On the best lede ever, and a Dixie Chicks roundup

Okay, so the Dixie Chicks made it onto the cover of Time magazine for their new album and completely unpenitent return to country music after a self-imposed three-year exile (a summary of the article can be found at CNN.com). The lead paragraph is the stuff of dreams:

Natalie Maines is one of those people born middle finger first.

As a high school senior in Lubbock, Texas, she'd skip a class a day in an attempt to prove that because she never got caught and some Mexican students did, the system was racist.

After Maines joined the Dixie Chicks, and the Dixie Chicks became the biggest-selling female group in music history -- with suspiciously little cash to show for it -- she and her bandmates told their record label, Sony, they were declaring themselves free agents. (In the high school that is Nashville, this is way worse than skipping class.)

In other Dixie Chicks news:

Bill O'Reilly gets tole by Natalie Maines, courtesy of TBogg.

Pat Boone thinks he is someone and calls the Chicks to task for their criticism of the President, who deserves their support, much like he supported President Clinton once 'pon a time (courtesy of Sadly, No!).

As of today, Taking the Long Way was ranked as the most heavily downloaded album on iTunes, "Not Ready to Make Nice" was the 52nd most downloaded track, and the album was the top seller at Amazon.com. It's been described as "the best Dixie Chicks album few may buy" - or not.

And for those who have been writing breathless letters to local newspapers, aghast that the Dixie Chicks still refuse to apologize for the 2003 comments, which they refer to as "The Incident" - they just released a single called "Not Ready to Make Nice," which proclaims their unreadiness to make nice. They could have called it "Don't Look for an Apology, Because Bush Is Still Fucking Things Up." They could have called it "I Have to Flip You the Middle Finger in a Song." Y'all, come on.