Geraldo Rivera

By ELIZABETH L. BLAND, Julia Cheng, Sora Song, VICTORIA RAINERT

Geraldo Rivera has left a cushy talk show on CNBC to report for Fox News from Afghanistan. The superstar war correspondent talked to TIME from Taloqan:

Q: What's your impression of the country?

A: This is worse than Beirut, man. I was there. This is worse than Bosnia, worse than Kosovo, worse than Colombia. This is the worst devastation of infrastructure I've ever seen.

Q: How much danger are journalists in?

A: I believe the eight dead journalists are policy; I don't think they're random. [The defeated Taliban] are filled with a bitter hatred of the West, and they see us as an extension of the army with which they are at war. We're squarely in the cross hairs.

Q: Are you happy you made the switch to Fox?

A: I'd rather be here than in Fort Lee, N.J. NBC had a vision of my role there, and I fought against it for three years. I need to be in an organization where I'm respected, and now I am.

Q: Has Bill O'Reilly treated you O.K.?

A: Yeah, you know, he's got his style. It's not my style. But there's room for all types; 24 hours of news, you can do anything you want.

Q: Can you ever cover O.J. Simpson again?

A: Oh, no, I couldn't do Simpson during that whole road-rage drama. I was so sick of him. I think of Gary Condit now--I just wanna go wash my hands. All of us in the '90s seemed to take a bunch of silly pills.