AL KAMEN

Kamen writes the In the Loop column for the WaPo and has a few nuggets in it every so often. Here are a few I liked:

Let's face it, the media continue to emphasize the bad news out of Iraq and absolutely refuse to highlight the important good news coming out of there of late.

Fortunately, the Republican National Committee puts out a weekly "Iraq Facts" page on its Web site that focuses on all the good news out of Iraq. This week's "Other Good News" section tells us: "Baghdad is to get its first water park and wave machine -- thanks to a Scottish company" called Murphy's Waves.

The RNC cites a report on the Web site of Scotland's Glasgow Daily Record a couple of weeks ago, quoting Murphy's international sales manager, Jim Stuart , who says he's "delighted to be involved in this project and it shows that rebuilding in Iraq really is happening."

The wave-machine pool project has been in the works for a couple of years, he said, when someone from a company called Baghdad Pools called and said he wanted to build a "fun pool for the city."

What better way to cope with the coming brutally hot summer in Baghdad with temps hitting 120 degrees? In the prewar days you might have had air conditioning, but electricity is still not up to prewar levels -- even to WWII levels.

So why not ride the great waves? LINK

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There was a most unseemly public friction last week between Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice over whether tactical mistakes had been made in Iraq.

Rice had said there were lots; Rumsfeld, dismissing her as if she were a reporter, said there weren't any.

"How are things between you and the secretary of defense?" NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams asked Rice on Thursday, after the two secretaries had lunch with national security adviser Stephen Hadley .
"Couldn't be better," Rice said, apparently seriously. "I think that what the secretary said was that he hadn't seen what I said."

Uh, no. Rumsfeld said: "I don't know what she was talking about, to be perfectly honest." In addition, he said her comment might reflect "a lack of understanding . . . of what warfare is about." LINK

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The No. 1 reading material on the Condoleezza Rice - Jack Straw tour to Iraq this week was the book "Cobra II," an inside account of the Iraq war by Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor .

Both U.S. and British officials accompanying the secretary of state and the British foreign secretary were engrossed in reading it as they flew back and forth to Baghdad from England. The book contains an appendix with a series of secret British memos critical of the U.S. occupation, written by diplomat John Sawers , who just happened to be part of the Rice-Straw meetings in Iraq.

The book also recounts how British officers were appalled when Gen. Tommy Franks showed his officers the movie "Gladiator" before the invasion to inspire them.