The result is a staggering work of reporting and storytelling.
Unlike a more nuanced work of reporting (say, George Packer's 2005 book on Iraq, "The Assassins' Gate"), Schmidle's project leaves us with few conclusions, few ideas of how to create function out of Pakistan's chaos.
The additional work of leading the PSGs was fairly limited; in fact, the meetings allowed cell coordinators time to collect, review, and discuss reports from all PSG members together at a single location, thus easing the work of reporting.
As a result of this elaborate architecture, the S. gigas shell exhibits a much greater damage tolerance than the calcium carbonate by itself, with a work of fracture reported to be three magnitudes of order greater.
One of these is a novel, one a biography, one a long work of reporting, the other a history.
But has the world ever seen as probing a work of zoological investigative reporting as "Unlikely Friendships: 47 Remarkable Stories From the Animal Kingdom"?
Journalism is an imperfect business, the work of reporting, understanding and writing about the complexity of human affairs.
"The Windsor claim relies on a single, vague literary allusion in a work of fiction," concluded the report.
In a footnote, the authors call their report "a work of journalism about a failure of journalism".
(For a longer discussion of the Report as a work of political theory, see here or my recent book on Moynihan).
