How to Save Afghanistan – TIME
Our efforts in nation-building, governance and counternarcotics should be smaller and more creative. This is not because these issues are unimportant; they are vital for Afghanistan's future. But only the Afghan government has the legitimacy, the knowledge and the power to build a nation. The West's supporting role is at best limited and uncertain.
-How to Save Afghanistan - TIME
TIME's article How to Save Afghanistan is fantastically written and simply worded. It presents a surprisingly easy solution for how to fix Afghanistan – do less.
The solution is deceptively simple when you think about it. We suck at building a government. We're good at education (well, better than Afghanistan anyway). We're good at farming. We can train an army. We can build power plants. Let's stop trying to fight all these insurgents. Let's stop trying to tell the Afghans how to run their country. Let's just give them the support ask for to build their country up. If they try to build something we don't like? We don't support it.
Transforming a nation of 32 million people is a task not for the West but for Afghans.
Audio Slideshow: Afghanistan’s Ongoing War
Members of D Company search for weapons in the village of Kajaki Olya. Many areas which the troops can patrol without incident by day fall under the sway of the Taliban at night.Some great photos and a really good script for the narration. Zalmai does a decent narration, but her voice lacks some of the emphasis that a good narrator requires. Well worth the watch, and worth hearing the story.
The Other Front – Back in Kabul, Never at Peace – Tyler Hicks – NYTimes.Com
-The Other Front - Back in Kabul, Never at Peace - Photographer's Journal - Tyler Hicks - NYTimes.com
Interesting but rather brief audio slideshow by Tyler Hicks on Kabul.
Hicks narrates the show himself in a boring, monotone voice, and with some slow string music in the background. I'd have liked to hear more details like the escalator, but I do really like the choice to crop all photos wide and short.
Blogging Off an Car Battery
Normally, I would add a short article like this to my Tumblr feed with a few tags and move on. But this is a really important story about the importance of spreading the freedom of the press to third world. Furthermore it's a great example of how an educated (literate) populace needs a Fourth Estate to assure that the government remains in check.
I don't often go for human interest stories, but this is truly inspirational.
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Meet Afghanistan's most fearless blogger -Slate Magazine |
