bully boy will scare the hell out of you, mike will make you laugh

AMY GOODMAN: We talk to the watched, Jeff Kerr, General Counsel and Director of Corporate Affairs of PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals; Matt Daloisio of the New York Catholic Worker; and John Passacantando of Greenpeace USA, he’s the Executive Director. Let’s begin with John Passacantando; what do you know about what they know about you?
JOHN PASSACANTANDO: Well, good morning, Amy. We know that the F.B.I., since January 1, 2000, gathered approximately 2,400 pages of information on Greenpeace. This is everything from copies of web pages to reports by corporate-funded think tanks doing analysis of Greenpeace; it's clippings; it's write ups of protests, peaceful protests that we have engaged in; and that's about half of it. The other half of it has been redacted. It's blanked-out pages. So you can't tell if there's eavesdropping. You cannot tell if there's intercepted email traffic. You simply can’t tell; you get multiple boxes of photocopied paper, and only half of them actually have the print still on them.
AMY GOODMAN: Jeff Kerr, you're with PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. We have been looking at documents that are almost fully redacted, except for the name of PETA.
JEFF KERR: Good morning, Amy. Yes, you're right. What the documents show, as far as we can tell, is a gross abuse of power and a waste of resources, as the F.B.I. investigates and infiltrates an organization that it admits in these documents is a lawful charity engaged in First Amendment-protected free speech activity. It's outrageous, and this kind of secret spying has got to stop.
AMY GOODMAN: What exactly do you understand the F.B.I. has been doing in your case?
JEFF KERR: Well, to the extent we can glean it from the documents, we know they're surveilling speeches on college campuses. We know they have gone to some of our protests on public sidewalks, where people are laying naked in a cage to protest cruelty in the fur trade, and we know that they have harassed and questioned our employees on roadsides, and we know they have gone to their homes and businesses to interview them. There's really just such a wasteful type of threat that comes through this, and one indication in one of the documents, Amy, there's reference made where they accuse us of being actively involved in a campaign against a company that we had protested six years before that and hadn't done anything previously. You know, the American people know the difference between a terrorist and somebody in a chicken suit handing out a leaflet against KFC's practices. But the F.B.I. apparently doesn't seem to know that.
AMY GOODMAN: Matt Daloisio, you're with the New York Catholic Worker. What have you read in the documents?
MATT DALOISIO: From the documents I've seen, it looks like the F.B.I. was concerned with the Los Angeles Catholic Worker and their work around Vandenberg Air Force Base and National Missile Defense. Mostly, it seems just sad that the F.B.I. would use resources to investigate a group that's always open about what we do and take responsibility for what we do and is really based in a faith that believes in the God-given dignity of every human being.
AMY GOODMAN: The documents refer to the Catholic Worker’s semi-communist ideology.
MATT DALOISIO: Yes, I guess if we are against war and working with people who are poor, that makes us semi-communistic.

did you watch democracy now today? if not, you missed a chance to hear, as amy goodman noted, 'the watched' speak. i agree with c.i.'s comments this morning about eric lichtblau and james risen's article. i'm not sure what that article was supposed to do, the headline did say it all. and it's really too bad that they can cover everything but 'the watched.' so to hear 'the watched' you need to go to democracy now's 'New Documents Show FBI Spying on Domestic Activist Groups.' maybe some time the new york times will find an interest in 'the watched'? way, way in the future? till then we'll have to be content to read the headlines like today that told us that the nsa was intercepting domestic calls.

i was surprised that c.i. didn't note a front page article on the strike in nyc so i called about that this morning. c.i. noted juan gonzalez's "Arrogance of the MTA made strike a certainty" which is a strong article. but i call and c.i. asks if i read the editorial? i hadn't.

how embarrassing for the new york times. trashing the labor movement for, among other things, being concerned about their pensions. who's in prison for destroying worker's pensions?
not for running off with the money but to funneling into bad investments (sometimes intentionally)? i'm not thinking of any name.

i'm sure there's some 1 but they aren't a poster boy. (or girl.) the new york times never looked more out of touch on workers than it did today with that hideous editorial. (no link, i don't want to give it traffic.)

here's something else the editorial didn't grasp. if you keep benefits or percentages withheld from a check for the workers in place but change the rules for new 1s, you change the rules.
you also set one group of workers against each other. which is the intent, to weaken the union. and the new york times never cares about a worker, they've made that clear for years.

i could hear the anger in c.i.'s voice when i was asked about the editorial.

i still hadn't expected to be as angry as i was until i read that piece of crap.

i'm focusing on governmental spying these days but that editorial angered me so a comment was required.

so let's talk about what we know today. (and you can check out c.i., elaine and mike for more on this and, i'm sure, wally as well.) we know that a judge stepped down:

Surveillance Court Judge Resigns in Protest of Bush Spy Program
This news on the Bush administration's domestic espionage program: the Washington Post is reporting a judge has resigned from the country's top spy court in protest of the secret program in which the National Security Agency has eavesdropped on Americans without court-approved warrants. U.S. District Judge James Robertson, one of 11 members of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, submitted his resignation Monday. The court is regarded as the only authority to authorize wire-taps for domestic espionage.

why do you think that happened?

could it be that bully boy overstepped and violated the constitution? yes, i think it could be.

high crimes? i think so. if we controlled the house, we'd be bringing charges of impeachment against the bully boy.

i want to note something mike wrote yesterday because c.i. and i were talking about how funny it is. he notes a news headline from democracy now and then offers a sarcastic take on the news:

Documents Show FBI Agents Tracked PETA For Years
According to the Washington Post, the documents offer no proof of PETA's involvement in illegal activity. But more than 100 pages of heavily censored FBI files show the agency used secret informants and tracked the group's events for years. The FBI also monitored political activities on college campuses. One FBI file included a contact list for students and peace activists who attended a 2002 conference at Stanford University aimed at ending sanctions then in place in Iraq.
Better spy on PETA because Pamela Anderson's gone after KFC! "They are crammed by the tens of thousands into pens. . . . They routinely suffer broken bones from being bred to be top heavy. . . . KFC refuses to do even the bare minimum . . . " It's like a communique from the Weather Underground! (Thanks to Jess for help with that.) We must stop Striparella! We must put the mastermind of V.I.P. beyond bars! If we don't, the terrorists have won!
After many hours carefully studying the Pamela Anderson Lee & Tommy Lee tape, J-Ass has detected many things that raised his interest. He passed the tape onto Alberto Gonzales for further study. Gonzales is said to be aroused and passionate by the contents of the tape.Who will save us from Pamela Anderson? Only the Bully Boy!

mike cracked me up but i don't doubt that somewhere there's a republican who will read it and think, 'that guy's right!' missing the point of the sarcasm and the point of the news. that's it for tonight.

democracy now
the common ills
news
like maria said paz
sex and politics and screeds and attitude
patriot act
spying
the daily jot
catholic worker
peta
greenpeace
the catholic worker
pam anderson
pamela anderson
mikey likes it

the outrage is building

so it's tuesday and i'm hearing outrage over bully boy's spying.

i was beginning to wonder how many people were paying attention because if i didn't start the conversation, it wasn't getting covered.

but today, friends visiting brought it up, friends and family calling brought it up.

i think the outrage is building.

we should be outraged. what's been allowed to go on is so against everything we are supposed to stand for.

kat had recommended eurythmic's new greatest hits which is called the ultimate collection.

i'm glad she did. here's something from a song annie lennox and dave stewart wrote:

i've got a light

though it refuses to burn

i've got a life

it ain't over

it ain't over

i've got a way

it's the only thing that's mine

the song's called 'i've got a life' and it's 1 of 2 new songs for this collection.

when i was feeling low today, i'd put this cd on and there's a lot to enjoy.

it's easy to get discouraged because we have known, most of us anyway, that this was going on. we've known it for some time. now it's been confirmed and we know it's much worse than anything we've heard yet. so we look around and wonder where the outrage is? it's building, slowly.

but it's important to keep the pressure on.

we need to be getting the word out on this.

while the shock is still out there.

this isn't just a left issue for every 1 on the right. shock jocks and others will act like it is but this is exactly why some conservatives were hesitatnt to vote for the bully boy.

they feared the sort of actions that we now know the administration regularly engages in.

in our community c.i.'s staying on this topic as are elaine, mike and wally. that's because this is an important issue. under bully boy, the government thinks it can spy on you for any reason and they're not prepared to go to the fisa courts for a warrent.

we should be outraged. there are rules and laws the rest of us need to abide by and then there's bully boy who seems to think that he's immune to the rules. (and prosecution.)
so we should be outraged that he's now resorting, again, to his 'with us or without us."

he didn't take an oath to represent half the country. he did take an oath to uphold the constitution and that's not being done. we should all be alremed.

time to open your eyes and find your voice

a lot is going on these days. i hope everyone read c.i.'s 'NYT: Raymond Bonner on Guantanamo Detainee, Linda Greenhouse on Jose Padilla's case.' we are torturing. we are what we accuse others of being.

bully boy's spying on us. he thinks that's okay. he's spent today and yesterday and saturday full of himself and how he's protecting the nation ... by destroying what we stand for.

maybe you caught the war lust the bully boy had when he was raving after 9/11 (several days after) and you thought, 'well this is what we have to do.'

why did you think that?

to save the country?

so how do you justify what's going on now?

how is the country being saved when everything we stand for is being twisted and perverted?

the nsa has been spying on american citizens. bully boy could have tried for a fisa warrent which rarely refuse to grant a warrent. that wasn't the route he wanted to take.

no legal route for the bully boy.

he'd prefer to just grab powers that don't exist.

he's perverted our nation.

we're supposed to stand for freedom but every move the bully boy makes is an attempt to take away another freedom.

john dean's must read book called it 'worse than watergate.'

how much more do we have to witness before we realize dean got it right?

the opposition party has flinched at the sight of their own shadow. they are only now beginning to find their voices.

now is not the time to be silent. now is not to the time to prop up your silence with 'no 1 knows what i believe.' it's time to speak out loudly.

this is our nation that's at stake.

if you're not using your voice and objecting to this latest assault on our freedoms, than you are not doing anything but wasting people's time.

it really is that simple.

if you watched democracy now today, you know that a student, college, was visited by homeland security. the reason he was under suspicion? he attempted to get mao's little red book via interlibrary loan. you can read more about it in gary leupp's counterpunch article.

it's past time for people to open their eyes and find their voices.

goldie and ruth and robert parry

it's the weekend. i'm here.

i'm not sure what to think of saturday blogging. i intended to do it 2 saturdays and then determine what i wanted to do.

i'm going to go ahead and carry it through the month and then decide.

with the reach out i'm doing to attempt to stop the confirmation of alito, there are honestly evenings when i'm too tired. and after 3 or so hours talking about alito, the last thing i want to do is write about him.

(though note, my position on alito is known. i don't shy from expressing it.)

i'm going to note robert parry's "Is Bush Leveling With America?:"

George W. Bush is winning praise from the major U.S. news media for finally leveling with the American people about the difficulties in Iraq. But Bush is still making many of the same false or fuzzy assertions that guided the United States through the first 1,000 days of war.
By refusing to correct or discard these fallacies in four recent speeches and in other comments on Iraq, Bush seems to be holding to an unrealistic course that will lead to an ever-lengthening list of dead American soldiers and Iraqis.
For instance, one of Bush’s favorite arguments continues to be that the U.S. invasion was justified by the goal of imposing democracy on Iraq because "democracies are peaceful countries" -- and, therefore, presumably an Iraq with democratic institutions should become peaceful.
The internal contradiction of this rationale -- from the leader of "the world’s preeminent democracy" which invaded Iraq in 2003 under false premises -- goes unnoticed by the U.S. press corps even though it watched the invasion unfold. In an Orwellian fashion, the news media accepts that Bush’s going to war was evidence of his peaceful intent.
Bush’s notion that democracies are intrinsically "peaceful" is also not supported by history. Democracies as diverse as the United States, France, Great Britain and India have fought wars against neighbors, in colonial possessions or in nations far away -- Vietnam, Mexico, Algeria, South Africa, the Philippines, Cuba and Kashmir, to name a few.
The United States and other powerful democracies also have supported proxy wars in even a longer list of countries. U.S. interventions of various types have touched nearly every country in Latin America and many of the islands of the Caribbean Sea.
War Hysteria Democracies also have shown themselves to be no more immune from war fever than autocratic states, as was demonstrated by the war hysteria that swept the United States in late 2002 and early 2003.
As Bush’s supporters poured French wine into gutters and ran trucks over Dixie Chicks CDs, the U.S. political debate was drowned out by full-throated calls for invading Iraq. Skeptics were largely silenced, often excluded from the major media. Constitutional checks and balances did nothing to slow Bush’s rush to war.

consider that your set up to tomorrow's third estate sunday review because 1 of the books we are going to be discussing is robert parry's fooling america.

that is an important book to me. it's 1 that i've given to friends over the years at christmas time. (i've also given robert parry's other books and enjoy them all but i think this book is overlooked in terms of the other books he's written because when i meet people who've read parry, more often than not, they've never heard of this book.)

the holidays are upon us and many people will gather for new year's eve. when you're around people, i hope you're discussing things that matter. i know my high school readers are taking these conversations into their class rooms. i am glad and i am proud.

goldie e-mailed. she's 15. she's a regular reader. and she's either enjoying her winter break or about to be. she said she takes the issues raised by all of us in the common ills community to her classes. she takes them into the hallways on breaks. she takes them to lunch period.

goldie wrote that i encourage her. no, goldie, you encourage me. you fill with me awe. you're carrying your weight and then some at a time when so many adults are acting like children, you've got a little more on your mind than junk.

goldie credits her mother with getting her to care about the world. she writes that her mother 'is an inspiration' and she must be to have raised such a wonderful, caring and committed young woman.

goldie read what c.i. wrote about talking about the war this week and making it an issue with the people around her and she wanted to comment on it but writes that she wasn't sure she'd sound smart enough.

goldie is more than smart enough and i'll share her comments here. i already shared them with c.i. over the phone this morning and c.i. echoes that goldie, so don't hesitate to share.

1) 'i am already bringing up the war on a regular basis and i read that and thought, "i'm doing all i can do." i was wrong. the plea or challenge forced me to leave the usual groups of people and raise the issue with others. i am really glad i did. a year ago, there was a group of kids in my school that i totally wrote off thinking they just didn't get it. a year ago that was true but today it is not.'

2) 'with people who still do not get it, after i raised the issue with them, i felt good about myself. maybe they haven't been forced to think about but i raised that issue and if they shot me down, some did, they had to deal with the issue for that moment.'

3) 'i had no idea that the mood in my school was so against the war. i told you i read the common ills religiously and that i'm kind of intimidated. my mouth dropped when a girl told me she was so glad i was talking to her about the war because she heard me talking about it in classes all the time and always wanted to say something to me but felt like she wasn't "smart" like me. she is very smart and the sharing we did was probably the best conversation i had. i also ended up with a new friend.'

i hope others talked about the war this week. if you're some 1 like goldie who raises the issue regularly, i hope that, like goldie, you found a way to do even more this week.

we really need to be using our power.

bully boy is addressing the nation tomorrow.

aren't we honored? don't we feel lucky?

he's only speaking because there is shock over his authorizing the nsa to spy on americans. he's in damage control.

but people are waking up to reality.

i want to note ruth's morning edition report because it is as a must read as always. i love ruth. she's compared me to her friend treva before and i take that as a huge compliment.

screech has no customer service skills (are you surprised)

yesterday, i mentioned an e-mail from belinda but didn't go into it. i had some questions about the e-mail and had written belinda back but hadn't heard from her.

she wrote back. this is what she's comfortable with me sharing. she's in 1 of the top 5 ranked, population, cities. companies bring her in to do customer service training. she trains a vareity of people and she was thinking about mike's interview with ryan and how ryan was treated by 'screech.'

she sent me some of her training material today.

belinda kept getting stuck on the comment 'screech' posted in reply to maria's comment. about how the tone was not her kind but the people were coming from a bob dylan site. and what belinda thought about was that 'screech' was acknowledging 1 problem to maria, and only 1, but in her e-mail to ryan, who was the 1 whose feelings got hurt by those people, she can't even mention that.

belinda stressed this point yesterday and today: when your company makes a mistake, you correct it quickly, immediately and express regret over the mistake. she notes that screech didn't do that.

she also notes screech broke the basic rule of customer service:
1) be fair (first come, first serve)
2) prioritize - customers are always your 1st priority
3) give full attention to your current customer

belinda sees that when 'screech' finally wrote ryan, she had already broken the 1st 2 rules by waiting so long to contact him. but what's worse, and belinda thinks this is 1 of the reason's ryan's wife is so upset, she threw #3 out the window.

'give full attention to your current customer'.

she's writing ryan but she's not even acknowledging the problem - how ryan's been hurt. instead, she comes off 'surly and nasty' and some 1 who 'needs to seriously upgrade her people skills.'

belinda: did she ryan as a 'difficult customer'? if so, she didn't follow the basic guidelines there either. she failed miserably and it's rare that you can fail so badly in an attempt to reach out, but she did. if she does have any people skills at all, i'm in doubt, then she wasn't attempting to apologize. she just wanted the last word. that trumped ryan's feelings and the reason she is supposedly writing in the first place. this was an interaction nightmare. she needs to seek out some 1. an analysist, a professional in customer service, some clergy member. but she needs to seek out some 1 and quick. this was a nightmare and it's her fault. i could use this as a test case in training and may well. could you please pass my e-mail to ryan?

i have done that and if he wants to, he will pass his e-mail from 'screech' onto belinda. i agree with her that it was a nightmare. ryan and his wife were obviously very hurt by screech's actions. if any 1 can learn from it, they should. more power to belinda.

so bully boy has no plans to leave iraq. i know that because scotty mclellan was on the tv saying that the elections didn't mean the terrorists would leave. i'll assume scotty was speaking for bully boy and dick cheney.

i'm so tired tonight (a lot of women over tonight and we grabbed stationary and worked on writing our reps to say 'no' on alito) so this will be it for tonight.

questions & connections

sherry wrote early this morning and said 'please let me be the 1st to congratulate you on last night's discussion.'

sherry was the 1st. all the other e-mails were, 'where is the post?'

we had to wait for maria's kids to be down for the night (and we were happy to wait) before we could talk.

the e-mails today, sherry wasn't the only 1, she was just the 1st. i am sorry that it posted late but there was a reason for that and those things will happen.

i enjoyed lance's e-mail. he said he was probably 'slow' and that he was sorry for that but he was finally getting the point about 'war got your tongue.'

lance: it is embarrassing & shameful that some would whether talk about nonsense in a superficial way than talk about something that really matters. and when we're a nation at war it is useless. hearing martha hit that point, i got the editorial.

no reason to apologize lance. sometimes things do come to us slowly.

it's cool.

the important thing is that we make the connections.

if you don't make those connections, then maybe you aren't thinking?

lance was thinking. he figured it out.

that makes him much smarter. and if he decided to do his own blog, you can rest assured he wouldn't be pouring over bad entertainment coverage and then rushing to pull quote it at his site. over and over. repeatedly.

1 thing lance got right away was that it was wrong to demand a correction from kat.

so there's another way lance is ahead.

lance says he's been toying with the idea of doing a blog for about a year now.

lance: if i did, i sure wouldn't think i could stamp my feet for a correction just because comments ended up more interesting than my dull writing.

so lance is obvious smarter than some people.

give it up for lance.

lance asked if was writing later now because i'm doing 'fun or sexy stuff with fly boy?'

we do go out on fridays. he's here during the weekend.

that's enough of each other for right now.

the home i live in wasn't our primary residence. this was our get away place. and when we split up, fly boy asked what we should do. should we split up the 2? sell them both and split the money? i told him i was fine with this 1 if he was fine with our place in the city. i like the ocean. i find this place very peaceful. so that's what we did.

the reason for the later posts is that i am trying to rally everyone i know to get behind stopping alito's nomination.

oops. my readers know who alito is but in case anyone's been stuffing their mind with the cheese at some sites, let's note that he's up for the supreme court. he is not a friend to women. whether it's finding, in the minority opinion, that a young girl can be strip searched because the police suspected a man that she and her mother were with or whether it's belonging to an alumni organization that stands against admitting women to college and ruining the homogenous nature of the old boy's club.

so i've been having women, friends and friends of friends, over most evenings to discuss this and to talk about how we need to stand against alito and any further erosion of reproductive rights.

fly boy is in the picture, he is not the focus of my life. nor am i the focus of his. if we take this any further or continue it, the reason will be because we're both being ourselves. in our marriage we really weren't that. we were like kids playing at what marriage is thought to be.
who gives us those 'instructions'?

pop culture. which is why it's so important that if you 'cover' it, you seriously address it. so few grasp that.

thanks to sherry and lance but to every 1 who wrote. i may note belinda's comments tomorrow but i'm thinking about the dishes and pots and pans that need to be washed and put away and thinking that's got to be taken care of.

maria and martha and me

copyright rebecca winters 2005. rebecca winters retains all rights to this post.

i'm back. i've just finished talking to maria and martha.

here's my transcription.

rebecca: ladies, how are we doing?

martha: cool on my end.

maria: long day. sorry for putting off the call so late but i have to get the kids in bed and down for the night or i would be putting the phone down over and over. i'll probably still have to at some point.

martha: maria, just stop it. we don't have a problem with that. let's talk about what we do have a problem with.

rebecca: which would be a certain woman.

martha: ooh! let's not name her. let's not even give her that. every 1 knows who we're talking about, right?

maria: i think so.

martha: so let's not name her. not to high road it but to make sure she's not given any free promotion.

rebecca: fine by me. so how do we want to start this? i think it starts with maria, right?

maria: well, what are we calling her, the woman?

martha: screech! after the kid on saved by the bell!

maria: okay, screech started it. the back story is that this man wrote something about bob dylan online. another man disagreed with him. and then this whole war went on at that site.
kat wrote about the war. she wrote this thing about how we 'can' have any opinion and like that. it was typical kat.

martha: you got that right! kat writes from the heart.

maria: so after kat writes, the man at the site, distorts kat's words and then provides a link to kat's post which reads like 'hey every 1 beating up on the man who disagreed with me, rush over to here and go after this woman.'

martha: exactly. that's exactly what it looked like.

maria: and i had gone to that site. i had gone to screech's old site.

rebecca: in fact, you were a big fan of screech's.

maria: i had e-mailed web sites trying to get them to link to her, trying to get them to provide a link to things she wrote. i worked that site like crazy. more than i did the common ills because c.i. was in 1 of those 'do not try to get us linked' moods. so i was working screech. 1st at her old site and then at her new site.

rebecca: and you posted at both.

maria: yes, i did. i shouldn't have been an unfamiliar name because i posted a lot at screech's old site and again at her new site. and not a lot of people posted at the new site. at the old site, a lot of women posted. martha posted there too.

martha: i did. i don't think i posted as much as maria though.

maria: so i go to screech's site and make a point of identifying myself as being from the old site. i explain that i do not like what has happened and that at the old site, screech would have already stepped in to get things under control because they were out of control. i explain that i liked kat's writing and that i felt she got slammed. i point out that the quote of her is a distortion.

rebecca: and what didn't you post in your comment?

maria: that the man who wrote the article was demanding a correction from kat. he doesn't have that up there. he doesn't say, 'i'm so mad i'm demanding a correction!' when that's what he's doing and i know about it because of the special round-robin.

rebecca: what happens?

maria: nothing. because my post isn't up there. i check for an hour, refreshing the page over and over. now that's never happened before. not at the old site, not at the new site. and with the language in use, i can't imagine that the previous quotes were 'screened.'

martha: and she e-mailed me about that to ask me if that ever happened to me at screech's old site or the new 1? and i write back, no. because it's never happened.

rebecca: what happens next?

martha: well i want to read what maria wrote. so i go to the site. it's up now. along with a reply from sceech.

rebecca: maria, want to comment on that?

maira: martha copied and pasted it and e-mailed it to me. i didn't see it right away. reading it, my mouth just dropped. she dismissed my opinions, she offers a lame excuse for the comments and she never addresses the issue of the quote being distorted. it was pat the little latina on the head and tell her to move along. it was so patronizing. and she wrote something like 'i would be interested in hearing your comments as a latina woman.'

rebecca: because you said in your post that you didn't feel comfortable sharing your opinions at screech's new site.

maria: and i didn't. at the old site, you had feminists and we could disagree strongly but we could find a way to respect each other. some 1 might really blow up, but she'd come back and she'd say 'i was in a bad mood' or something like that. it was a supportive environment. that's not what was up at screech's new site. and i really took strong offense to her choosing sides especially since she was saying that kat couldn't write as well as the man did. this is feminism?

rebecca: and martha how did you respond?

martha: i was insulted for maria. just reading it, i was insulted on maria's behalf. i was thinking, 'oh no she didn't!' but screech did. so i decide i will write her because i'm thinking screech doesn't know what's going on and i liked screech up to that point. so i write her and i break round-robin rules because the only time i've ever read c.i. mad was that thing where 1 of you guys wrote about something in the round-robin without permission.

rebecca: right. c.i. thinks that's a private conversation and if we're going to write about it, we better have gina and krista's permission and if it's something they put in but didn't do themselves, we better have their permission plus the person we're talking about.

martha: well i broke round-robin. i did tell gina and krista in an e-mail and they were okay with it.

maira: c.i.?

martha: well after i'd written screech, screech wrote back with just her phone number and a requst to call her. but by the time i saw that c.i. had posted 'cut off all contact' and i agreed with that. especially since i'd already broken the round-robin. i wasn't going to make it worse. after that went up, i e-mailed c.i. and said what i'd done and also that i would call later. which i did do?

rebecca: and?

martha: c.i. said if i'd explained it to gina and krista, then it was now with them.

rebecca: right because the point earlier was that c.i. hears from gina about some 1 writing about the round-robin and about something in it and there's no permission from her and krista or from the person, the member, that was written about. c.i. came down hard, and c.i. did come down hard on that, because not only did it happen but after it happened the person made no attempt to contact gina, krista or the member. c.i. felt that point needed to be made and made strongly to protect the round-robin.

martha: well i broke it. i apologized and no 1's mad. every 1's been understanding. and that's because, gina said, i broke it to try to get the truth out regarding kat and to reach out, because i did think screech didn't know what was going on by the way she dismissed maria, so it wasn't a problem.

rebecca: she gave her phone number. did you call her?

martha: not then. not since. i did get asked in an e-mail by jess if i'd been contacted since because he was bothered by an e-mail. i hadn't been. today 2 more e-mails arrived. they were mailed on thursday.

rebecca: woah, this is breaking news. hold it. she e-mailed on thursday. can you pull those up?

martha: yes. the 1st 1 is 21 k. the title's mine 'attention' to her. she didn't change the title in any of her 3 replies.

rebecca: what's the time on this?

martha: 20:42:39.

rebecca: so 8:42. i wish i had ava on the phone. can we take a break and all get back together in 10? there's a point here that may need to be made?

[we take a break.]

rebecca: okay. i wanted to figure out where she was located. i couldn't get ahold of ava. i did get ahold of jess. he states that from her own personal account, which is what she's used to e-mail the common ills since saturday night, right before midnight, she's eastern time. so at 8:42 she wrote you. at that point, the only thing up at the common ills was cut off contact. what she's writing about in her e-mail to you?

martha: the 1st 1 about how all these things are posted. about how 'kat thinks' --

rebecca: cutting you off, just to note kat hadn't posted on this at this point. she wouldn't post on this topic until saturday. the roundtable we all did at the third estate sunday review wasn't up when she posted this. i was up, c.i. was up only with the cut off all contact post.

martha: that is strange because she states 'seeing all that is written' and all that was written that she'd seen was maria's comment, c.i.'s cut off contact and my e-mail. she's not mentioning you in the e-mail so i find it hard to believe she's seen your thing. she would have mentioned it because she's mentioning everything in there including talking about the request that kat make a correction.

rebecca: the 2nd 1?

martha: it shows thursday in my inbox but is 21 seconds after midnight for the time stamp on her end.

rebecca: so right after midnight? i'm pulling up something on my computer. usually when we're talking at the third estate sunday review, dallas hunts down the links and that must be a pain in the ass when we're tossing out a 100 things at once. okay, while the thing was being published, the roundtable, c.i. was logged in to the common ills and posting an alert. the time on c.i.'s entry is 9:10 pm. on the east coast, where we're guessing screech is due to her time stamp, it was 1:10 am friday morning at that point. so if her time stamps correct, wherever she happens to be writing from, the roundtable wasn't up yet. i want that point made. the roundtable wasn't up yet. tell us about the 2nd e-mail.

martha: i've got a problem then because she's talking about cedric and he's in the roundtable.

rebecca: what she's saying?

martha: that he's 'frustrated.'

maria: i think she's talking about cedric's comments in kat's post. where cedric's quoted, from tuesday, on rappers.

rebecca: hold on and let me go there? scrolling down. okay, got it. yeah, i think you're right maria. we'll allow that she may have a problem with her time stamp on her e-mails from her official account because she's stated she's had problems receiving e-mails.

martha: which might explain why they didn't show up on my end until today.

rebecca: so we'll allow that. we can be fair.

martha: the e-mails seem nicer than i expected. they were nicer than the way she responded to maria. but she apparently feels i played the race card, as an african-american woman, because there's a lot of attempts to justify the critique and say that it's not meant to say that rappers have been influenced by dylan. maybe her man needs to say that and not imply it. the structure of the sentence, which she quotes, does imply it. but in the 1st 1 she's going on about how she's under attack. the 8 pm 1.

rebecca: what's interesting is that she chooses to e-mail c.i. saturday night/sunday morning. when we're all pulling together the third estate sunday review. c.i. takes the time to reply to her and thinks she's sincere about wanting peace, c.i. may still think that, i haven't spoken to c.i. now why she e-mailed c.i. is something we can't figure out. as cedric said 'what's a brother got to do to get an e-mail!'

martha: exactly. i mean, hello. if you think cedric's frustrated, why don't you wait cedric? i mean it looks like what touched it off the most was cedric's comments. maybe they're just scared of talking to a man, an african-american man?

rebecca: will cedric has an e-mail address posted and he has commenting at his site.

martha: good point. because i broke the round-rob due to her comment to maria that the man at her site had to post what he did, where he distored kat's words, because kat didn't allow comments. so i thought that she didn't know about the demand for a correction. in her e-mails she knows. don't write that the only way he could offer something was to post that comment when he's able to e-mail kat and demand a correction.

rebecca: well ava and jess handle a lot of the e-mails during the week at the common ills.

martha: right.

rebecca: she's blown up at ava.

martha: she had a hissy fit on maria. considering that they avoid cedric like he's got the plague or something and that she seems to think i'm playing a race card, my guess is that i got the e-mails i did because it was 'uh oh, scary black woman.' now she would disagree with that because she feels the way kat was treated had nothing to do with gender.

maria: oh good god, it had everything to do with gender. i mean the man's whines about how the comments were the focus of kat's thing instead of what he'd written. that's male ego. that's wounded male pride. this was about gender from day 1.

martha: i don't disagree with you, maria. i think the way you were dismissed was even more so.
and i could say more but rebecca said to talk in generalities.

rebecca: that's right. that's per ava's aunt. she said talk about it that way. which reminds me i need to put something at the top of this thing.

martha: what's that?

rebecca: a copyright notice. i'm not sweet like kat. kat was so nice. she pointed out the mistake but she never asked for a correction. i don't want to see them pull something out of this and distort it.

martha: she keeps justifying what happened in both e-mails and the thing that makes me angry despite the fact that she's obviously trying to step lightly is the fact that she keeps justifying.

maria: i just want to say that i had a right to have my feelings noted at the common ills. i was dismissed in a very rude way. she's supposedly a journalist so you'd think in her comment the 1 thing she'd zero in on was that kat's quote was altered. she just blows that off by not commenting. i'm tired of her. and i'm tired of people who can't write about the war. why have a site if you're just going to write about tv and music from the 60s.

martha: well she doesn't really do that. she mainly just says 'oh look what i found.' sort of here's this, here's this. it's really like bad npr in text. really bad npr.

rebecca: i would agree with that. kat had an opinion and didn't speak like she was up in the clouds looking down on the world.

martha: no, kat, keeps it real.

maria: and that comment she wrote to me, i mean, come on. who is she to judge kat's work? kat's written about everything, even her abortion.

rebecca: kat can put it out there without having to couch or hide. she's a strong woman.

maria: she is. and you know where she stands. this woman, screech, seems to think that everything is that clear and screech's writing isn't that clear nor was the man writing. and he really was a prick. i mean forget his e-mails to kat, forget his attempt to sick a mob on kat. just his long winded nonsense of 'i think bright eyes' put in that i'm using a stuffy voice 'i think that bright eyes is' whatever 3 insults he said about 'when a president talks to god.' i mean they can't choose a side at that site. they can't find their ass with both hands. where do they get off slamming bright eyes or kat?

martha: because they're scared. i think. but let's talk about the mob because maria was the 1st 1 to post on the reactions.

maria: yeah, nobody came in. nobody tried to be the adult. until i did. what did screech write? something about how obvious the points were by her man, so stupid kat just can't get it. and she needs to face a hard truth, most of the people posting besides the suck up who also slammed kat, most of them weren't even talking about the man who wrote the article. does that give you an indication of how boring his piece was? you had dylan fans outraged that a comment was posted saying dyaln wasn't all that and these people just swarm in to attack the guy. but the article that was written, no 1 was focusing on that.

martha: they should have kissed the ass of the guy who wrote that 1st comment because he's the only thing any 1 was paying attention to. that happens when you're too chicken to voice an opinion. nobody notices the wallflowers. those 2, screech and her buddy, were just the most annoying with their clucking. cluck-cluck, tut-tut. it was cokie roberts time.

maria: i'll never go back there. i go to feminist sites. i go to sites that are friendly and supportive of women. when they went after kat, the trying to turn the mob on her, the judgment of her writing, the comparison of her to a man - i mean come on. why is a man the measure? why does kat have to live up to some man's standards?

rebecca: she doesn't.

martha: she sure doesn't. and where he does he get off demanding a correction. i could go into screech's e-mail but i won't quote it. i will note that she's defending him and it's so lame. he didn't deman a correction from cedric. he did from kat. don't try to push women around. that's what it was. they can try to put lipstick on this pig all they want but the pig squeals and it says 'women have less rights.'

maria: and i really believe that was the attitude. and that's why i couldn't believe screech thought it was okay to use that man as the yard stick. that man's not fit to wash out kat's bras.

rebecca: that really was the turning point, when she weighed in with that slam on kat's writing.

maria: and kat offered to put up anything that man wanted. but she wouldn't do it and pass it off as her wrods. and he didn't want that. what he wanted was for his words to come out of her mouth. it wasn't enough that he get a hearing, it had to look like it was kat saying this.

martha: and he had a hearing and then some. he posted his dopey dylan opinion. he then posted on kat at his site. so why does he need anything from her site?

maria: ego. pure ego.

martha: and there was nothing at the site that did anything but slam kat. that includes screech's comment she posted. so for her to write me and say no 1 attacked kat, that's just nonsense. she stood in judgement on kat.

maria: and found her lacking when compared to a man.

martha: and that really touched a sore spot, that i brought that up. that's all over her replies. i only wrote her once.

rebecca: so what do you think, martha? we're not pull quoting from the e-mails here but you've read them. what do you think based on all you've seen?

martha: i think she knew she did wrong and didn't want to say so publicly. i think she could have ended it if she'd have written kat in the same manner. kat didn't ask for a correction. kat waited until saturday to post on this at her site. kat was attacked on wednesday and on thursday.

maria: if she wanted to make peace, she should have gone to kat. not c.i. i'm so sick of every 1 whining to c.i.

rebecca: they know c.i.'s a soft touch. they know they'll get more than a hearing. they know c.i. will bend over backwards to be fair. so they go whining to c.i. in this case how awful c.i. was. - c.i. was more than fair in the roundtable and at the common ills.

martha: the oprah moments, gina calls them.

maria: and i like that about c.i. i like that c.i.'s willing to say 'i could be wrong.' or willing to look at something. we've been trying to find an all spanish link to link to, francisco, miguel and i for months. c.i. wants 1 but c.i. wants it to be 1 that we support and it's hard to find 1 that's a general interest. and we tend to quibble over them regardless. so it's been i don't know how long, we started looking in april.

martha: well i think we all respond to it. it's like a friend who tells you what they think but says 'this is just what i think.' but what i'm more concerend with right now is the way it effected every 1. i mean there were serious attempts to find peace with that site.

rebecca: right, we killed things at the third estate sunday review. ruth killed her ruth's morning edition report. maria, did you submit something?

maria: i did the headlines and included a comment in the intorduction that i thought i could slip in because it was in spanish. but c.i. noticed it and e-mailed, 'i think it says this, am i right?' it did say that. and c.i. said, 'it can't go up, she wants peace. can you pull that?' and i wasn't in the mood. i was being stubborn. i apologized for that on monday.

martha: ruth's could have gone up. ruth pulled it, right?

maria: right but i'm not doing an op-ed. that's news. the comment didn't belong there. and i tried to sneak it in sunday afternoon. coming in a news entry and considering the comment, it didn't belong there. i was actually glad it wasn't posted. i still am. even after reading eddie's e-mail today about the latest which really calls into question any genuine effort on their part for peace.

rebecca: the olive branch had thorns on it. that's what jess said. and c.i. may still want to high road it, but we held our tongues because there was a chance that it might be genuine.

martha: does anyone think c.i. will comment on it?

maria: no. c.i. will high road it.

rebecca: agree. there are links, link updates, c.i. needs to do. and when c.i. goes in to add those, the link to screech will just disappear with no comment and you'll never hear screech quoted at the site. if there's a humorous look at screech's site, c.i. may participate in that.

maria: at the third estate sunday review.

rebecca: right. but unless it has to do with the site iteself, there will be no form of comment. c.i. will just cut her off. and this is such a big thing as it is, because it is big and we agreed not to talk about that, that screech will face consequences in other ways. it will be like an edith wharton novel and the door will close here and there and she will wonder, was that because of? c.i. won't be ordering any of that. c.i. will even defend screech if her name comes up. not 'she's great' but 'let her do what she wants.' but behind the scenes women will be standing by c.i. screech will feel the cold and it won't thaw.

martha: and ava?

rebecca: ava will go along with c.i. ava's aunt is another story. but ava will stand with c.i. they might end up excusing themselves from co-writing some pieces at the third estate sunday review but that's it. the attitude will be it's not their battle to fight, defending screech.

maria: well that's up to them how they handle it. i wanted my say.

martha: me too.

rebecca: and that's why we did this. and i want to be sure something's clear, c.i.'s attitude is that life's too short for this nonsense. if you're not worth it to c.i., you just aren't worth it. and screech isn't worth it. c.i. felt protective of her but that's gone. so she'll just be cut off and she'll notice that others treat her differently. what screech did is the reason for that. that's the point ava's aunt makes. it's her fault. she made her bed.

martha: her own dirty bed where she rushed in to attack kat. and patronize maria. and play 'who's better, man or woman? man!' the low, the absolute low, for me is her failure to address the demand for a correction.

maria: that was low because of what it represents. but i think the failure to do anything to try to weigh in on the war, the continued focus on shows, on tv shows, that are nothing but junk. i mean that goes to what a person is. i noticed a huge change when screech moved to the new site. suddenly topics that we got in addition to the tv junk, those were gone. we were just left with junk. and i mean, think about how martha and i 1st bonded.

martha: yeah. maria was posting there and i knew a maria was highlighting it at the common ills.
screech was trashing jane fonda. she was just trashing her.

rebecca: i know about that. i found it shocking that she got away with that. and i'm really not sure that someone's who best known for saying rah-rah to veronica mars is really qualified to evaluate monster-in-law. that film wasn't geared to the zit cream crowd.

martha: and i didn't get it and maria had already posted but i added my 2 cents saying 'anti-woman, it's got 3 women in it, 2 are in conflict and they learn to respect 1 another.'

maria: which may have been screech's problem since there's not a lot of respecting women. there is a lot of cheerleading adult actresses playing teenagers. but i had said something like 'they don't deserve this' and they didn't. and she shoots back, well women are the 1s saying this!

martha: yeah. off our back was saying it.

rebecca: really?

martha: i was joking. my point was, she quotes all these mainstream women and then wants to say 'women are saying it!' she always quotes the mainstream.

maria: and what was the point in tearing down jane fonda or her movie? it made no sense. what does she tell me? something like 'go read the women' and i don't need to. but there again it was time to tear down a woman and screech was there.

martha: well there again, like with a lot of people they tear down, it was not just a woman, it was some 1 speaking out against the war. i mean that's why people i know dismiss screech's new site.

maria: exactly. what's on fox tv? screech can tell you that. she just can't have express an opinion on a war that's nearly 3 years old. it's like, 'put away the barbie dolls and grow up already.' because you're useless.

martha: here, here. she's like access hollywood and that might go over well but if you're wanting democracy now or counterspin, it's like, 'who watches this stuff?'

maria: and it wasn't that bad before she moved to her new site. i mean martha was offended by her new orleans coverage.

martha: yeah. not a word to say about the people. but i'll just be quiet on that except to note that i think that's what the quote kat has in her thing is about. if so, i agree completely.

maria: where there are real issues and real problems she's writing about nonsense. and maybe that works for people who are into nonsense. but after awhile, it just gives you a headache.

martha: and it's not what she covers, it's the way she covers it. you read ava and c.i. taking on tv and you get a real critique.

maria: a feminist critique.

martha: you read her and if she's not assembling quotes, she's got nothing to say. it's like she's the listings in the tv guide.

maria: she's made herself useless. or maybe at the old site, others said 'uh that's enough crap you think you can write about something that matters to women?' i'm an adult, i'm a single mother, i don't have time for her nonsense. and i kept thinking, we both did, okay she's getting used to her new site. well how long does that take?

martha: 3 years? she's not exactly rushing in to give attention to the air war in iraq, is she?

maria: she's useless and she's made herself that. grown women who care about the world do not need her silly focus. and not silly ha-ha. silly as in no meaning.

martha: when your country is at war and you've got nothing to say, what are you? an enterainer? okay, maybe that's what she is. a really bad entertainer cranking out covers of gloria gaynor and donna summer. but i need something that's nutritional. she's just all these empty calories.

maria: i really think that says it all.

rebecca: then we'll close. thank you both for participating. i really appreciate it.

maria and martha and me coming tonight, watch for it!

so jim's on the phone and the peace has been pulled off the table.

not by us. by her.

you know who i mean.

the cowardly voice.

who has no opinion on the war.

who has nothing to do but yank everyone's chain about tv crap. not examing it, just running off at the mouth about it as though she were a pre-teen.

that's not really true. actually it's nothing but a lot of links and a few sentences of 'comment.' kat had a delicious parody of the woman's writing style but i won't swipe from kat because she may want to post it now.

so jim's telling me about the note that will go up explaining the hell we all went through when this woman made a last minute 'sincere plea for peace' or 'desire' or 'wish' or whatever the fuck the claim was.

you know for someone who gets snippy with every 1, and i mean every 1, about her own words, it's awful strange she can distort kat or any 1 else.

she's always right! even when the world screams back 'you are wrong!'

so mike's got the goods in terms of a guy. jim tells me and for a 2nd i'm thinking, 'damn it! that should have been mine!'

then i get the noodle cooking and think, 'hey where my girls at?'

right here tonight.

maria and martha and me.

shooting the shit, talking the talk.

i don't usually do sneak peaks or 'next time . . .' entries but i had to come in here to delink any way.

huge thanks to maria and martha for agreeing to talk it up public and keep it real.

check back later tonight. you won't want to miss it.

her name is barbra

i had an e-mail from billie that had me very excited.

she's watching the barbra streisand thing on pbs. probably right now.

she e-mailed this morning to weigh in on a few things and mentioned that my name is barbra was airing tonight.

so i made sure that no 1 was coming over, made sure i have microwave pop corn and almond joy, my favorite candy, on hand. i even bought some hard candies just to munch on.

this was going to be time to spend in front of the tv and just kick back.

i was really excited.

i forgot, as ava and c.i. have pointed out, pbs doesn't have a national schedule. i've had roy orbison and now wild chronicles.

i love nature. but having your heart set on barbra and getting anything but barbra . . .

i hope i haven't already missed it here.

there are some voices that i just respond to.

otis melts me.

jack johnson makes me feel playful.

with barbra ... it's always been like hearing bells ring.

i've never been impressed when her voice goes all over, hitting the lowest of lowest notes, the highest of highest notes.

she has a range and that's nice.

but it's always been this clear sound, regardless of the note, that has reached me.

when she holds a note, any note, she can stay on it. that's not true of every 1.

a lot of singers on the radio mean to hold a note but their voice waivers and wobbles and never comes near the note.

barbra's voice has always sounded like bells to me.

something that excites you and makes you stop.

the way you do if you're walking down the street on a cold day, not really paying attention, when suddenly church bells start to ring. you have to look. you have to stop. you have to respond.

that's barbra's singing voice for me.

i'm a fan of her films too.

when the mirror has 2 faces came out, i had to see it right away.

i went to an early show. i wanted to have the chance to watch it immediately again, don't freak i bought tickets for both showings.

my fear was that i would hate it.

i always fear that.

she gets trashed so much.

but i loved the mirror has 2 faces. i thought the film looked gorgeous and i thought it was hilarious. i found rose, barbara's character, very moving.

she surprised me with meet the fockers.

it was laid back barbra and i had forgotten how wonderful that was.

she was so relaxed onscreen.

that's not insulting her other roles. rose isn't a relaxed character. but it was like the character she played in up the sandbox to me, just a really down to earth character.

now some couldn't get behind that and it was their loss.

i couldn't sit through meet the parents. fly boy thinks it's hilarious and, though it wasn't a reason listed for our divorce, i'm sure that the repeated viewings of it didn't help either us.

that was a joke, though fly boy may be the only 1 laughing.

but barbra and dustin hoffman were so funny and worked so beautifully together.

fly boy and i can both watch that dvd and enjoy it. repeatedly.

there are so many currents, that you're supposed to laugh at, in the 1st 1 that limit women and encourage women to be limited.

in the sequel, there's no way to limit barbra.

and she does it not by going for a heavy role.

she just radiates and warms you.

after yentl and after the way we were, in that order, that may be my favorite barbra film.

there's a 3rd voice to barbra. there's the singing voice that is beautiful and most critics who don't like her and don't like a song choice or all of her song choices will usually point out that the voice is beautiful. then there's the acting voice and you get a huge split.

after all these years, people still feed the need to point out that she doesn't look like kim novak or whomever they were expecting.

i think she's equally as beautiful and that the things that are different about her looks make her beauty.

1 day at the grocery store they had a photo of her on a tabloid taken outside, in the sunlight. the headline was trying to tell you that barbara had lost her looks. had she?

i don't know. i just know that her skin was amazing. i saw the headline and realized i was supposed to see something frightening. but i just saw a wonderful complexion and a woman who looked like she was doing errands. i mean the hair not perfectly set, the make up not expertly applied. i didn't see any 1 losing their looks.

so let's talk about the 3rd voice which is the political voice.

after jane fonda, she's probably 2nd on the list of women in the entertainment industry that the right wing loves to hate.

i always wonder about the women who hate barbra for her politics.

it has nothing to do with this war because in war or not, the right wing loves to hate her.

and you have to wonder about the women who hate her because what she's standing up for is, hello, women.

'barbra thinks i should have a right to pursue any avenue i want without anyone saying "no, you're a woman!" and stopping me? oh, i just hate her.'

i mean what is that all about?

'please put me in a burka' seems to be the message of women who gripe about barbra's politics.

as a long term barbra fan, i do have complaints.

here's my biggest 1, no more pictures of her and her son jason.

when he was a child, they looked so good together.

she looked like the proudest mother in the world. the 1 who might get too involved and you might have to say 'back off, mom, i need some space' but not 1 who would ever have to be asked to be included.

she would be there, from a distance if you need space, but she just always looked so proud of her son in those photos that i truly do miss having new 1s.

that's my selfish wish.

jason's a grown man and the last thing he may want to do is pose for photos, for the press, with his mother and that's his right. but something tells me that if barbara got to choose, there would be just as many photos of her with jason as there are of her with her husband james brolin.

that may be what i responded to the most in meet the fockers. it met my image of barbra the person. just this wonderful source of love and strength.

i didn't get the special on my pbs station tonight and i may have missed it. so i've made due with listening to some of my cds and, having made the mistake of making yentl 1 of them, i'm now jonesing for another viewing of that film.

so that's what i'm going to go do.

thoughts on the trashing of kat and people who don't seem to know we're at war

first thank you for all the great e-mails on the post that went up thursday.

a few wondered why i didn't post friday since i took weds. off. i wasn't off weds. i was writing the thing that went up thursday. i saved it to draft. and on thursday, i was taking part in the community's special programming.

i really loved doing that, by the way.

i love that we can all come together like that and be this group of support.

and that we can do it with laughter because there was a lot of laughter during that.

eli wrote to say my line about 'no pledge drive' made him laugh. thank you, eli. it may not have been my line though. we were all pumped up when c.i. called to say there would be special programming. c.i. was willing to host it at the common ills and invite anyone over. c.i. wasn't sure how many would be interested in participating. when the number became obvious, it became a third estate sunday review thing. and dona said, 'rebecca, you'll be the only thing up until we get this special programming done' so i was really glad that i had that thing saved to draft and that it was so long.

not long enough for sherry who wrote that she'd read it and was waiting and ended up rereading it before the 1st half of special programming went up. but she loved the roundtable which was the 1st of the 2 special programming events.

i hope every1 got something out of it.

it was a long process and it took a great deal of time but i haven't heard any 1 gripe about that.
we were drained at the end and not everyone could do what i did, crawl into bed and sleep as late as you want. so i want to thank every 1 for being there.

and let me point out that was a thursday post. i know that every 1 would love it if there were entries at all the sites every day, several times a day.

that's not going to happen. i honestly wish c.i. would post less because i know the time constraints c.i. is under. but we all have lives and no 1's doing this to make money. we do this because we think we have something to say. if some 1 doesn't think they have something to say, they may not write that day.

but i think, as a whole, the community provides more than enough commentary each week. i think we did that this week because special programming covered a lot of topics.

why are so many on the left and 'left' silent about the war?

that's really something that disgusts me.

c.i.'s idea for 'war got your tongue' almost didn't get heard. everytime c.i. would attempt to explain it, 1 of us would have just got the title and start laughing. it's a great title.

as others have noted at their sites, that's 3 pieces we put together. like lennon and mccartney putting parts of their own stuff into 1 song. we did that due to time but i think the editorial turned out amazing.

we were actually done before we all hung up. but jim wanted to read it. aloud. to all of us.

when he was done, ty said 'i'm satisfied' and we all were.

there are things you do and you can take comfort that you tried. maybe it didn't turn out quite the way you expected but you gave it a try and didn't just sit there wishing some 1 else would do it.

then there are the things you do that turn out differently and you look at them and think, 'i'm not just proud that i took a stab at something, i'm proud of how it turned out.'

that's how i feel about the editorial.

to me, it speaks to the issue that a large number of people have stood up but a larger number has stayed silent. why?

why do they stay silent?

are they afraid that if they took a stand, they'd lose readers. if they came out for the war or against it, they might lose readers?

that's something to wonder about.

is it all about 'will i be liked?'

i think for some it is.

i have more respect for the war cheerleaders that mean it then i do for the 1s who never say anything.

and of course, i agree with the people speaking out against the war.

i don't think even a casual reader would ever get the impression that i was for the war.

but i think a casual reader of a lot of other sites, online mags, might wonder where they stood.

so, for instance, if you put 'politics' in your site title, you don't have an excuse for being silent on the war.

i don't think there's an excuse for not speaking out at this point. maybe if you're a reader and you're shy. but if you've got the guts to weigh in at your own site (blog or magazine) you should have the guts to have an opinion on the war.

it's not the supporters who keep it going at this point, it's the 1s who stay silent.

some supporters are actually starting to question it.

but the war will continue as long as 'good men do nothing.' that's from hannah arendt, i think. the quote section. it's about evil, i believe. i read it in 1 of elaine's posts and it stayed with me.

as long as good men and good women stay silent, the war goes on.

no end in sight because why end it when so many don't seem to care.

and if you're silent, that's how it reads: that you don't care.

there are times when all of us will let an issue slide in terms of posting because who has the time to cover everything? i know elaine will grab something or some 1 else so i'll focus on something different. but i've never been afraid to talk about the war. i've never been afraid to say that i'm against it.

i've written about it often.

now i started this site at a time when people were backing off from talking about it. the election had happened, the inauguration was about to or had just happened. tom hayden had a piece against the war that a supposed left site wouldn't run.

all the sudden we were supposed to just focus on other things.

i didn't buy that.

to me, the war is everything that is wrong with the bully boy.

1) people are dying and the 'compassionate conservative' doesn't care.

now he's comparing iraq to japan. he'll lie to justify his illegal actions.

2) when the government that we've installed comes to more power, life will be worse for women in iraq then it was before. we didn't liberate the women in afghanistan and we've made things worse for women's rights in iraq.

he is no friend to feminists. he's only a friend to women if you're a woman who has no self-respect.

3) we were lied into war.

this is about his refusal to address facts. he doesn't like facts. he likes spin. so he lies and manipulates.

4) the economy still sucks.

we've got the usual happy talk stories that it's better. in a month that'll be over. at christmas time the media always pushes that the economy has gotten better.
you don't get the big ads from department stores and companies if you're telling the truth about the economy, not when we're in the big shopping period.

and the war is 1 of the many excuses he offers for the bad economy. his decisions are why we're still in a bad economy.

5) the silencing of dissent.

without it, he'd have no war today. he pulled that trick from the start. he and his attack dogs think they can bully the whole country, the whole world.

the arrogance, the lies, the destruction, the attacks, it's all there in the war.

so that's why i couldn't be silent about the war.

i'm shocked that so many can.

but, if you watched the wizard of oz, you know that some believe courage, brains and hearts need to be handed out. we've got it all inside of us, if we choose to access it. most of us don't choose to. i don't know who we think our silence helps?

isn't it funny that bernie has nothing of value to offer the world today but he does have the time to bully kat?

isn't it funny that his site can claim poor little bernie had no way to be heard which is a big fat lie because kat had offered to post his whiney crap at her site if he'd write something.

maybe bernie should stop trying to bully women and figure out where he stands on the war?

or are the attacks on anti-war voices like kat and bright eyes supposed to tell us where bernie stands?

bernie's priority is apparently bernie. people dying doesn't upset him. some woman not kissing his ass does. it's all about bernie.

well bridget may have loved bernie, but no 1 in this community does.

he can continue writing his whiney ass, sniveling sucks ups to the new republic and being useless.

now bernie would say 'i don't suck up to the new republic! i wrote my disagrement with them!'

bernie's not real smart apparently.

he doesn't seem to grasp that when he highlights the new republic and links to them and then delivers his kid gloves treatment he's endorsing them.

he's chosen to take seriously a rag that's declared war on peace activists and thinks 'jokes' about arundhati roy being targeted with bunker busts are okay.

any 1 who was outraged by that b.s. wouldn't be highlighting the rag.

he's like a man defending his best friend who beats his wife with 'only when he's drunk. he only does it when he's drunk.'

oh, okay, that's different then.

it probably hurts her a lot less then too, since he'd drunk. right?

there is no difference.

that rag became a rag under the right-wing of the 80s and they still practice their bullshit attacks. there's no difference between the new republic and bill o'reilly except some people think that the new republic is 'high brow.'

they are both bullies. they are both disgusting.

and people are tired of it.

i was so glad to see the community rise up against bernie.

the round-robin friday made me proud to be a part of this community. the work we did at the third estate sunday review thursday made me proud to be a part of this community. what could have been a very destructive moment became a really inspirational 1 for me.

i think that's the lesson in the world we live in now. you stand together on your beliefs and you find strength.

on the crap women bloggers have to put up with

note this, i can't get into my account. i called t but she's not at her place and won't be for a few hours. i then phoned dallas, who says it's very cold in dallas, and imposed upon him. he's copying and pasting this to the top of this entry for me and posting it. and he's at the ready for tonight's special programming. we all think dallas should do his own site and i don't think any of us can ever thank him enough for all that he does to help out. he really gives his all for the community. so thank you, dallas.

the entry below was written last night. i can't get in so i can't read it. you find a typo, if that's what you were seeking, consider it your reward. (and dallas better not correct anything. i feel like i've imposed enough on what sounds like a cold and dreary day.)

these are my opinions below. the unidentified woman is kat. i didn't have her permission last night to name her. i do now.

my opinions of this are my opinions. i will offer no correction to them. if the jerk who thinks he can make kat correct her opinion wants to try that shit on me, it'll get real ugly. i don't take shit from men who have their feelings hurt because a woman has an opinion and thinks that means they can insist upon a correction. i don't play that bullshit game.

since i wrote this, the man finally responded to kat. or to 'cat' as he wrote. did he finally say 'please post the following as my take on this'? hell no.

and there's a reason. those kind of men never want it to be their words. it's not enough that they get to comment, they want it to look like a woman's changed her mind. if he was quoted and noted, it wouldn't look like kat changed her mind. this is, MY OPINION, about some little minded man getting ticked off that a woman didn't kiss his ass and so he thinks he can come along and insist upon a correction to some 1's opinion. i don't play that game.

i think it's offensive. i think it's disgusting. i don't think women should ever be treated that way and i damn well will never take it.

so if the jerk reads this and is offended, guess what, too bad. it's my opinion. despite what you seem to think a penis is not required to have an opinion. some of us think with our brains. dallas, please put this intro in bold to distinguish it from last night's entry. readers, please note, there will be special programming tonight. check at the common ills for a note on that later tonight. special programming but no pledge drive.


i'm pissed off tonight.

don't expect anything great here.

a friend got an e-mail where someone dumps on her. (should i state the obvious - it's from a man. ain't it always the way?)

she's making excuses for his lack of a reply with she's in california and he may be on the east coast so there may be a time difference.

i think that's a bullshit reason.

if you dump on someone and demand something from them, you need to be ready to reply to them.

i'm sick of men who think they can weigh in on anything but let a woman disagree with them and they want corrections.

it's not as though the man doesn't have an outlet and it's not as though he hasn't already weighed in on what my friend wrote. he has. he's given his opinion at his site.

and defended his commenters including the 1s who attack people with 'deep' comments like 'stupid shit.'

you know what's stupid shit?

some 1 with their own outlet disagreeing with a woman's opinion and thinking he can demand a correction of her opinion.

that's STUPID SHIT.

and that's the STUPID SHIT that women have to put up with.

i'm so fucking pissed right now.

she's not blogging right now.

she's trying to wait to see if she and the guy can come to some understanding.

FUCK UNDERSTANDING.

he tells her to re-read his post.

excuse me, you NEED TO RE-READ HER POST.

she's not even commenting on him. she's talking about the comments that were left when 1 person offered a different opinion.

but HE demands a correction.

i'm sick of the MIND FUCKS.

i'm sick of the BULL SHIT.

HE has his own place to post.

SHE DOES NOT HAVE TO EAT HER WORDS BECAUSE HE DOESN'T LIKE HER OPINION.

that's BULLSHIT.

any 1 who knows me knows i'm not afraid to go public with anything.

the only thing i've ever not gone into fully that i wanted to was my abortion and that was because my ex-in-laws were screaming their heads off and i didn't want it to screw over my ex-husband (who is fine with me posting anything about the abortion or any thing else).

but they were worried about their reputations.

because MY ABORTION isn't MY GODDAMN STORY. it's apparently their story.

it happened to ME but i don't have the RIGHT to write about it.

so i am taking this personally, what's happened to my friend.

my friend needed some 1 to talk to.

so i listened.

she doesn't want me to blow this up so i won't name her or him.

but i'm SICK OF THIS SHIT.

i'm going to use wally as example because every 1 knows how cool wally is and that he'd never pull this type of shit.

let's say that i blogged here 'i don't think florida's a big deal.' (i do think it's a big deal.)

wally's got a site. he can post whatever he wants up there.

he would not have the right to contact me and demand a correction.

WOMEN HAVE OPINIONS.

WOMEN CAN EXPRESS THEM.

IT IS BULLSHIT FOR MEN TO PULL THIS CRAP AND THEY DON'T PULL IT WITH GUYS THEY JUST PULL WITH US.

i'm sick of it.

the guy posted his opinion of her opinion at his site.

but that's not good enough for him.

he wants a CORRECTION to her opinions.

that is BULLSHIT.

she's not angry.

she's trying to work through an understanding with the man.

i love her to death but she doesn't need to work through an understanding.

i've read what she wrote. i've read what he wrote.

she didn't weigh in on his opinion.

she doesn't need to correct her opinion of the attack comments.

women, we need to STOP doing this shit.

we need to stop worrying about the hurt feelings of little boys.

we need to stop thinking that because they gripe it's somehow our fault.

it's not our fault.

it's their fault for thinking a woman can't have a DAMN opinion of her own.

it's their fault for thinking they can whine or gripe or demand a correction.

i've so had it with this shit.

i am so sick of men playing mr. macho and telling just what they think online but let a woman disagree and they want a fucking correction which they whine about in private.

he's got his own damn site. he's posted his damn opinion.

he needs to apologize to my friend.

his lack of agreement with her opinion doesn't mean he gets a correction.

there's nothing to correct.

when i briefly worked in the entertainment industry out in los angeles, there were 2 clients who wanted corrections to every story that was written about them.

so you'd have to humor them because unless there's an error, a magazine won't give you a correction. if they print the wrong birthday for you, they'll correct it. if they get your credit wrong, they'll correct it.

if their opinion differs from you, they don't correct it.

i ask male bloggers all the time, 'do you have to put up with shit?' and they don't.

but let a woman write something and men think they can demand whatever changes they want.

take your pissing match into the men's room.

we don't need you to wave your dick.

i told her there's nothing about him in her post that needs correcting.

she could posting today but she's waiting for his reply.

and isn't that just like a man to leave a woman waiting?

i'm so sick of the bullshit.

again, he's posted his opinion at his site.

his opinion doesn't capture what she wrote but is she screaming for a correction?

no.

he's got a site to post at.

he doesn't need to try to force her to do a correction.

that's bullshit.

men like that need to start learning some boundaries.

and women, we need to stop letting them mind fuck us.

it's not our job to kiss their boo-boos or help their wounded egos.

we are not their mothers.

maybe this guy hasn't read her reply yet, like she thinks.

i don't give a damn.

you don't demand a correction and then not reply to the person.

and let's just note the 2 e-mails.

his? all about him. taking her to task for her opinion.

her's? telling him that she didn't take apart his opinion. he wasn't the fcous of her entry. he could have been and she explained where she disagreed with his opinion but noted that she didn't post her disagreements.

women, we need to quite explaining ourselves to men.

with some men, it doesn't do any good.

he fired off his e-mail and probably gave his boner a tug.

now she's fucked over and can't post because she doesnt want to write anything until she's tried to work out some understanding with him.

i don't take this shit. and i know from women bloggers that they say they find that 'inspiring.'

quit being inspired by me and start using your strength.

because until you do this same shit happens over and over.

i respond to every female blogger who writes me with this type of problem.

i know it's not an isolated incident.

i know that women get these e-mails from men all the time.

there are women who won't blog about politics because of this crap. they wanted to, they started to and then some man e-mailed them screaming that they better change this or change that.

as centrist ed learned, i don't grovel, i don't plead.

you didn't like my crack about your hair, ed? too bad, get a grown up hair cut and don't give me a whiney ass reason why you couldn't get your hair cut before you posed for a professional photo.

i don't back down and that's partly because of the hell i went through with my abortion and partly because i hear from women that it really inspires them.

i'm glad if inspires some 1. but we really need to stop this crap.

i can stand up for me and i will stand up for any woman blogger who's got some man sniffing around, growling that she apologize.

but it needs to be more than me or more than few others and me.

when we don't stand up to men, we make it harder for another woman.

i love my friend very much. but her efforts to find an understanding with this man don't help the next woman he demands back off her opinion and give him a correction.

a correction he feels is 'obvious.' not so 'obvious' that he can name it.

it's obvious to him. it's always obvious to men like that.

he can't point to an error because there's not 1.

he just doesn't like her opinion.

and when it's a woman apparently, if you don't like the opinion, you don't just blog that you don't like it, you demand a correction because big bad you won't be pushed around by some woman!

that's a hell of a sense of entitlement.

i'm sick of it.

i have heard from too many women this same story.

we need to stop backing down. we need to stop trying to work through an understanding with men we have no relationship with - men who only show up to tell us 'you are wrong!'

do you catch the shout outs online? men shouting to men.

women don't get shout outs as a rule, they get shouted at.

it is unacceptable.

if he offers an apology tomorrow, i'll let this drop. but i don't think he's going to apologize.

i have a lot of high school readers and i love you but, please, male or female, do not act this way.
if you're a guy and you disagree with a woman do not make the mistake of thinking you can demand that she changes her mind. if you are a woman, do not let some guy do that to you.

if we all stood up just 1 day, this crap would happen a lot less. if we all stood up just 1 month, i bet it would cut it out.

and don't make the mistake of thinking that when a guy tells you that you have made an obvious mistake that you have in fact made any mistake. that's just his opinion. you can blow it off and you should.

he is not ruler of the universe and he is not ruler of your's. you need to own your own universe.

if he calls you a bitch, guess what? you will live through it.

there are many worse things to be called.

in the past, i have suggested to women that they post those e-mails.

these guys don't want to do this in public. they want to bully a woman into changing her mind in private. then when she posts their 'correction' they can claim that she came to it all on her own.
if you knew some of the stories i've heard since i started blogging, you'd know this is not uncommon. and you'd raise an eyebrow when a woman blogger 'clarifies' a previous post.

we need to stop doing that.

i wonder if it happens to women who try to be op-ed writers in print?

i won't cave. i'll stop blogging before i cave.

i'll continue to be here for any women blogger that goes through this shit.

but i want you to know, not all male bloggers are like that. you would actually have a lot of support online if you challenged and outed these men.

there are a lot of male bloggers who weren't aware of what was going on.

there's 1 who has a standing offer to several female bloggers to back them and post on his site, which is a pretty big site, if they want to out these men.

so if you're reading this and you are 1 of those male bloggers that thinks you can have a fit in private and no 1 will ever know, you need to think again. because it's not just me that's getting sick of this crap.

there are men who respect that a woman can have an opinion they disagree with. they can even tell you 'i disagree' and not demand that you change your opinion.

this is a pattern of sexism and it's a new form so i'm glad i've written so much about this because as we spend more and more time online, this will be an issue that's discussd in the future.

and men who are behaving badly better be worried because it won't stay silent forever.

i dealt with 3 female bloggers on this last week who e-mailed me to share the latest demands from a man.

they alway have their own sites, these men, but they always want to contact you privately and tell you to make a correction.

guess what? if you don't make it, they go away.

when ed realized i wasn't going to rewrite my post about his hair, he moved on.

no more of his whining to c.i. about how mean i was and how i needed to change my post and correct it because he was going through a really bad time and he didn't need my mean remarks.

well if he'd gotten his hair cut for a photo he was posing for, 1 that he knew his organization was going to promote, he wouldn't have had a problem to begin with.

if he hadn't tried to act like a friend to social security, while arguing for privatization, he wouldn't have had to deal with me to begin with.

apparently i'm the 1st woman that ever said no to him. (shocking to me as well.) he got over it.

here's some tips for women bloggers:

1) you have a right to have an opinion
2) you have a right to express it
3) you have a right not to back off of your opinion because some guy's feelings are hurt

here's some tips for male bloggers who think they can force a woman to change her mind:

1) you're going to find at some point a woman who won't back down
2) when that happens realize that you are the 1 with the problem
3) try to grasp that women have brains and not just boobs

i love the men who've griped at me while at the same time wanting to know exactly how large my breasts are?

they want me to be their ideal woman, big breasts and no words that ever disagree with them.

boys, when you want that, pick up a playboy because that only happens in your little fantasies.

it's not reality and it's too bad that you haven't been forced to face reality yet in your life.

there's a reason your jerk off fantasy is only a fantasy - in the real world, women have opinions and you won't always agree with them but that doesn't mean you're right or that you can get a corretion to some woman's opinion.

if i've misjudged this man, i'll let it drop. but i don't think i have. a man who can't tell the difference between opinion and fact, a man who tells a woman she needs to re-read his post when she didn't argue his post and when he 'obviously' hasn't read her's is a man i think i can determine pretty well.