SOME OF THE MANY CONGRATS TO MEDIACHANNEL

Steve Rosenthal writes: “Congrats on your 7th. It is just 6 years ago that we met and I really respect your contributions to political and social media at the highest levels of my mind. You are the peoples treasure.

Shebar Windstone: May you all have many more — & enough funding to light the candles on your cake!

Barbara Goetz: “Molly would be very proud of what you do.”

Jayne Stahl: mazel tov

REMEMBERING FATHER DRINAN

Marjarie Arons-Barron writes from Boston:

That was a wonderful overview of your accomplishments. I congratulate you. I am struck by the fact that, in addition to Molly Ivins’ death, this week we lost Bob Drinan. For many of us, both in activism and journalism, Bob was the seminal event in our lives. He lives in our hearts every time we do something that is mission-driven, every time we reach beyond our suburban comfort levels and do something for people in Africa or Cambodia, every time we speak out against the insanity and inanity of the current administration in Washington. It’s no surprise that the Massachusetts Congressional delegation is dominated by Bob’s mentees, especially Barney Frank. The timing of these losses is exquisite in a painful way.

JOE DUNPHY WRITES: MARCH ON NBC

I saw a brief crawl on WNBC-TV, New York, noting that the station is up for licence renewal around June, 2007. If you’re looking for a spot to have a march on the media, here is an event worth highlighting. GE/NBC has many things to account for, including their failure, with many other media conglomerates, to cut through the fog of propaganda around WMD’s. GE, BTW, is one of the bigger corporate beneficiaries of globalization.

Brian Williams of NBC covered the story of the Turner Cartoon Network marketing itself with devices in public places that freaked out the city of Boston which feared it was under attack:

Judy Newman writes from Atlanta, home of the Turner Broadcasting (now run by Time Warner, not Ted Turner):

“I just caught the end of Brian Williams’ story re yesterday’s event in Boston on this evening’s Nightly News. Someone was saying something to the effect, “I wouldn’t expect this from The Cartoon Network. Maybe AlJazeera, but not the Cartoon Network.”

Turner Apologizes for Adult Swim Promotion
Promotional Stunt Shut Down Boston
http://www.tvweek.com/news.cms?newsId=11479

OR ARE WE LIVING IN A CARTOON?

Mary Fox writes about Sundance:

The fact that Sundance has been colonized by the spreading virus of Hollywood hype is an inevitable process that has befallen every attempt that has ever been made to build something intended to escape the gaping maw of the corporate world. When Rupert Murdoch has bought out MySpace, what can you say. The so-called independent film medium itself has long since become a joke, as the mega-studios all jumped aboard the bandwagon and established their own “boutiques” but, recalling the whole Michael Moore saga with “F-9/11″ and Miramax, how can you seriously call this “independent”?

Undoubtedly Redford’s money has kept the Sundance undertaking afloat before the mainstream glommed onto it, but possibly what would be more productive now would be for the makers of the types of films no longer considered “suitable” for Sundance to work together to create their own space, utilizing the internet not just as a marketing tool but as a low cost distribution mechanism. Recording artists who have taken this route have succeeded in carving out a living while preserving their integrity and freedom from the indentured servitude of the music industry.

ON MOLLY IVINS

Anthont Zurcher was Molly’s editor at the Creator’s Syndicate:

If there was one thing Molly wanted us to understand, it’s that the world of politics is absurd. Since we can’t cry, we might as well laugh. And in case we ever forgot, Molly would remind us, several times a week, in her own unique style.

Shortly after becoming editor of Molly Ivins’ syndicated column, I learned one of my most important jobs was to tell her newspaper clients that, yes, Molly meant to write it that way. We called her linguistic peculiarities “Molly-isms.” Administration officials were “Bushies,” government was in fact spelled “guvment,” business was “bidness.” And if someone was “madder than a peach orchard boar,” well, he was quite mad indeed.

Of course, having grown up in Texas, all of this made sense to me. But to newspaper editors in Seattle, Chicago, Detroit and beyond — Yankee land, as Molly would say — her folksy language could be a mystery. “That’s just Molly being Molly,” I would explain and leave it at that.

But there was more to Molly Ivins than insightful political commentary packaged in an aw-shucks Southern charm. In the coming days, much will be made of Molly’s contributions to the liberal cause, how important she was as an authentic female voice on opinion pages across the country, her passionate and eloquent defense of the poorest and the weakest among us against the corruption of the most powerful, and the joy she took in
celebrating the uniqueness of American culture — and all of this is true.

But more than that, Molly Ivins was a woman who loved and cared deeply for the world around her. And her warm and generous spirit was apparent in all her words and deeds.

Doug Latimer writes:

To be honest, Molly was on the periphery of my consciousness. I probably learned more about her watching a segment today, done in ‘04, on DEMOCRACY NOW! than I had in all the years since I’d become aware of her.

Even so, I appreciated what I’d seen of her wit and fire. I wished she’d been more excoriative of our Dear Leader (e.g., she states in the DN! piece that she doesn’t think he’s “mean” … oy) … but perhaps that’s indicative of a nature that depises the evil that men do, but not the perps themselves. Is that fair to say?

That aside, she put her ass out there when she didn’t have to … and that’s the quintessential definition of a mentsch to me. It’s a quality in short supply … and it hurts to lose someone like that.

So there’s nothing for it but to go out and raise holy hell, is there? I don’t imagine she’d mind the noise.

ON THE MARCH

Ira Richards writes:

I liked your Znet commentary on the Jan 27 peace march in Washington. I was also disappointed by the lack of media coverage, but not too surprised. I had hoped that “the mainstream media” would dutifully follow once it realized which way the wind blew, but after the Republicans lost the mid-terms and with polls consistently showing significant majorities opposed to the war, it is no longer possible to ascribe press, TV and radio inattention to timidity alone. The myth of the media as watchdog should be dead and buried once and for all. The various branches of the media are just cogs in the controlling machinery, under the direction of the wealthy elite mentors of this nascent fascist regime. Goebbels would be proud.

As for the quoted dismissive comment by one of the airhead TV “personalities”, that the usual sort of people attended, I met people there who hadn’t protested before, archetypal next door neighbors from the hinterland, like the van full of smiling folks we chatted with at the Metro station who had driven all nite from Tennessee. One of them told me that it was the first time he had participated in a demonstration, commenting that he wished that he had been paying closer attention to what was going on, and that he would have been out sooner if he had. There were also plenty of seasoned protesters, of course, but the remarkable thing is that so many ordinary people have finally figured out what Bush is up to, despite the collusive bias of the media.

Regarding the number of marchers, I must reluctantly admit that it didn’t “feel” like a half million souls on the street, though there certainly were not so few as to merit the “tens of thousands” description commonly used. Nor did I sense the boisterous optimism that permeated previous protests, though I might have been projecting my jaded resignation that Bush and the puppet master Cheney will not be stopped by marchers, no matter how numerous. Whether we influenced the cautious congress remains to be seen.

As a nation we have lost stature and credibility because we have permitted Bush and Cheney to commit horrible crimes in our name. I believe that we can only redeem ourselves in the eyes of the world if we repudiate their policies by removing them from office. Perhaps if a million of us turn out the next time the Dems will get some backbone. If you attend the next rally look for us there with a banner that says: “The Onus Is On Us: Defenestrate the Decider!”

SWISS RADIO COVERS THE MEDIA REFORM CONFERENCE

Mark writes from Mediachannel Europe in Geneva with these links to his reports.

http://www.freie-radios.net/portal/content.php?id=15256

http://www.freie-radios.net/portal/content.php?id=15273

Jayne Stahl: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, James Joyce who would have turned 125 years old tomorrow…born: February 2, 1882…

REVIEW: Ralph Nader, An Unreasonable Man
A new documentary gets down to the bone on the life and times of America’s consumer advocate
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/47500/

MICHAEL ALBERT’S NEW BOOK REMEMBERING TOMORROW

Our colleague Michael Albert who I first met in the heady days of anti-war activism at MIT has been a key player with Z Mag and ZNET. He has a new book out and we are delighted to tell you about it:

In this candid memoir of the American Left, veteran anticapitalist activist Michael Albert offers a characteristically unadorned personal account of recent American movements to transcend inequality. A uniquely visionary figure, Remembering Tomorrow recounts a life of uncompromising commitment, whether chronicling the battles against the Vietnam War and his own political awakening as a member of SDS or recounting the challenges of creating alternative social models, Albert strikes a balance between resistance and vision. Reflections on the life of a child of the sixties and would be physicist cum radical economist, Albert’s story is a lesson in the profound hope that inspires social change.”

The book includes, in its 450 pages and 34 chapters, the history of ZNet, Z, South End Press, Parecon, and much of the left from SDS to the WSF over the past forty years, including matters of belief, motives, values, organization and structure, funding, policy, people, and interpersonal relations.

The book page for Remembering Tomorrow is at http://www.zmag.org/remtom.html

ANNOUNCEMENT: CABLE POSITIVE

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Contact: Lauren Horowitz, Tel: 212.459.1502 E-mail:
Lauren@cablepositive.org
Web: http ://www.cablepositive.org/programs-tonycox.html

WEBSITE NAMES MY BOOK ON TOP LIST—LOOK AT THE COMPANY I AM IN

The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead by Max Brooks - Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison - The More You Watch, the Less You Know by Danny Schechter
LiveJournal.com

Ok, gang, that does it for me for this week. I am off to Yale, not jail and will have a full report. Next week, a trial in lower Manhattan comes to a conclusion the case of ROMERO vs AVEDA. The Native American musician Robbie Romero is suing the Aveda and Estee Lauder Company for not fulfilling promises to Native Americans in connection with a special range of goods developed for and sold by the company. Native American leaders including Chief Oren Lyons and Dennis Banks are expected to observe the final arguments on Monday morning at Thomas and West Broadway in Tribeca. I hope to be there in the latest chapter or the broken treaties saga of Native America.

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