Helping Iraqis Who Give Help

I met Kirk Johnson about five years ago, when he was about to graduate from the University of Chicago with a degree in Near Eastern studies. Since then, he went on to complete a Fullbright in Cairo, work in Fallujah, and maintain a now-defunct blog called US Amnesia (where he interviewed such notable scholars as Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn).

The reason I mention him now is that yesterday The New York Times published a letter of his that I think you should read. It echoes an important point he made last December in the Los Angeles Times. And while you're at it, check out his piece in The Washington Post Magazine about the harrowing experience he had in Iraq, and why his time there came to a premature end.

Important things for us to be aware of, I think.