“Fifty-two licensed private security firms operate extensively in Afghanistan, employing more than 25,000 people.Among the major American firms are Xe Services, formerly known as Blackwater, and Triple Canopy.
“About half of the companies employed by the U.S. military in Afghanistan are Afghan-owned, including Watan Risk Management, run by two of Karzai's cousins, and NLC Holdings, which provides security for U.S. military convoys and is run by Hamed Wardak, the son of the defense minister. Many other companies are unlicensed and have been accused of operating as violent militias that often bribe the Taliban for safe passage.”
Can you believe that? While families right here in our towns are struggling with unemployment and watching their retirement savings go up in smoke, the United States Government is paying money to Blackwater and to “private security” companies owned by corrupt Afghan President Hamid Karzai's family and cronies – and some of these companies are accused of then paying our money to the Taliban!
Did you know that the number of armed security contractors in Afghanistan has almost quadrupled since September 2007, from 2,401 to 16,398 in March of this year (Washington Post graphic here)? That's the wrong direction for Afghanistan and the wrong direction for America.
I'm asking for your vote and your support in the Democratic primary on September 14th because I think that after 9 years, it's time to create jobs here at home, not in Afghanistan. If you agree, now is the time to join our campaign as a grassroots endorser – you can do that at the top of any page on our website.
Afghanistan is the Graveyard of empires.
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p>Alexander the Great, the British Empire, and the USSR all failed there.
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p>And so will we.
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p>At this point, the ones that are getting our money ARE giving it to the Taliban.
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p>A lot of people in Afghanistan are opportunists who are for sale to the highest bidder.
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p>Our staying there does nothing to get al-Qaeda or the Taliban or anything else that could ever interest us.
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p>So we should save lives and save money by getting out.
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p>It is not our concern to “get the outs in” in foreign nations, when there is no difference between the “ins” and “outs” that concerns us.
You seem to be the candidate that takes a stand. These years of lapdog congress are bleeding us dry. I’m disgusted with the no-can-do attitude of congress when in fact they control the purse, the ultimate power. Little wonder the American people have such a low opinion of the congress.
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p>If you get elected, don’t change. Please? We’ve already had a candidate that promised “change”. And he did.
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p>“All change is not growth, as all movement is not forward.” –Ellen Glasgow
You know, where John Adams sings something along the lines of “Instead you gave us congress”.
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p>No – we should not be paying private security firms in Afghanistan, and paying them 4-10 times what United States Service people are paid.
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p>Remember back when I posted that what is needed to shrink and extinguish the Taliban is jobs for the Afghans who need them to feed their family? Well, I sure did not mean jobs with corrupt blackwater clones. Unions are not an issue in Afghanistan preventing a WPA type approach but i am afraid that window has closed long ago.
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p>A mighty power is quiet in Congress. Too many owned by too few. Little with the belly fire of Mr. Adams. The quick buck snatched from the taxpayer or the taxpayer’s descendant rather than the argued problem resolved is sufficient for most. Not the vision of the founders.
and having the performance in chambers. Well. I can dream, can’t I?