HAMID ALL THE DESTRUCTION

I told you so!! Go back and read what I wrote about President Obama's decision to send

more soldiers to Afghanistan. I was and am against it. I observed the government was corrupt;

but what's worse is that the people of Afghanistan have no confidence in their President, Hamid

Karzai. In fact, some Afghans have joined the Taliban because of how offensive Karzai's

administration is. I also pointed out the parallels between Afghanistan and our past experience

with Vietnam; in particular, a regime so corrupt that President Kennedy approved a coup to

remove one corrupt administration only to install another equally corrupt administration.

In a series of speeches, Karzai has accused the United States of trying to "dominate" his

country. He accuses U.S. and NATO officials of falsely charging him with trying to steal the

recent presidential elections in which more than one million bogus votes were identified, his

brother being the prime suspect. Karzai attacked the Obama administration, accusing it of

meddling in internal Afghan affairs; conveniently ignoring the fact that he recently attempted

to take over the nation's election commission by replacing the commissioners with his own

hand-picked apparatchiks.

In a speech to tribal elders, Karzai said no American military actions will proceed in their

areas without them being notified. Analysts believe Karzai was, in effect, giving them veto

power over U.S. troop movements which would totally defeat any justification for having

American troops in Afghanistan. The icing on the cake, however, was when Karzai invited

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Kabul for a state visit. Ahmadinejad delivered

an anti-American tirade accusing the U.S. of every crime possible against humanity.

Thomas Friedman, the New York Times resident Iraq war cheerleader, recently reacted

to Karzai's speeches by asking "...so this is why we've sacrificed the lives of thousands of U.S.

soldiers? This is why we have spent over $200 billion to pull Afghanistan out of the Dark

Ages?" Friedman says we cannot be successful in Afghanistan with Karzai in power and

ultimately he will break our hearts. I couldn't agree more.

The Obama administration has virtually no leverage over Karzai. Obama flew to Kabul

to meet with him and demand he clean up the corruption, stop the drug trafficking, and

improve the lives of his people. Karzai ignored him. Now the administration is debating

whether or not to rescind an invitation for him to come to Washington to demonstrate our

displeasure. How pathetic!

Obama has no exit strategy. He has no definition of victory. He listened to the generals,

as the Regressives demanded; and has become another Democratic president involved in an

unwinnable war. Once again, Cindy Sheehan's question continues to loom large, demanding

an answer: "Mister President, what is the noble cause that soldiers died for in Afghanistan?"

Karzai's worst fear is that if Afghanistan is reformed and rebuilt, if the people get truly

honest elections, if the violence is reduced and their lives improve; he and his brother and

their corrupt henchmen will be thrown out. The United States winning means he loses. A

freer Afghanistan implies his own political destruction; therefore, he consistently sabotages

each and every U.S. goal for reform.

And what about his brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai? Karzai's brother runs the city of

Kandahar, the spiritual home of the Taliban. Not only has he been on the payroll of the CIA

for years with little to show for it; he's also the face of corruption in Afghanistan. He is

connected to the opium trade, which brings in billions of illegal dollars that goes to fund and

rebuild the Taliban and al Qaeda in his district. To this he's turned a blind eye. No business,

legal or illegal, can be conducted without him taking a cut. U.S. forces are about to start a

campaign in Wali Karzai's Kandahar. If he is not replaced, you can imagine how successful

the campaign will ultimately be.

We have backed the wrong horse. Unfortunately, he is the horse we rode in on and the

water in this river is too deep and swift to have second thoughts at this stage of the game.

The only leverage Obama has left is to threaten to pull our troops out and bring them home.

For political reasons, that won't happen. American soldiers, once again, will be thrown into

harm's way, to be killed and wounded. American taxpayers will, once again, be expected to

stand back and look stupid while hundreds of billions of dollars are flushed down another

rat hole. And this I can promise you: Years from now we will be waxing philosophic about

how we allowed ourselves to be blindly tricked, once again, into another pointless military

quagmire. Pathetic!! What do you think? I welcome your comments and rebuttals. Please

send them to lionoftheleft@gmail.com