COVER: Books Aren't Dead. (They're Just Going Digital.) (All overseas editions). Senior Editor and Columnist Steven Levy explores how technology is poised to change the way people read, write and publish works. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos believes he can improve upon one of humankind's most incredible device. This week Bezos will be releasing the Amazon Kindle, a handheld e-book device that can store hundreds of books in its memory. He hopes the device will leapfrog over previous attempts at e-readers and become the turning point in a transformation toward Book 2.0. While literary critics are bemoaning a possible demise of print culture, book lovers on the Internet are waiting for a chance to refurbish the dusty halls of literacy. "If you're going to do something like this, you have to be as good as the book in a lot of respects," says Bezos. "But we also have to look for things that ordinary books can't do." Levy also reports on other initiatives underway to digitize libraries. Also part of the cover package, as the first journalist to get his hands on the device, Levy reviews the Amazon Kindle, available Monday, November 19 at www.Newsweek.com.
Baghdad Comes Alive. Chief Foreign Correspondent Rod Nordland writes that for the first time in years, Baghdad is showing signs of life. "For someone who has returned periodically to Baghdad during these past four and a half years of war, there has been one constant: it only gets worse. The faces change, the units rotate, the victims vary, but it has always gotten worse ... For the first time, however, returning to Baghdad after an absence of four months, I can actually say that things do seem to have gotten better, and in ways that may even be durable," he writes. But the calm is all too fragile, and it's an opportunity that the government cannot afford to miss.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70990
Condi's Southern Strategy. Senior Editor Michael Hirsh writes that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice worries that the corrosive power of hopelessness has taken a hold in the Middle East. Palestinians and Israelis both know by now, she says, "that even ordinary people can be driven to violence if there's no hope." Rice draws a connection between the plight of the Palestinians and her history as a black woman in white America, a clear sign of how personally she's taking the mission to create a Palestinian state- a task that has obsessed and defeated many a secretary of State before her. "There is an image of the United States' frenetically trying to get the two sides to an agreement. It hadn't worked. So with all due respect I'll try it my way," she says.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70992
The Italian Love Affair. Guest columnist Mauro Suttora, a senior editor at Oggi, Italy's largest weekly magazine, writes that Italians have adored America for 60 years. "Ever grateful for liberation from the Nazis-and for introducing them to rock and roll, disco, 'Sex and the City' and the iPod. Rome was once the world's capital, but Italians are happy to acknowledge that the power has shifted to America."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70959
'A Freeway to Europe.' Special Correspondent Benjamin Sutherland reports on Croatia's progress since the wars that tore it apart more than a decade ago. Now this nation of 4.4 million people is on track to become the newest member of NATO and the European Union. Croatia's new A1 highway- built in six years, at a cost of ¤3 billion- winds 416 km from near the capital, Zagreb, south, and has been hailed as a "national pride," a "masterpiece" and the "freeway to Europe." The A1, however, is more than just a pretty highway. It is a symbol of everything that has gone right in the Balkan country.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70952
China's Secret Growth Engine. Contributing Editor Stephen Glain reports on Zhejiang province and why the once neglected region has always been ahead of the rest of Chinese business. Economists now hail the Zhejiang province for its bottom-up model of development and fearless regard for the global economy. It's also being watched as a bellwether for the Chinese economy.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70954
Dangerous Liaisons. Investigative Correspondents Mark Hosenball and Michael Isikoff report on the speculation that former FBI and CIA employee Nada Nadim Prouty, who pleaded guilty to defrauding the United States in a federal courtroom, is a "Hizbollah mole" with terrorist ties.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/71107
PROJECT GREEN: Feeling the Cool Breeze. Hong Kong Bureau Chief George Wehrfritz reports that building Asian cities on environmental principles is the fastest and cheapest way to reduce its demand for energy-and cut greenhouse-gas emissions.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70956
'It's All About Energy, Stupid!'. San Francisco Bureau Chief Karen Breslau reports that the presidential candidates, it seems, have figured out what venture capitalists and entrepreneurs have known for years: green is Topic A.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/69535
Toyota's Green Problem. Midwest Bureau Chief Keith Naughton reports that the environmental community has turned on Toyota, riding high not long ago as the auto world's green leader, for siding with Detroit in opposition to tougher new gas-mileage laws.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/69534
GLOBAL INVESTOR: Fly East for the Winter. Guest columnist Ruchir Sharma, head of emerging markets at Morgan Stanley Investment Management, writes that Central and Eastern Europe is in the middle of a growth miracle that parallels East Asia in the 1970s and '80s. "For a long period of time in East Asia, the continent's small-to midsize economies fed off each other's success, growing quickly ... The CE4 countries of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia have averaged growth rates of 5 percent, the Balkan nations of Romania and Bulgaria have grown at nearly 7 percent, and the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have expanded at 10 percent," he writes.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70962
WORLD VIEW: America the Unwelcoming. Newsweek International Editor Fareed Zakaria writes that despite the Bush administration and Congress's measures to improve air travel, data and anecdotal evidence suggest travelers looking to come to the United States still encounter problems. "The United States is the only major country in the world to which travel has declined in the midst of a global tourism boom," Zakaria writes. "And this is not about Arabs or Muslims. The number of Japanese visiting the United States declined from 5 million in 2000 to 3.6 million last year. The numbers have begun to increase, but by 2010 they're still projected to be 19 percent below 2000 levels. During this same span (2000-2010), global tourism is expected to expand 44 percent."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70991
LAST WORD: Imran Khan Pakistani Opposition Politician. Shortly before his arrest, Imran Khan, the Pakistani cricket legend and opposition politician who spent 11 days in hiding after President Pervez Musharraf declared emergency rule, told Newsweek that he is frustrated by the Bush administration's continued support for Musharraf. "George Bush is creating anti-Americanism in Pakistan ... Militancy and radicalization in Pakistan are increasing at such a phenomenal rate now that we actually think that our future is at stake. All thanks to Musharraf. And for this one man, Bush is going to sacrifice 160 million Pakistanis as if they were sheep? He is worse than the Shah of Iran," he says.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/70374
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