It's a good thing

[Leslie Savan]

    The press is quoting Martha Stewart's signature line a lot these
days: "It's a good thing." It's a good way to imply that she's done a
bad thing.
    I THINK I heard "It's a good thing" (with just a dab of irony) long
before it became a Martha shtick. But maybe I'm wrong. And I really have
no sense of the chronology.
    Does anyone know if Stewart "coined" it--as much as one can coin
these four words strung together? Or did she merely popularize it, and
did people started saying it more because of Martha, maybe even feeling
Martha-like as they said it? Or was it already an entrenched popular
phrase, and did Martha just borrow it as her own personal slogan? Any
ideas? Any chronology?