From AP via CTV.ca:

Afghanistan's interior minister says there may be between 10,000 and 15,000 Taliban fighting inside his country, and the insurgent group is operating across about 17 provinces.

Mohammad Hanif Atmar offered a rare estimate of the size of his government's most organized and potent opponent during a visit to Washington.

So, the Afghan government has released information about something secret!

To get my reference, check out this Sept. 2, 2008 post: Taliban numbers probably up: former Cdn. ambassador to Afghanistan.

This is going to be a grim day for the history books in Denver.

The Rocky Mountain News will publish its last edition a few months shy of its 150th birthday.

Here's a Poynter.org post.

Robert Niles, editor of Online Journalism Review and a former RMN staffer, tweeted that he will have a post up in the a.m.

@100000words has the following contest going: Have you submitted your pick for the song that best describes the state of journalism? Winner gets a $25 Amazon GC http://tinyurl.com/ak6wdb

Here's my pick:

Why? Maybe it's the pints from earlier this evening talking, but the notion of an island civilization of poets and explorers doomed to sink beneath the waves, to live on only in legend, seems an apt metaphor for these troubled times.

"And as the elders of our time choose to remain blind, let us rejoice, and sing, and dance, and ring in the new -- Hail Atlantis!"

Gary Numan in the pretty-much-unavailable-but-not-forgotten film Urgh! A Music War. It fits my mood this evening, so here you go:

Marilyn Manson and the Foo Fighters, to name two, have covered this song. But I like this version.