The publisher, fresh off the plane from Johannesburg, breezes into the office and props his feet on a desk. "The Colonel," as he likes to be called, discusses upcoming story ideas. Should next month's cover feature a new machine gun, which the Colonel himself tested in South Africa? What's the latest battlefront news from Afghanistan and El Salvador? The executive editor is there, but not the small-arms editor or the sniping-countersniping editor. The meeting soon breaks up, but not before the Colonel warns a staffer headed for Central America, "Be careful down there."
No, this is not the office of Vanity...