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CircCess, a 35‐member library network, was moving toward a major system upgrade when it discovered that the planned system would not support Boolean functions. An alternative approach to providing a shared catalog and linked circulation functions was sought, resulting in a CD‐ROM‐based solution. The process of developing the concept, unexpected problems associated with selecting a vendor, delays and problems resulting from an expansion of the original concept, and related issues are detailed.

The arms of the fog slowly enfolded the city behind us until we seemed a thousand miles at sea. Suddenly up ahead loomed the place they called “The Rock.” It looked bigger than Gibraltar—like some ghostly liner carrying lost souls to the nether world. Come to think of it, that wasn't a bad analogy. After all, hundreds of careers had ended inside those granite, escape‐proof walls. “The Rock” was a vale of tears, no doubt about it.

Velda stared at the airport carousel as the first bags of luggage made their appearance.

AGILE II is a full service utility providing shared cataloging in eight MARC formats with access to local data, database management, inter library loan, electronic mail, subject searching, authority control and other features. The adoptation of AGILE II and the MARC format to support community (agency and program) information suggests imaginative applications for similar systems. Two sidebars discuss installations of AGILE II.

The LS/2000 integrated library system at Carnegie‐Mellon University has been enhanced to include an Information Function. Existing, as well as planned functions, screen displays, and selection options are described and illustrated. Options include announcements, guides to book locations, library hours, access to library guides and bibliographies, library policies and services, and information describing the use of the LS/2000 online catalog.

As CD‐ROM becomes more and more a standard reference and technical support tool in all types of libraries, the annual review of this technology published in Computers in Libraries magazine increases in size and scope. This year, author Susan L. Adkins has prepared this exceptionally useful bibliography which she has cross‐referenced with a subject index.

Despite its stated intention to be independent, impartial and thorough, the 9-11 Commission was none of the three. The Commission was structurally compromised by bias-inducing connections to subjects of the investigation, and procedurally compromised, among other reasons, by (1) its failure to take up promising lines of inquiry and its failure to try to force the release of key documents that were closely guarded by the Bush administration, the FBI and various intelligence agencies; (2) its distortion of information about pre-9-11 military preparedness, foreknowledge of the attacks or attacks of like-kind; and (3) omissions of information related to the funding of the plot and the specific whereabouts of key officials on the morning of September 11, 2001.

These structural compromises and procedural failings converged to assure that the Commission would not challenge core elements of the “official story” of the 9-11 attacks. This failure was compounded by the Commission's desire to produce a final report that would read as a “historical narrative” rather than as an exhaustive set of findings on the critical unanswered questions that arose after the attacks. The Commission's unquestioning acceptance of the official narrative also meant that it missed a perhaps larger opportunity to challenge key myths associated with American exceptionalism. Thus, the 9-11 Commission ultimately functioned as an instrument of cultural hegemony, extending and deepening the official version of events under the guise of independence and impartiality.