I'm not in a jotting mood. Community members will know why.
Kat does an outstanding job and is an incredible person. For someone to distort what she's written pisses me off. That it happened at a site that I've recommended bothers me as much as it does Gina, Krista, Brenda, Brad and Kyle who've been circulating the e-mail on this.
Mike hadn't checked his inbox. He called this morning to ask if I was going to post and to ask if C.I. was posting. C.I. posted but posted late. Mike didn't call C.I. because he thought C.I. might not be posting to actually get some much needed sleep.
That's not the deal. The deal isn't even that someone disagrees with Kat. The deal is that someone's distorted Kat's words.
I asked Mike if he'd spoken to Rebecca and he hadn't. I told him she didn't post last night because her entry was about some of this nonsense including an e-mail telling Kat to correct her opinion. Rebecca called me and read it to me. She said she wanted to do that before she read it to C.I. because she thought C.I. would be pissed at her. I didn't think there was anything wrong with her post. I've called her this morning and she said C.I. told her to post it and didn't see anything wrong with it either.
If you see something up here that's my opinion, you're free to disagree. You're free to e-mail and say you disagree. You're not free to demand a correction to my opinion.
Kat's been distorted and the person distorting her wants her to correct her opinion. There's no fact to correct because her facts are correct.
I don't stand behind that. Rebecca's post is about how some men think they can boss women around. That's how I see what's going on. A man thinks he can make Kat correct her opinion just because he disagrees with her.
He also hasn't had the decency to reply to Kat after dumping his issues on her.
So I'm not in a jotting mood this morning.
I spoke to Mom before posting this morning. I told her I wasn't into jotting today because I'd write about this and everyone's hoping the man will either apologize or back off with a forget it e-mail. Mom said the man was wrong to alter Kat's words and that I should say so.
I agree with that.
Mom sounded like Rebecca this morning talking about how some men think they can tell a woman what to think and she said she hopes Kat doesn't "correct" her opinion. She said for me to put that in when I posted.
In the end, there are people who will stand against the war and there are people who will stay silent. Kat's never stayed silent on the war. Apparently some men don't have the same guts and character that Kat has. So it's okay for them to drop words from what she's written and make it sound like she wrote something she didn't.
It's not cool in my book.
If it's not fixed, I will be saying more. C.I.'s hoping that it's a misunderstanding that can be cleared up. I want to believe that too. If it's not, the community will move on and the community will stand behind Kat.
Swiping from C.I. (The Common Ills posts are up now):
Remember the scheduled topic for today's Democracy Now! (thanks to Rod):
* On the 25th anniversary of the death of John Lennon we discuss his life and politics with historian Jon Wiener, the author of "Gimme Some Truth: The John Lennon FBI Files."
From page 168 of Phil Strongman and Alan Parker's John Lennon & The FBI Files:
The renegade M15 spy David Shayler gave his employers a nudge by revealing the fact that there were British files on Lennon -- over his support for left-wing parties -- as well as on two '60s students who were now members of the new cabinet (these were former student union leader Jack Straw and one-time anti-apartheid activist Peter Hain).Weeks later M15 began to shread over 120,000 of the files it had held on UK subjects -- including one John Winston Ono Lennon. Rather than fight this outrageous action, the government actually seemed to encourage it -- perhaps grateful that the youthful excesses of its senior and junior ministers would now never be made public. Those who'd been less successful in life than high-ranking government members -- those who might have had their careers slowed or destroyed by secret action -- were the losers. They would not be able to claim compensation without proof. And that proof was rapidly being turned into pulp besides the south bank of the Thames.
But the US copies of the M15 Lennon files -- or at least those that were sent to the FBI --- did still exist. And after much prompting from Wiener and his civil-liberties legal team, the FBI agreed to ask for British permission to finally release the last ten Lennon documents -- those FBI files that had originated in, contained information from -- or were copied to -- Military Intelligence 5 and 6.
Yet, despite all their freedom of information pledges, Blair's regime hesitated for a few days, and then said "no." [. . . ]
The discussion on Democracy Now! should be quite interesting. And the Wiener noted in the excerpt is Jon Wiener, Goodman's guest for today's show.
Check out the show. John Lennon stood for peace. So does Bright Eyes and "When A President Talks To God" isn't "trite, crudely so, and certainly unenlightening" unless sitting on the fence about the war has given you splinters in the brain.
I'll close by quoting David Zirin, a writer Mike and I have tremendous respect for, and I won't alter his quote but will leave that to fence sitters on the war who think it's okay to alter Kat's quote and feel that citations of The New Republic are, I'm guessing, 'neat':
The New Republic magazine - a pro-war Democratic Party rag - thought it would be provocative to muse about killing and torturing anti-war activists. New Republic writer T.A. Frank found it cheeky to sit in and mock an anti-war panel sponsored by the DC Anti-War Network, the DC ISO and others. He thought it would make his colleagues chuckle to wish for "John Ashcroft to come busting through the wall with a submachine gun to round everyone up for an immediate trip to Gitmo, with Charles Graner on hand for interrogation." The New Republic thought they would score points with their puffy beltway buddies by printing a call for someone to "take a bunker buster to [internationally known anti-war author] Arundhati Roy." The New Republic also thought they'd get away with it. They were wrong.
On Friday, about fifty-plus anti-war and global justice activists picketed their shabby Washington DC offices [tough times for TNR]. We were loud and proud demanding both print-space to rebut Frank's psychotic rant as well as a formal apology. As we chanted gems like "Stop the Threats, Stop the Lies; New Republic Apologize" and "New Republic YOU can go Kill and Die for Texaco," their quivering editorial team remained holed upstairs, refusing to address our demands, defend Frank's rant, or even leave the office. While their staff shook in the newly christened "New Republic Panic Room," we handed out hundreds of leaflets to passers-by outlining their nasty dirge.
Our "Fight the New Republic[ans]" campaign began when we posted a response to Frank on the Counterpunch website. The reaction was staggering with TNR receiving hundreds of e-mails and phone calls. It was incredible, as letters poured in from around the world, from anti-war vets to unionists in India. Despite the diversity of responders, the message was quite unified: if you want to get to Arundhati Roy, you have to go through us first.
That's from "Fighting the New Republic[ans]." As NOW notes, "Peace is a feminist issue." Mom wanted that in and also said I should note that distorting a woman or trying to make her correct her opinion are not feminist issues. Mom said too that I needed to add NOW to my links so I'll do that right after I post this.
