Last year, I said that I'm tired of choosing leaders for other nations.
I had just chosen Haider al-Abadi to be the leader of Iraq. I had to sack Nuri al-Malaki to do it.
I got stories put in the newspapers, saying what a bad guy Nuri al-Malaki was, when I sacked him.
Not that I think Nuri al-Malaki is an especially good guy. But since I had made him the leader of Iraq in the first place, getting all those negative stories printed about him seemed a bit unfair.
I do not actually choose the leaders of other nations myself. I have people who do that for me.
Currently, my people, and the people of the people in some other nations, are trying to figure out what to do about the leader of Syria.
I am glad that I have people who handle this for me.
About who should be the leader of Syria, I have not got a clue.
My people usually know these things. But they have a very narrow view. They know who should be the leaders of other nations, when we should invade their lands, when we should hunt down and kill their terrorists, and when we should sell them F-16s.
I do not usually like the leaders of other nations that I choose.
Though last year, I chose Ashraf Ghani to be leader of Afghanistan. I like that guy.
He was once a professor at Columbia University. He wrote a book about fixing failed states. When I have to choose leaders of other nations, that would be the kind of guy I would want to choose.
I like books by Columbia University professors about fixing failed states. I figure anyone in a habit of choosing leaders for other nations should read them. If you are choosing the leader of another state, then that state pretty much by definition is failed. And this book is written in English. Which happens to be the language that I can read.
Some people in the other nation might not like my choice. It just demonstrates how I choose the leader of their nation, and they do not. But since many of the warlord guys who do not like Ashraf Ghani for the Columbia University stuff, I had just chosen anyways, I'm not sure their criticism of my choice is especially fair.
When I chose Ashraf Ghani to be leader of Afghanistan, I also chose Abdullah Abdullah to be the other leader of Afghanistan.
This was unorthodox. There was nothing in the constitution of Afghanistan, which I had written, that said I could choose not one leader but two.
I decided that they should later hold a jirga, which would validate the two-leader arrangement, and make it constitutional after the fact.
This was part of my general scheme. I choose the leaders of other nations, who then validate decisions I would like them to make.
I did not actually like the two-leader arrangement, myself. I thought that putting the Columbia University guy and the warlord-spokesman guy together in one government, would just lead to endless fights about every little decision, and make the government I had installed dysfunctional.
Except that having a President, and a Vice President, and Another Vice President, and a Prime Minister, all fighting to control patronage, might lead to a lot of fights. Afghanistan is having a big argument, about that. And I am tired of it.
I'm Tired of Choosing Leaders for Other Nations
Which is exactly what happened. My people who had handled the leader choosing for me had liked the plan though.
The leader of Afghanistan I had chosen has just done something I do not like. It is more dysfunctional than I could have guessed.
There is this guy in Afghanistan, Khalilullah Frozi. He is half in prison, for having run a billion dollar Ponzi scheme, which was called the Kabul Bank.
Some of the warlords I had chosen to lead Afghanistan were in on the Ponzi scheme. They used the scheme to buy an airline, which they then used to smuggle cash they made in the scheme to the mansions they had bought in the scheme, in Dubai.
Though Mohammed Fahim, who had bought the airline to smuggle his cash to his mansions in Dubai, had already just used an airplane from his military that I paid for, when he wanted to smuggle drugs to Russia.
One of the people I had to do leader choosing for me once told the leader of Afghanistan I had chosen, that about choosing people like Mohammed Fahim as leaders of Afghanistan, they ought to cut it out.
As evidence of the tensions, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton bluntly told Mr. Karzai that running with Marshal Fahim would damage his standing with the United States and other countries, according to one senior administration official.
Accused of Drug Ties, Afghan Official Worries U.S., New York Times
Khalilullah Frozi, who is supposed to be in prison for the Ponzi scheme, but is only in prison at night, recently held the opening ceremonies for a big real estate scheme.
In a big day for development here, a notable Afghan businessman stood with top government officials on Wednesday as he signed the contract for a new township: 8,800 homes across 33 acres of prime real estate in the heart of the capital, with an initial investment of at least $95 million.
There was just one problem: The businessman, Khalilullah Frozi, is supposed to be serving a 15-year prison sentence for his role in defrauding Kabul Bank of nearly $1 billion of depositors’ money. The scheme brought Afghanistan’s biggest bank, where Mr. Frozi was listed as chief executive, near collapse in 2010, and it deeply shook trust in the Western-backed financial system here.
Afghan Businessman Convicted in Kabul Bank Fraud Is Still Free to Make Money, New York Times
My people who choose leaders of other nations for me think this is all very odd.
“Clearly, this is very odd,” said a senior Western official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he had been surprised by the development and had yet to gather full details. “The message it sends is that if you have stolen enough money, you can get away with it.”
Ashraf Ghani's guy who handles the legal stuff, who was at the opening ceremony, said some very odd things.
At the ceremony opening for Mr. Frozi’s project, called Smart City, Mr. Ghani’s legal adviser, Abdul Ali Mohammadi, thanked the businessman for his investment.
I had chosen Ashraf Ghani as one of the two leaders of Afghanistan to fight corruption.
A Mr. Kos is so tired of all this, that he has quit.
“With the exception of some sporadic activities, in one year since the new president and the C.E.O. took positions, I could not see any systemic action against endemic corruption in the country,” said Mr. Kos, who was a member of the Independent Joint Anti-Corruption Monitoring and Evaluation Committee. “All we’ve needed was some good political will and support, which never came and in such circumstances, I did not see the point to go on.”
I am very tired of it too.
The people I have to choose leaders of other nations for me are concerned with such issues as whether to invade them, or whether to sell them F-16s.
I follow such issues fairly closely. They can dominate my view of the world. My view of the world becomes narrow and self-interested. Even though I am not normally much interested in F-16s.
Choosing leaders for other nations ends up very corrupting to both sides. And I am very tired of it.
When I follow the goings on in other nations, I'd rather be concerned with such things as what movies they are watching now, what books they are reading, or what spices they like in a stew.