Rest in peace

Steven Vincent, U.S. freelance journalist, has been killed in Iraq. Vincent maintained a blog that I had unfortunately been unaware of before reading of his death on CNN. It sounds like he was a wonderful guy.

Vincent was an eyewitness to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and traveled twice to Iraq afterward, paying his own way and "traveling without security or official connections, living by his wits," according to the Spence Publishing site.

The result was his book, "In the Red Zone: A Journey into the Soul of Iraq," published late last year. Vincent dedicated the book to those who lost their lives in the attacks.

"I stood that morning on the roof of my building in lower Manhattan and watched United Airlines Flight 175 strike the south tower of the World Trade Center," Vincent said in a December 2004 interview with Frontpage Magazine.

"At that moment, I realized my country was at war -- because of the 1993 attack on the Trade Center, I figured our enemy was Islamic terrorism -- and I wanted to do my part in the conflict. I'm too old to enlist in the armed services, so I decided to put my writing talents to use."