For those of us raised on beat-heavy pop, rhythm and blues, and rock, Mr. Reich’s infectiously rhythmic music was a path into “serious music,” a realm that might have once felt closed. Among Mr. Reich’s legions of fans must be many a rock, funk or hard-core devotee who came upon works like “Drumming,” or “Music for 18 Musicians” — two of his best known and most hypnotic percussion epics — and found themselves somehow changed.

Steve Reich’s Fascinating Rhythm

"I'm here to tell you that NBC is not some cold, corporate machine. It's people like me, trying to put their son through prep school and buy their daughter a horse."

Mark Cuban told an advertising conference last month that only a "moron" would buy YouTube.

That means you, Larry, Sergey, and Eric. Especially Eric, I suppose.

“It’s not about the video. It’s about creating a community around the video.”

There is no community in Google. If there's anything that could be Google's eventual undoing, it is this. I question whether buying YouTube could fix this.

Google’s largest investment to date was its $1 billion equity investment in Time Warner’s AOL subsidiary, which was part of a multiyear advertising deal.

I had no idea about that. What are they doing investing in AOL?

YouTube, Ready for Its Close-Up

The traditional media has been slow to come to grips with the American public's distrust and dislike of President Bush -- sentiments clearly reflected in opinion polls dating back well over a year.

Almost alone among the network newscasters, MSNBC's Keith Olbermann is channeling that sensibility. Channeling it -- and amplifying it.

In fact, the increasingly shrill Olbermann is fast becoming the Howard Beale of the anti-Bush era: He's mad as hell, and he's not going to take it anymore.

His newscast-ending "special comment" yesterday was a doozy. Here's the text ; here's the video.

"Increasingly shrill" is an apt characterization, but he's worth having around.

Where is that show, "I'm gonna kick your ass", anyway? I bet Keith would be great on that.

Olbermann's Special Comments

Timothy Naftali * offers a Harper's-style comparison of Rumsfeld and Robert McNamara.

Questionable presidential endorsement: Nixon calling Rumsfeld a "ruthless little bastard" (admiringly)

Following that Harper's link:

Percentage of Americans in May who believed that democracy would take hold in Iraq: 54

Number of the fourteen other nations surveyed where a majority believed this: 3

* (My review of Blind Spot now appears on the first page of results for a Google search on "Timothy Naftali".)

Tale of the Tape | Rumsfeld and McNamara

Rumsfeld's latest snowflake appears in today's Washington Post.

It was never going to be an easy mission. Not all the news about Afghanistan is encouraging. And yet, for all of the challenges the Afghan people face, there are many promising indicators.

Building a new nation is never a straight, steady climb upward. Today can sometimes look worse than yesterday -- or even two months ago. What matters is the overall trajectory: Where do things stand today when compared to what they were five years ago?

In Afghanistan, the trajectory is a hopeful and promising one.

Afghanistan: Five Years Later, By Donald H. Rumsfeld

Richard Clarke gets an opportunity to explain why Clinton plugged his book, like, twenty times, during that heated exchange with Chris Wallace. (He doesn't seem happy about it. I imagine his phone has been ringing off the hook with talk-show interview requests, which he is not inclined to take.)

Also, I don't think Clarke likes Cheney:

... ham-handed attempts to erroneously link Iraq with the Qaeda attacks ...

And he doesn't like Bush's direction to Hayden:

Particularly troublesome to me ... was the National Security Agency’s illegal wiretapping of phones ...

He also calls out Bush (and Tenet? Goss? Negroponte?):

... also the abandoning of our treaty obligations under the Geneva Conventions by engaging in "alternative interrogation techniques" at the CIA's secret prisons.

He can turn a phrase:

... some in government have been waving the bloody shirt -- scaring voters with the hobgoblin of Al Qaeda to reap political advantage.

Blinded by Hindsight

O’Hanlon doesn't have much to say here, but the data in the chart are worthy of your review.

On balance, the data suggest that while Iraq is not lost, the United States and its allies there are hardly winning either.

In that vein, interestd readers should also check out the RAND report, Shaping the Future Air Force.

The State of Iraq: An Update

... Congress recklessly decided to funnel extra money to the Air Force’s irrelevant F-22 stealth fighter. ... Congress prefers lavishing billions on Lockheed Martin ...

... emergency measures have taken a heavy toll on ... the career decisions of some of the Army’s most promising young officers.

... the Pentagon concedes that no large withdrawals from either country are likely for the foreseeable future.

... the Pentagon and Congress remain in an advanced state of denial.

America’s Army on the Edge

President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan tried to convince President Bush on Friday that a deal he approved with tribal leaders in one of the country’s most lawless border areas would rid the areas of Qaeda and Taliban influence, rather than give the groups more freedom to operate.

Mr. Bush and his national security aides were clearly skeptical, according to administration officials, but at a news conference, Mr. Bush appeared to take General Musharraf’s assurances at face value. General Musharraf knew that there were enough questions in the air about the accord that he felt compelled to explain that “this deal is not at all with the Taliban; as I said, this is against the Taliban, actually.”

I'm sure that's just what he was telling the mullahs across the negotiating table. To the extent his statement is true, it is of this nature: "If you would be so kind as to refrain from the use of the words "Taliban" and "Qaeda" in your written correspondence, telephone calls, emails, IM sessions, etc., that would really help me out. TIA, Mushy :)"

General Musharraf, who has a book coming out on Monday ...

I read that and thought, Whaa?

Indeed, Musharraf's book, In the Line of Fire: A Memoir, is currently at #46 on the Amazon top sellers list. Among books in pre-order status, it's #9. Among non-fiction pre-orders, it's #4.

Update: The book is now at #41.
Update #2: As of opening day, the book is at #12 overall.

I found this amusing:

General Musharraf said the agreement had "three bottom lines."

But not as amusing as this exchange:

When asked about the issue at the East Room news conference, General Musharraf refused to answer the question — not on national security grounds, but on the grounds that it would violate his book contract. “I am launching my book on the 25th, and I am honor-bound to Simon & Schuster not to comment on the book before that day,” he said.

After laughter subsided, Mr. Bush said, “In other words, buy the book.”

Presumably it's Bush's recommendation that has propelled the book to its present status. Still, they're no match for the duo of Chomsky and Chavez.

For the backstory on this exchange, see this; the "issue" mentioned above is the alleged threat issued by the US to Pakistan in the wake of 9/11.

As ever, I got as much out of the last sentence in a story as the first:

On Thursday, asked if he knew the whereabouts of Mr. bin Laden, Mr. Karzai smiled and said: “If I said he was in Pakistan, President Musharraf would be mad at me. And if I said he was in Afghanistan, it would not be true.”

Musharraf Defends Deal With Tribal Leaders

The Democrats are not fans of this report, calling it "unsophisticated."

Al Qaeda leaders wait patiently for the right opportunity to attack.

Al-Qaeda has metastasized its scale of influence by reaching out to like-minded Islamist extremist groups and inspiring new groups and individuals to emerge and carry out independent attacks.

We are not looking at Muslims who practice their faith fundamentally -- there is nothing wrong with practicing religion in a fundamental way.

"Not that there's anything wrong with that."

Intelligence experts agree that the funding to al-Qaeda amounts to much less than is raised by other terrorist groups, such as Hamas and Hezbollah.

I would be more concerned if bin Laden was able to attract hundreds of thousands of people to a widely publicized, televised rally in the hinterlands of the Northwest Frontier.

The report includes a short (one paragraph) sidebar on al-Suri, who was discussed at length in some of the recent articles I've recommended.

There's a figure entitled "The Terrorist Network in America" which shows an extensive presence by a wide variety of organizations. The text is vague as to what this means, but it suggests the activities are mostly fund-raising.

The minority view, led by Jane Harman, is interesting:

This paper is ... merely an assemblage of press clippings. ... This "threat assessment" adds no new information to the nation's understanding of the challenges ... The Committee should evaluate ... the value of the President's Domestic Surveillance Program. ... Has the program produced any results?

al-Qaeda: The Many Faces of an Extremist Threat | HPSCI [PDF]