The Oval Office Felt Square to Some
Ask the CIA: the Public's Top 10 List
So what, exactly, do people think the CIA has been up to? Apparently not much good. On its website, the CIA posts documents from the past half-century that have been released to the public (most through Freedom of Information Act requests). The top 10 most popular search terms in October were:
10. Iran
9. Guatemala
8. Afghanistan
7. Bay of Pigs
6. Iraq
5. mind control
4. China
3. Area 51
2. Vietnam
And No. 1? That would be UFO.
Seven Years and a Lot of Legal Pads
It took Sen. Barbara Boxer seven years of cross-country flights and countless legal pads to make her literary debut, A Time to Run, a novel about a California Democrat and her effort to defeat a conservative Supreme Court nominee. Sound familiar? The plot, says Boxer, stems from her efforts to block an appeals court nominee. Lukewarm reviews aside, "if liberals read the book and it makes them happy," she says, "then I consider it a success."
Trans-Atlantic Partnerships
European officials hope the Israeli political shake-up won't interfere with what they see as stronger--and more effective--activism by the Rice State Department in the Mideast. A senior European official praised Rice's recent all-night negotiating session in Jerusalem for a Gaza access deal. "What Condi has done in these past days is great. We're exactly on the same line here," says the official, who enthuses about an "almost friction-free trans-Atlantic environment" of late in handling the Israeli-Palestinian issue.
Learning How the Other Half Lives
There's at least one liberal who wants to know how the other half lives. Seattle public-radio-show host John Moe spent a month immersed in conservative culture--forgoing the New York Times, resetting his radio from NPR to Rush Limbaugh, and making pilgrimages to the Reagan and Nixon libraries. He chronicles the ideological adventure in Conservatize Me, to be published by William Morrow next year. The hardest part? Listening to patriotic country and western songs. "Liberals have better music," he insists. But Moe also found conservatives to be funnier. "To be funny you have to have confidence," he says. "And you develop confidence when you rule the world."
With Kevin Whitelaw, Alex Kingsbury, Thomas Omestad and Richard J. Newman
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