I’m back! And the dona­tion fund is less than $1000 from the magic $10,000 mark for the third expe­di­tion to Iraq. And by the time of depar­ture on May 12, that fund should be around $15,000. “Donations”:https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=callbritton%40nyc.rr.com&%0Aitem_name=Reports+from+the+%0AMiddle+East+by+an+independent+journalist are, of course, always wel­come.
As for the tim­ing, I’ll be fly­ing to Oslo on May 12, and then on to Amman, Jor­dan on May 16. I’ll be in Oslo speak­ing at a jour­nal­ism con­ven­tion, and the spon­sor­ing group has gra­ciously agreed to pick up the tab for the air fare. This is all con­firmed, thank­fully.
As for what I’ll be doing once I hit Jor­dan, that will be a lit­tle more impro­vi­sa­tional. The cur­rent secu­rity sit­u­a­tion in Iraq makes get­ting in to Bagh­dad almost impos­si­ble on a ground route, and stay­ing there might be unten­able. I can promise noth­ing at this point other than that I will assess the sit­u­a­tion as best as I can. Sev­eral friends of mine have turned back rather than go in. I hope to avoid that.
And as a bit of a teaser, this week­end I inter­viewed Muham­mad Baqr al-Najafi, the West Coast/American rep­re­sen­ta­tive for Grand Aya­tol­lah Ali al-Sistani. He was very can­did regard­ing the ayatollah’s thoughts about the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion, the interim law, Muq­tada al-Sadr and the occu­pa­tion. I’m work­ing on pitch­ing arti­cles based on this inter­view and hope to have the tran­script up in a few days. I think you’ll like it.

Hello every­one. I’m going to have to take a short break as I’m trav­el­ing this week­end. We will return next week. In the mean­time, I urge you to check out “Juan Cole”:http://www.juancole.com/, “Billmon”:http://www.billmon.org, “Josh Marshall”:http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com and “Atrios”:http://atrios.blogspot.com.
Also check out “the Agonist”:http://www.agonist.org/, “Intel Dump”:http://www.philcarter.blogspot.com/ and “Kevin Drum.”:http://www.washingtonmonthly.com

Well, well. Richard Clarke’s not the only one with a “sus­pi­ciously timed” book out. A cou­ple of entries from B2I have been anthol­o­gized in Never Threaten To Eat Your Co-Workers. It’s a fun book, with some really tal­ented authors. (Much more so than me, frankly.) Check out the FAQ.
From the back of the book:

Thanks to online Web jour­nals, or blogs as they’re affec­tion­ately nick­named by Net savvy voyeurs, any­one can jump into the shoes of a TV star, inter­na­tional jour­nal­ist, crim­i­nal court lawyer, video sales clerk and a busy mom, among oth­ers. These online diaries serve as an enter­tain­ing and edu­cat­ing cross-section of the peo­ple dwelling online.
The Best of Blogs fea­tures the most provoca­tive online writ­ing by unknown writ­ers and under­ground celebs. MTV’s The Real World’s cast mem­ber Neil For­rester gives new mean­ing to the phrase “Bite your tongue.” Star Trek: The Next Gen­er­a­tion actor Wil Wheaton gives his take on the Hol­ly­wood sys­tem and fleet­ing star­dom. Web designer Heather Hamil­ton finds her­self in the unem­ploy­ment line after pub­lish­ing work sto­ries in her blog, Dooce​.com. Humorist Choire Sicha gives advice on bro­ken hearts and time­shares. Illus­tra­tor Mark Frauen­felder throws out his cell phone and uproots his fam­ily from Los Ange­les to the sandy beaches of Raro­tonga. Plus tales of creepy video store cus­tomers, online love lies, Iraqi pol­i­tics, office pranks gone wrong, jury duty, a child­hood meet­ing with Darth Vader and so much more.

Alan Gra­ham and Bon­nie Bur­ton, the edi­tors, should really be com­mended for putting together this “best of the blo­gos­phere” for 2003. I’m really hon­ored to be included. And not to sound too self-serving, but I hope the book is a big suc­cess — these writ­ers deserve a lot more atten­tion in the wider world.