An Incredible Loss

I noticed a few minutes ago that I placed Steven Vincent's book, In The Red Zone, in my left sidebar quite a while back and have kept it there because I loved the book and wanted to make it available to Byrd Droppings readers. (I only post Amazon links for items that I have read or watched and highly recommend.) When I saw the link a few minutes ago I realized that I did not cross-post the terrible news of Steven Vincent's murder in Iraq that I posted at Polipundit late Tuesday night. Below is that post: [

UPDATE: Arthur Chrenkoff has a moving post on the news of the death of his friend, Steven Vincent. Do not miss it. Jeff Harrell also shares his memories of his friend, Steven, and some of the emails he received from him.]

I just heard on CNN that Steven Vincent has been found shot and killed in Basra, Iraq. I read his excellent book, In The Red Zone, last year. Since this was someone I read and whose writing I greatly admired, the news hit me much like the news of Michael Kelly's death did. I will update when more information is available.

UPDATE 2:10 a.m.: The In The Red Zone site has no mention of Vincent's death yet . This is the most recent entry there as of this posting: "Steven has a piece on Basra in the July 31 New York Times."

UPDATE 2:30 a.m.: Michelle Malkin already has a post up with a news account and quite a few links. I will be reading back through my copy of In The Red Zone tonight and will be posting some quotes, although it may not be until in the morning. I heard an interview with Vincent quite a while back in which he made the excellent point that he was surprised that the cause of women's rights was not being stressed more strongly during the debate on Iraq, as it had been in Afghanistan. I have an unfinished draft post that I thought I might put in article form based on some of his statements on that topic, but I just never got around to finishing it. He was extremely intelligent and, as Michelle said, "fearless." His voice will be sorely missed.

UPDATE 2:45 a.m.: The following is the first paragraph of my draft post that I wrote sometime last year:

Wednesday morning I heard Steven Vincent make a statement that made a lot of sense to me. He is a freelance writer that paid his own way to Iraq to report the story there "unhampered by media or institutional bias". He said that he is not a PC guy, but that his experiences in the Middle East had turned him into a raging feminist. He said that he was really surprised that we were not using the feminist angle more frequently when explaining the good things that are happening in Iraq.

There is a link in this post to an excerpt from Vincent's book.

UPDATE 12:00 p.m.: Late last night when I heard the news of Steven Vincent's death I was upset that I had not done more to spread the word about his incredible book and blog, In The Red Zone. Buy the book, or look for it at you library. You will zip through it and want to go back and read it again later. He was so incredibly talented and his account of what he saw in Iraq is unlike any I have seen anywhere else. Now as I read items written by his friends, I am sad that I did not get to know him. The radio interview I heard him give stuck in my mind for all these months, not just for what he said, but for how engaging and energetic he was about the subject. As La Shawn Barber said, "I didn’t take the time to get to know him, and now it’s too late."

La Shawn posted this quote from Bryan Preston: “The thing about Steven that set him apart from most journalists in Iraq was his courage. He didn’t spend his time trading rumors in the green zone hotels. He actually went out into Iraq and explored it, trying to make sense of things. He didn’t go over there as some experienced Crocodile Dundee type, either.”

La Shawn is collecting links to things being written about Steven Vincent today and has posted a link to his NRO archive. If you have never read Steven Vincent, go and read him now. If you have read him before, I am sure you are have already been going back and re-reading the work of this very brave and brilliant man.

UPDATE:  More here from the Christian Science Monitor.

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