If you haven't seen it yet, take some time and read these two stories from the Washington Post this week.

The two-part series on Dick Cheney and the showdown between Justice and the White House over the secret surveillence program is amazing reporting - it's also worth checking out the earlier stories in the "Angler" series on Cheney, and I'm definitely going to want to check out the book when it comes out.

It's this sort of thing that keeps me going to the front door in the morning to pick up the Post. Often enough, I'll think the paper is overrated - the local coverage, especially, doesn't stand out from any other major metro paper.
But then a series like this comes along, or some excellent Olympics coverage, or a long-form feature story, and it makes up for all the mediocre days. It's the stories that take a long-term investment of time that make the paper great, and it's those stories that are often the first ones cut as media outlets try to beat the economy by cutting back on coverage.