Breaking News Alert
The New York Times
Tue, October 27, 2009 -- 9:10 PM ET
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Brother of Afghan President Is on C.I.A. Payroll, Officials Say

Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of the Afghan president and a
suspected player in the country's booming illegal opium
trade, gets regular payments from the Central Intelligence
Agency, and has for much of the past eight years, according
to current and former American officials.

The agency pays Mr. Karzai for a variety of services, and
those financial ties and the agency's close working
relationship with him raise significant questions about
America's war strategy, which is currently under review at
the White House.

OK, I'm officially double-plus unhappy with the Afghan expedition. Mostly because a small, minority of Americans are fighting this war on behalf of a majority who couldn't be bothered to lift a finger when it comes to national service or even community service. We cannot kill our way out of this problem and I don't know if we have the troops to secure the Mountainous and Tribal regions of Afghanistan, especially since they just flee to the Pakistan side of the border. At the same time, we can't allow Afghanistan to continue to be a narco/terror state, it is one of many, but the answer is economic development and Secular democracy that creates an environment that is secure to do business in. We don't have the money in the treasury to do this the old fashioned way, so I better hear some new ideas that not longer include breeches in International Law, because when we sign a treaty, it's the law of this land, not just, over there, otherwise no treaty process would ever be pursued. Afghanistan needs a sustainable agricultural transition from Poppy's to a crop that will provide enough for their self-interests more then growing Opium. That means we need cops on the beat to protect these rural regions from the Taliban when Coalition forces aren't there. The only way to do that is with a physical police presence to execute the law on behalf of the people. The military isn't designed to enforce the law, they're designed to destroy enemies, so we need cops on the beat. That means going to the UN, and bolstering International Law such that UN police forces have teeth to enforce the legal process and we need to use not only carrots, but sticks when it comes to encouraging our allies with common interests to send "police", as you train as many of the locals to enforce their democratic sourced laws as possible.

I have a problem with drone assassination and I have problem with Al-Qaeda running around unencumbered. We need a better legal framework for dealing with irrational actors and their groups, and that framework starts with understanding that when a tiny minority group believes that violence is part of their political solution that we enforce the law such that it doesn't compromise the legitimate political process. Like The Manson Family, this is a police issue, and not a military issue. We need to prevent the conditions that allow people to turn to terror from forming. Poverty, Hunger, Corruption, these are the enemies of the will of the people, which is contrary to the democratic mission, but we can't proceed like Dick Cheney and George W. Bush, because history has shown over and over again that we need a new way other then war to progress our international political ecosystem. Bin Ladin wants us to over react, kill the people we're supposedly protecting, and create anti-West sentiment. I say spite the Devil, and find a way that allows the interests of the people to be met without killing them.