Ring of Fire
Rebroadcast Sundays 3pm-5pm ET
Journalist Wayne Madsen discusses the noose of truth closing around Karl Rove's neck. David Brock of Media Matters delivers the "top ten" stories the media have slept through in the past five years, and corporate watchdog Robert Weissman examines the verdicts of high-profile white-collar crime cases.


The Laura Flanders Show
Saturdays and Sundays 7pm-10pm ET
The Young Turks fill in for the Laura Flanders Show. This group of three is a funny, smart, irreverent and entertaining look at politics, sex, news, pop culture, current affairs and personal stories. As they say, "We Don't Make the News, We Make the News Sexy."

The Revolution Starts...Now
Sundays 10pm-11pm ET
Pop critic, musician, and The New Yorker staff writer Sasha Frere-Jones shares his killin’ set-list. Picks include Common, The Disco Four, John Doe, Slint, Mike Jones, and London grime -scene prodigy Lady Sovereign.

On the Real
Sundays 11pm -1 am ET
Guest: Actor Mario Van Peebles.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]
 

When Zach and Shirley saw Rebecca's entry on the e-mails visitors had sent this site, they each e-mailed to say it needed to be commented on here. There was an article in Friday's Times that would have allowed that but Friday morning we were focusing on London. Today, McFadden's article is the most important one in the paper (my opinion as well as that of Kara, Eli and Markus.) (Marcus and Markus are two different members, Susan wondered if I'd made a typo. Many, but that's not been one of them.) (Consider this a companion piece to the entry that just went up.)

I'm picking it up now because Saturday mornings allow for longer discussions and because some members feel Saturdays are slack off days on my part (because I put in time with The Third Estate Sunday Review on Saturdays and often the morning entries are all that goes up).

Miller is responsible for her reporting. She is not, however, responsible for the reporting of others. It's an easy out to act as though Miller persuaded the nation. The Times does have a reach but other papers and TV (and radio) do as well. Making her the fall guy for every bad reporter is letting a lot of people off. Offering that her story, wavied around by Dick Cheney, silenced dissent means you know of a Meet the Press rule that I don't. I'm not aware of any rule that Tim Russert has to operate under which says, "If a guest cites the New York Times, the debate is over."

Miller wrote her stories (and Howell Raines was fine with running them -- some occur under Keller's tenure but the bulk that people complain about are under Raines' tenure). Hold her accountable for them. But she didn't anchor and report for Nightly News. NPR didn't offer up an hour or two to her daily to produce, report and star in The Judith Miller Report. Miller wasn't laughing it up with the weather man on Good Morning America before ttossing to a breaking report, live from D.C., reported by Judith Miller.

I'm not defending her reporting. But there's a tendency to overlook the others involved. I don't know if that results from people being late to criticism of the reporting on the lead up to the war or what. It can't just be a case of "bash the bitch" because there are a number of women who cheerleaded into war and while one now deceased columnist may get a pass since she's no longer around, a lot of the reporters are still around, still on your TV, still on your radio, still in print.

I don't know Leslie Stahl's reporting because outside of 60 Minutes, I really didn't follow CBS news as a viewer. But Stahl's stated she should have been more skeptical. I haven't heard a lot of voices saying that. (And I have no idea how lacking in skepticism Stahl's reporting was.) If the Times had named Miller in the mea culpa, it would have been very easy for every network to turn it into "Miller did it!" I also haven't heard of any network offering a mea culpa of any sort. (Ted Koppel offered a wishy-washy thing on Democracy Now! that didn't cut it for me personally, maybe it did for you. Or maybe it's just that since he read the names of the dead, the American dead, we're all so thrilled that he finally did his job that we're going to overlook all the Nightline reporting?)

And maybe turning it into Miller Time allows us to overlook NBC reporters? Take the rah-rah, getting ready for war, news reporter (male) doing segments about packing a toothbrush! Rah! Rah! Forget the vanity behind that "report," that was time that could have been spent expressing less enthusiasm and asking some hard questions.

In the mainstream there's not a lot of people who's hands are any cleaner than Miller's. Within the Times, she deserves criticism (though she's not the only one at the paper that does). And the Times does have a reach. But the NewsHour needs to take responsibility for their own actions (including Jim Lehr sitting dazed on the sidelines when a former general attacked a guest who offered, in 2003, that Haliburton might be getting paid for work they weren't actually providing -- what was so "shocking" then is hardly news today because we've grown so use to hearing one report after another about the results of Haliburton -- in all it forms -- and their no bid contracts).

NBC fired Peter Arnett. Was that bravery? Ashley Banfield (Ashleigh?) gave a speech criticizing the war reporting that, as the Times reported, led to her being called into "the woodshed." And as soon as her contract was up, she was gone. Was that bravery?

Blame Miller for what she did, absolutely, but let go of the fantasy that Miller was somehow unique or alone in the coverage. A reporter (on TV, radio or print) can't offer up, "I said 'The New York Times' is reporting!" We're a resource/review here. I could offer that up. But I'm not standing in front of microphone pretending I'm reporting from D.C. If someone wants to endorse a Miller report on TV (and bask in the reflected glory), they're responsible for knowing the report and checking it out. It's not NBC's Nightly Resource/Review. It's NBC's Nightly News.

Miller's "crimes" (bad reporting) were not the "crimes" of one. I also don't believe that Miller went on TV pronouncing "Democrats" as "demoCRATS" as one reporter did (not at Fox) until called on it. And what's Stretch's excuse for trumpeting that the administration was saying Paul O'Neill might have stolen documents? I'm sorry, I'd finished the book Sunday (The Price of Loyalty). Stretch reported Monday. Granted the book wasn't due out until Tuesday but if I could get a hold of an advanced copy (and I did), Stretch and NBC could as well.

And it wouldn't have required anyone reading the entire book. They only would have had to make it to the second page of text (viii of the author's note) to read:

That was just the start. In March, O'Neill approached his former colleagues at the Treasury Department for what he insisted was his due: copies of every document that had crossed his desk. One day, as he was leaving Washington for Pittsburgh, he passed me a few unopened CD-ROMs. "This is what they gave me," he said. . .

Stretch couldn't tell you that because he hadn't done the work. Seems like with the charge the adminstration was making (no surprise, a later investigation found O'Neill innocent of the charges), he might have wanted to get O'Neill's side. (Katie Couric was left to mop up after Stretch the following day in an interview with Ron Suskind and Paul O'Neill.)

I won't disagree that Miller benefitted from the system (a lazy one) but she wasn't the only one.

And the character assinations (on Scott Ritter, on Susan Sontag, on Paul O'Neill, on Richard Clarke, etc.) were successful because a lot of people ran with them. (Miller supposedly had Ritter blackballed from the Times. Whether that's true or not, I don't know; however, since we're speaking of this topic, it should be noted.) Everytime a Dixie Chick was trashed, it made it that much harder for others to speak out.

The administration operates under intimidation and bullying (hence, the Bully Boy). But it took a lot of meek reporters and sycophants to allow that to happen.

If you missed Poppy's televised interview around the time of the RNC convention, he had no kind words for the Times. (Unless you consider his plea to Maureen Dowd to come back into the fold, kind words.) The Timid has bent to the administration. It didn't win them any love letters. (Which is why they long ago should have stopped trying if only for selfish reasons.)

What they're doing now (they being the Times and Miller) is standing up for reporting. Regardless of their motives (which I don't know) this can have an effect. Some other paper can say, "Hey, the Times stood up." Or a reporter at the Times can argue that the cuts go back into the article with, "Well do we believe what we argued in court or was that just a bunch of hot air?"

Regardless of their reasons, they took a stand and it's one I personally support.

The visitors who e-mailed claiming "Now Karl's going to walk!" That presumes he would be convicted of something in the first place. But let's say he would be. Let's say if Miller testified, he'd be thrown in prison. I don't think the whole world depends on Miller. Fitzgerald seems to have a number of witnesses who claim to be reporters. And if it's a choice between Rove going to prison or the principle of a free press, I'll go with free speech. Rove's not that all powerful. If he were, Bully Boy wouldn't have had to constantly call in Karen Hughes during her "I'm going back to Texas with my family" period. Like Betsy Wright before her, Hughes becomes a footnote in the narrative's thrust to maintain the importance of the males involved. (If Hughes' power is news to you, read Laura Flander's Bushwomen.)

Rove's slimey and he trips himself up. The fact that he's been fingered (by Lawrence O'Donnell who drove the story, not Cooper) tarnishes him in a way that could bring him down (without a trial, without a conviction). But that would require making him the focus of rage and not Miller.

Among others, Fitzgerald has reporters from Time, the Washington Post and a goodly segment of NBC. If he can't make a case yet, that says more about him than it does about Miller.

It's working out nicely for Rove, this anger and frustration at Miller. It certainly detracts from what he allegedly did. Now you don't suppose that's why the New York Post attacked Miller, do you?

The Times should have front paged Robert D. McFadden's article. It's buried on page A10. It's important and part of the debate that should be going on re: Miller. FAIR's included news such as this in their argument. They argue that there are legitimate whistle blowers and they should always be protected. Visitors show up and want to e-mail, "You don't realize that she's putting free speech at risk!" Which demonstrates that not only did they misread the one entry they're responding to, they also missed all the entries where we outlined that.

It is a risky stance. She's decided to take it and so has the paper. There's rarely a perfect case that presents itself in real time. But if Miller and the paper are willing to defend the right of the press, I'm going to go along with them. No one else has to but unless you want me to chuckle, or marvel over your abilities to use the f-word as noun, verb, direct object, adverb and God knows what else, you're wasting time with your e-mails. And visitors who think I'm crushed at the thought that they might not ever come back have mistaken this site for one of the many cowardly newspapers that buckles under any criticism.

This site generates no revenues. It was started as a place to address issues (mainly about the war) that weren't being noted elsewhere. (By elsewhere, I'm not slamming any blog. I'm blog ignorant. Then more so than now but still blog ignorant.) I'd say what I usually said in a speech. (And have posted sections from speeches, which is how Jim, The Third Estate Sunday Review, recognized me when I was giving a speech he attended.) I'm critical of the press (as should be obvious from any entry) but I was raised to be critical of it and to expect a great deal from it. (More than it can probably give in the real world but also more than it's given in the last decade.)

Starting out, I thought I'd Daniel Okrent it ("what I wanted to write about") but it quickly became a community (probably further evidence that I'm blog ignorant and that what it became papered over some of my many blog flaws -- though not all, I'm sure). Early on readers became members because they took this site as their own. Suggestions, requests, links, they weren't hestitant (then or now) to make known what they were interested in.

Today, a member e-mailed asking about advice for starting a blog. I told the person that if I were starting up today, I'd probably just be a smart mouth full time. That would allow for readers, not members, and we'd never have to get too heavy. (And I wouldn't stay awake, as I did Thursday, until I heard from our last member in England.)

If every visitor walked, it wouldn't hurt my feelings or cause me to worry. We don't have a site meter and I'm truly not concerned with "hits."

Though I wouldn't rejoice over it, I'm also not worried if members walked.

I value members e-mails and really regret that I don't have time to reply to them all personally.
But the community's far larger than anything I expected.

When I offered my objections to Dexter Filkins' November reporting (the now "award winning reporting"), the objections of some visitors didn't make me back off that stance. This has never been done to make money or to get "exposure."

This isn't to get a job in print as some suggested in e-mails. I could have that out of college and didn't take it then. (Nor am I suited for it. I would add "or talented for it" but I think there are a lot of people of little talent working in the print medium so that doesn't seem to be a hinderance of any kind.)

Those who are convinced that my support of Miller's legal battled is an attempt to land an offer at the Times have apparently not noticed the quality of rought drafts here (poor -- I'm speaking of mine, not members' posts). They also are under some assumption that the Times is going to see one defense of a stand that I believe in as more important than all the mockery that's gone on here.

I've refused private contact with people of the Times (or anyone else I comment on*). Which meant asking Dallas to be the in between on informing Felicity Barringer of the post where I attempted to offer her reasons for her article (without revealing who she was or what she wrote) as well as my own. (Dallas also contacted the one angry that Love in the Greenzone gossip hadn't translated to easy treatment here. Only Barringer gave permission to be quoted.) (And Love in the Greenzone rumors wouldn't have made it up here. The reporters remarks about how their article was savaged unfairly would have.)

I haven't traded "access" for treatment of anyone.


I think that covers all the topics Rebecca posted on. If I forgot something, Shirley and/or Zach, let me know.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

[*We do have members who are journalists including Professional Journalist who disclosed in this space that he works for the Wash Post. They aren't highlighted by me. I also avoid highlighting reporters I know. Or in the case of Anthony Lappe, people whose family I know. And I read a really strong piece at Guerilla News Network today and was hoping someone would e-mail on it. No one did, so it didn't go up here. We do highlight Tom Hayden and I've disclosed that I know him. Considering the efforts of some to distance themselves from him -- due to the call for an immediate withdrawal -- I frankly don't give a damn that we've highlighted him. We've also highlighted Jane Fonda who's not a reporter but I mention that because Martha asked, "Has Monster-In-Law crossed 80 million yet?" It did so last weekend. No, it's not a "bomb." Yes, Martha, people would like to work that "fact" because of their own hatred of Fonda. And it's conventional wisdom so unsuspecting people may end up repeating it. It isn't, however, reality. As Mike pointed out, it's the second highest moneymaker Jennifer Lopez has appeared in -- live action. Worldwide, it's at over 92 million. The film was a hit. Not a recouper, a hit. In a summer that's seen only five live action films cross the one hundred million mark, 80 million looks pretty damn good. And as Martha noted in her e-mail, we're talking about a film that's three stars include a woman over sixty, a Hispanic lead and an African-American lead -- Wanda Sykes. Martha wondered how it ranked next to Steel Magnolias which was the last film she could remember with mulitple females in lead roles. It's three million behind Steel Magnolias currently. It's a hit and in a summer -- the Times was right on their prediction here and I was wrong -- that's depressed and depressing for the movie industry, people should know the box office before dubbing it "a bomb." Universal would be dancing in the street if Cinderella Man had done eighty million. Even with an idiot trying to grab publicity for himself by refusing to exhibit the film, Monster-in-Law proved that Fonda is bankable and that for all the nonsense from the anti-Fonda set, she will not drive paying customers away. And believe it or not, that was a worry for some. The same nonsense of "too controversial" that Fun With Dick & Jane had to earlier put to rest. If she wants to, if she wants to, she can make additional films. The myth of protests and and five million tops, the threats of boycotts were proven to be the voice of a small minority -- as has always been the case but certain types can get skittish. Polling demonstrated that Fonda's presence positively impacted the film. If she makes this her final film, it will be her choice not something imposed upon her and she will be able to say she went out a hit. And went out as a lead, not a supporting player. As she, and others like Barbra Streisand, broke down the age barriers for leading women in the late seventies and early eighties, she's blazed a trail yet again.]

[Note: This entry originally appeared at The Common Ills.]