Here in Los Angeles, it isn't acceptable to be anything less than superlative, whether we're talking about a child's grades or her parents' sagging nasolabial folds.

We are all about being the best, whether that requires the ministrations of a syringe-wielding dermatologist, a deft colorist or a personal trainer.

In this information age, the American occupying forces in Iraq have come face to face with a terrible reality: the insurgents have become at least as savvy in conducting information warfare.

In an increasingly shrinking and highly interconnected infosphere, distinctions between foreign and domestic are fast disappearing.

China is now powerful and influential enough to make American world dominance inconceivable. And in the longer term, China is bent upon and will achieve gross military and economic parity with the United States.

China is methodically following the example of Meiji Japan.

Though the dangers of epidemics and terrorist nuclear attacks are now obviously pre-eminent, rising behind them is a newer world yet.

India is courting, and being courted.

The country is beginning to escape its preoccupation with Pakistan.

A powerful bomb killed at least 10 people, 9 of them civilians, when it exploded Friday afternoon near an army truck parked in a crowded outdoor market in Quetta.

You have to remember that Republicans have a different relationship to ideas than Democrats. When Democrats open their mouths, they try to say something interesting. If the true thing is obvious and boring, the liberal person will go off and say something original, even if it is completely idiotic. This is how deconstructionism got started.

Prodded by the United States, Pakistan began an offensive along its northwest border this spring to flush out forces of Al Qaeda that had escaped from Afghanistan and to help find bin Laden.

But after suffering heavy casualties and causing civilian deaths that stirred opposition, the Pakistani Army declared victory two weeks ago and announced that bin Laden was not in Pakistan.

Many American intelligence officials are confident that he is, however -- and that he is as dangerous as ever.

The most intriguing, and potentially most important, dimension of the deal for the company is that it is IBM's China card.

The new Lenovo, folding in the IBM personal computer business, will be China's fifth-largest company. IBM is eager to help China with its industrial policy of moving up the economic ladder, by building the high-technology engine rooms to power modern corporations and government institutions with IBM services and software.

IBM is placing 10,000 of its employees, its brand for five years and some of its prestige in Lenovo's hands. There is a lot more at stake than the cash.

Today, there are two ways to create long-term value for information technology customers and shareholders. "Invest heavily in R&D and be the high-value innovation provider for enterprises, or differentiate by leveraging vast economies of scale, high volumes and price."

10x10 is an interactive exploration of the words and pictures that define the time.