an open letter to the Diane Rehm Show

I expect a lot better from the Diane Rehm Show than this morning's discussion of the conflict in Afghanistan. Some of your commentators seem reasonably well informed but uniformly opposed to US involvement. Some are astonishingly, well, frankly, ignorant. To conflate all the insurgents into one group and talk as if "the Taliban" is a single entity with unified command, membership, and goals is, at best, naive. To describe the current shift in operations as throwing thousands of more conventional forces into the country is simply inaccurate and bespeaks either dishonesty or a lack of familiarity with the current conflict that should have disqualified the speaker from inclusion in the panel. Likewise, the astonishing statement that the Taliban leadership and al-Qaida have had no connection for the past 20 years suggests that the guest is either mendacious or atrociously unfamiliar with the region.

What is most striking is the total absence of anyone who supports the current plan for counterinsurgency and support to the Afghan government and people; there are plenty of them around in senior levels of government and academia, so I can only assume that a deliberate decision to exclude that point of view was taken, for some reason. I would expect a more balanced and realistic presentation from the Diane Rehm show. I am very, very disappointed.

[I also emailed this to their comment line.]

it's really hard...

...to write (or even read) when one sits in the middle of an open-cubicle office and people insist on sitting around having conversations in the middle of the common area.

I can read if I hold my fingers in both ears, but I can't type that way.

Unfortunately, since I'm writing a paper for class, I can't really tell people to shut up because I'm working. :-)