[Pak Daily Times] Afghanistan's Caped President Hamid Maybe I'll join the TalibanKarzai
... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a
Pashtunface on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use...
confirmed on Monday that his office has received money from the US Central Intelligence Agency over the past decade, with wads of cash reportedly handed over in suitcases and backpacks.
Karzai thanked the US spy agency for what he said was money well spent just hours after The New York Times
...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize...
reported that Karzai's office received tens of millions of dollars in cash in a CIA effort to win influence.
"Yes, the NSC of Afghanistan has received money from CIA in the past 10 years. The amount was not big, rather it was small," Karzai said in a statement, referring to the National Security Council which is part of his office.
Karzai said the money had been used for good causes in Afghanistan, where endemic corruption has undermined efforts to establish a stable state, more than 11 years after the US-led invasion to dislodge the Taliban. "The money was spent for different reasons: operation objectives, helping maimed and sick (people) and for house rents and others objectives," the president said, without giving further details. "These assistances were very productive and we thank them." The statement relayed comments that Karzai made at a presser in Finland in response to The New York Times article.