Posted on 10/13/2009 7:10:46 PM PDT by nuconvert
Al-Qaeda is in its worst financial state for many years while the Taliban's funding is flourishing, according to the US Treasury.
Senior Treasury official David Cohen said al-Qaeda had made several appeals for funds already this year.
The influence of the network - damaged by US efforts to choke funding - is waning, he said.
The Taliban, meanwhile, are in better financial shape, bolstered by Afghanistan's booming trade in drugs.
According to Mr Cohen, the al-Qaeda leadership has already warned that a lack of funds was hurting the group's recruitment and training efforts.
"We assess that al-Qaeda is in its weakest financial condition in several years and that, as a result, its influence is waning," Mr Cohen said from Washington.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
They could rent them out by the hour.
My first thought.
Right. People who buy illegal drugs have no responsibility, whatsoever.
The police can’t even keep them out of prisons, what exactly do you intend for “free” Americans. Decriminalize and then at least we would cut off the funding for terrorists.
George Soros is keen on destroying America so he will be eager to help Al Quaeda with their funding needs.
If you don't want to fund the Taliban, don't buy illegal drugs. If you do buy illegal drugs, then you're responsible.
But they wouldn’t be virgins anymore.
They're magical allah-ways-virgins.
You might ask the Sudanese, they took most of it when they kicked him out.
Assault, rape and murder aren’t substances that can be “kept out” of anywhere, whether by appropriate or even by inappropriate searches. They arise from a state of mind. Drugs are, and could, in principle, but not in practice. Not even in prisons.
Although I don’t buy illegal drugs, the drug warriors are responsible for assuring the funding of the Taliban, by keeping prices high and the black market necessarily involved.
If you are a drug warrior or its supporter, YOU are responsible.
What’s your position on personal responsibility?
My position is exactly that; people should be responsible for their own actions. I will add that it is preferable to your position of government responsibility, that they should be our nannies and tell us what we should and shouldn’t do. (And which incidentally causes more harm than good, among other things ensuring funding for criminal organizations especially, but not limited to, terrorist organizations composed of people who want to kill you and me both.)
Let me add that putting governments in a position to legislate morality tips both ways. You sometimes end up with the Taliban, executing women for adultery (even when they were raped) and such, which I think we can both agree is objectionable, but you sometimes end up with the California solution of gay marriage and other such liberal mandates, which I think we can also agree is objectionable. I claim that there is no way anyone can obtain and sustain a government that legislates morality in exactly the desired way, and worse, this argument applies to every individual - no one will think the government legislates morality exactly correctly.
Therefore, government should simply stay out of the business of legislating morality, insofar as it is separable from violation of other people’s rights. (In other words, I agree that murder should remain illegal, but the reason murder should remain illegal is not because murder is immoral, which it is, but because it violates the rights of the victim(s).)
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