Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for January 09, 2014
January 08, 2014
January 10, 2014
Transcript:
Melissa: So I'm calling Jen from freakin' Afghanistan, and she's worried it'll make her late for her pedicure! What's up with that? I mean, I can see how a deployment doesn't seem exceptional anymore. The war feels endless, I get that... We've been propping up a corrupt, failed narco-state for 13 years! No wonder people like Jen tune out. Roz: I love watching you walk stuff back. Melissa: And frankly, I could use a pedicure myself.
The “narco” part of the “corrupt, failed narco-state” had virtually been extinguished by the Taliban. Afghanistan’s poppy farming industry practically began de novo again in 2002. (So did the corruption, actually. The Taliban were brutal, semiliterate tribal mullahs, but they were not corrupt, and this is one major reason they had a LOT of early support; kind of like Pol Pot initially had in Cambodia, come to think of it.)