Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for July 20, 2013

I’m so glad I saw the “real” Afghanistan back in the 70s before the Russian intervention. I stayed with an Afghan family in Kabul – the parents of a friend back in the States. They lived in a self-contained household (designed like a fortress) – 2 brothers who each had 2 wifes and 10 children a piece. The water came from a well and the toilet was a hole in an outhouse. There was no garbage as there were no packaged foods, thanks in part to a cow. I’m glad I got to see and climb the Buddhas at Bamiyan before they were bulldozed.I even learned some Pashtu and Dari expressions.

Two alternative (i.e not 2012) reruns. For yesterday:http://www.gocomics.com/doonesbury/1974/03/20 Fame for ZonkerToday:http://www.gocomics.com/doonesbury/1974/03/21 Meet the PrincipalMike

PS: I even walked around Kabul dressed like an Afghan, turban and all. My Afghan hosts said I looked just like an Afghan. (It’s only recently that I learned that my Y-chromosome comes from Centfral Asia).

..actually they do and doing quite well…

Yes, they do – very trendy destinations, particularly for European travellers

Thailand’s doing otay…

With a few googles you find thatAfghanistan is an Obama operation.

To ALL, Isn’t it a shame that religion and politics destroys so much in this world???

The US left Afghanistan? The helicopter repair person should know the next rotation and the next and the next….

“It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness — an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.” – W.E.B. Du Bois-http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/20/opinion/blow-barack-and-trayvon.html?hp

Re: Buddhas at Bamiyan.The Taliban destroyed those historic giant Buddhas. Most of the world protested that action for months before the Taliban destroyed the Buddhas. The Buddhas were NOT BULLDOZED*

Mullah Mohammed Omar ordered the Buddhas destroyed in 1997, but this was delayed by various protections and payoffs by the rest of the world.In early 2001, the Buddhas had become such an huge kiddie on all news sources, that when the Buddhas shelled the statues carved into a stone mountain, and then dynamited them in March,I sensed we were being set up to accept sending our blood and treasure into the Graveyard of Empires.JusSayin

*issue, not kiddie. I am displeased with auto-correct.

“Taliban shelled the statues…”

Ok I advise against ever coming back. Maybe in 20 years but before then.

In Vietnam we called it the Freedom Bird. I don’t remember anyone really smiling. Everyone seemed kind of sullen and a few of us wept. The black soldiers, returning to their lives as second class citizens, nearly rioted and we were met by MPs in Japan. And ladies? You may get home, but you’ll never leave Afghanistan.

No more than you think Fritzi Ritz’s are “real boobs”.

Don’t think the ladies actually have to worry about the “mission” being over — it will never really end.

It’s like Arizona but no golf courses.-http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-05-02/world/35454878_1_afghan-leaders-afghan-officials-afghan-authority

So are you saying twice as many casualties in half the time is a Obama success ? Bush/Cheney Administration didn’t leave the job incomplete, they just left office.