She was "drugs and thugs". I can appreciate the idea of making Taliban membership a bar to government but I worry that the barrier would make recovery too slow. Governing in Afghanistan has been a very tenuous thing historically. The current government has to figure out a new President come this August and the current President's term is up in June or July. There is a whole debate about whether he or someone else should be president in the interim. There is a lot of corruption in the government. But it is the best we've got. It may not work. Lord knows that plenty of other groups have tried to impose some sort of government on Afghanistan and failed. It is by no means a sure deal that we will have any success what so ever. I can only hope we do and if we do, it will be by working with moderate elements to establish a new on the ground reality that gradually moves away from the old realities and figure out a system that allows for future change.
Judah On Sun, Mar 8, 2009 at 11:25 PM, LRS Scout <[email protected]> wrote: > > I think like Iraq we should make Taliban membership a bar to serving in > government, it may take us longer to rebuild, but I feel the foundation will > be more solid. > > What part of DoS? Or was she "State" ;) > > I did mention the OGAs specifically btw. > > -----Original Message----- > From: Judah McAuley [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Monday, March 09, 2009 2:19 AM > To: cf-community > Subject: Re: is this true - Obama hinting at negotiating with the Taliban? > > > The "she" in question was a State Department employee, so certainly > not a normal civilian. She lived in a hooch and fell asleep in a > blackhawk in full body armor. And hell yes, conditions are horrible in > Afghanistan. Even in the liberated cities. Especially for women. I > never said otherwise. But that does not mean that there are not > moderate elements which is what Michael said and what I took umbrage > at. > > We need to establish internal security in Afghanistan through its > armed forces and central government. And that will involve (near term > at the very least) substantial cooperation from far flung tribes that > have elements that currently support the Taliban or have in the past. > These groups need a reason to support the central government and to > build a local power base off of something other than opium and beating > women to death. Those are the moderates and I hope that they will > follow through and grow more tolerant over time. But it is not a quick > easy thing. I've got no great illusions there about how rapid change > will come. There are some impressive gains but it is not clear that > they will be held. > > What I decry is that the notion that there are no moderate elements > and things are just what they are and won't change. That thinking is > defeatist and useful. We have opportunities and we need to take the > best advantage of them that we can. Denying that there might be > moderate elements of the Taliban is far from useful. > > Judah > > > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:291059 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
