What’s going on, #nerdland? The 2/18 preview

Good morning! In lieu of the video previews we hope to bring to you here on the blog, I offer Marvin Gaye. I feel confident we won’t hear any complaints.

We could not be more excited (and focused, and a little sleepy) up here in 30 Rock, eating the breakfast that the “Up w/ Chris Hayes” team so generously bought for us while we finish our preparations for this morning’s premiere edition of “Melissa Harris-Perry.” It only makes sense that we give you a heads-up about the terrific guests joining Melissa this morning.

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• Edward Cox, chairman of the New York Republican State Committee, and the late President Nixon’s son-in-law. He’ll join us to discuss the ever-rightward lurch of the Republican Party, a take on which you might not expect from Melissa.
• Baratunde Thurston, digital director of The Onion, comedian and co-founder of Jack & Jill Politics. Author of the recently-published (and hilarious) How to Be Black. Read Melissa’s review of it here.
• Chloe Angyal, freelance writer and editor at Feministing, where she blogs about gender, sex, politics, pop culture and body image. Currently writing her doctoral thesis on romantic comedies; read her recent Jezebel piece, “I Spent a Year Watching Rom-Coms and This is the Crap I Learned.”
• Peter Edelman, professor of Law at Georgetown University, and author of the upcoming “So Rich, So Poor: Why It’s So Hard to End Poverty in America.”
• Dorian Warren, assistant professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, and fellow at the Roosevelt Institute. Watch him talk about the “recession generation” with Melissa as she guest-hosted “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell” last summer.
• Touré, msnbc contributor and author of “Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness? What It Means to Be Black Now.” Both he and Jawn Murray, pop culture expert and lifestyle reporter, will join us to talk about the late Whitney Houston on the day she is laid to rest in Newark, NJ this morning.

Most of all, we’re looking forward to you all joining Melissa this morning. See you at 10:00am ET.