Hikers, Taliban, and Blood Diamonds (Tuesday's Second Hour)

Hi everyone. While working on this review this afternoon my power went out for no apparent reason than that Ameren is evil. So...I lost it and now don't have time to do it again properly. Sorry about that. I do want to make a couple of comments though. I see they've moved on from James Kim now that they have three hikers to follow. The piece probably shouldn't have kicked off the hour, but other than that I had no problem with it. Anderson's piece on the Taliban was very good and I'm glad to see them keeping on that story. I also enjoyed the interview with George Packer, but I do have to nitpick the use of the term "jihadist". As my Muslim friend (I totally need to get a picture of me pointing at her like Stephen Colbert and his black ex-friend) Liberation337 points out, the word is not synonymous with terrorist. She gave me this definition:

Jihad: is an Islamic term, meaning to strive or struggle in the way of God, and is sometimes referred to as "the sixth pillar of Islam", although it has no official status.[1] Jihad has a wider meaning in Islamic literature. It can be striving to lead a good Muslim life, praying and fasting regularly, being an attentive spouse and parent or working hard to spread the message of Islam.

The news media as a whole needs to do a better job at understanding these terms and passing that knowledge on to the viewers. I wasn't sure what the purpose of the Gary Tuchman piece on the 1955 shooting spree was, but it was pretty appalling that guy only did five years in a facility and now walks free. The Jeff Koiange pieces were great, as always. The Congo makes me so sad, but it's good to see Botswana doing well. The "How Far Would You Go?" piece made me realize that apparently CNN won't go very far because it was a repeat we just saw. Geez. The Shot was of some guy on yahoo doing a Rubik's cube in less than two minutes. Blindfolded. I was never very good at those stupid things. My cousin could rock it though. Tom Foreman admits he used to peel the stickers off. Cheater! Actually, I think most people did that. Anderson said he doesn't have the mentality to do it, but he strikes me as one of those people who wouldn't be able to let it go until he solved it. Well, that's all folks.

Did the pieces on blood diamonds make you think twice about your jewelry? Who kicked butt at the Rubik's cube?