Tim Blair

Can't wait for their drive-time segment, "Fisk Watch". Similar to that 'Fugitive' radio gimmick they launched here, but you beat the cunt with rocks when you spot him.

i wonder if ARMAN reaches any other part of the country besides kabul. if not, it has at least one thing in common with afghanistan's government.

That's great news. Unless ARMAN-FM plays Styx or Journey. Then it's a disaster.

Disappointed Adam?

Or REO Speedwagon, Supertramp, Nightranger, Loverboy, oh the pain, the lovely, lovely pain...

Somebody's quagmire got taken away? Is somebody cranky? Does someone need a nap? Here's your bottle, little boy...

Poor quagmirists. Just a few months ago, the American Imperialist Agressors (TM) were going to be dying by the thousands at the hands of the Taliban resistance and the Brutal Afghani Winter (TM).

Now, they're reduced to protesting inadequate FM transmission power and unjust antennae patterns.

Adam, even if your accusation is true, do you seriously imply that anarchy is worse than the Taliban? Jeez, and they call conservatives fascist...

Hey, Adam, how many Afghan refugees have gone back home now? Around two million?

Must hurt to realize the masses you're trying to defend are running towards American troops.

Since when is the opinion of Fitzsimons worth any kind of response whatsoever?

Bastards!

FitzSimons immediately understood the appropriate response to fundamentalist mass-murderers - say you are "desperately sorry" that you made them do it and try to stop anybody fixing the problem at its source by circulating over-wrought e-mails. Hey, it works better than holding your breath.

However, his tame Afghani got it wrong. The US imperialist aggressor did *not* want to "bomb Afghanistan back to the stone age". Oh, no - it was much, much worse than that. They decided that Afghanis must be "punished" by being given morning chat radio and Middle East E-Z Listen'n! Does the black and diabolical nature of the Great Satan know no bounds of human decency?

TFK

When are the appeasement folks like FitzSimons going to get it?

Doesn't he understand that these wonderful Islamic Extremists want us all dead? I know, apparently not.

Hey Tim, just an obervation, but have the majority of the American refugeess from the 60's settled in Australia? Or are they the Australian version?

As we say in Chicago, Whaddaya think?

How about some Jeff Beck, ARMAN?

Is their station car called the "BLACK VEIL THUNDER" ??

An ex-rugby player trying for some respect as a social commentator. Is anyone else laughing as much as me? This guy has been at it for years and still peddles the same save-the-world lefty/liberal pipe-dreams. So far other than some low rating books he hasn't really set the world on fire.

I personally would take anarchy over the Taliban, but I'd probably prefer the Taliban over Kenny G or Michael Bolton...

in response to gaz, yes i am disappointed, because it would be cool if this kind of initiative wasn't restricted to kabul. just like it's a great pity that karzai's government is similarly limited.

Who is in-charged of Kosovo, Adam?

Kosovo: UN Peacekeeper Seriously Injured After Attack

Jerry:

How about broadcasting Kenny G and/or Michael Bolton songs at the Taliban?

Or would that be a war crime?

Patrick,

I classify Kenny G and Michael Bolton CDs as weapons of mass destruction. I believe their use in warfare was banned by international law several years ago, though I suspect many UN bureaucrats secretly listen to them in their offices. It would explain a lot.

Afghanistan was not the most modern country in the world pre-Taliban. Post-Taliban, well....

One thing at a time. One step at a time. An FM station, with un-veiled women on staff, is actually up and broadcasting. That's great!

Think of what a defeat this *one* station represents to the Taliban. All the items that were forbidden: Music, Women working, Un-veiled women getting publicity pictures taken, ads for stores selling 'forbidden' merchandise, and they even laugh on the air. (I read a report by an Afghan woman that they could be punished for laughing.)

If you always look at what they haven't been able to do yet, you miss what they have done. So what it doesn't reach beyond Kabul YET? It will in time.

One of the faults I find with the reports coming out of Iraq and Afghanistan is the focus on what has NOT been done to the exclusion of what has. Can you imagine what would have happened if this type of reporting had taken hold during WWII?

The first couple of years at least, Japan was taking over island after island, inching closer to Australia. US Navy? What US Navy? (What US army, even?) Europe was overrun with madmen and the UK's island looked *very* tiny. Today's 'ace reporters of doom and defeat' would have loved it!! So much defeat to concentrate on.

Things looked very bad. I can just imagine some of today's 'ace reporters' back then. In the UK, they'd be having the daily 'German Lesson' column and in Australia the daily 'Japanese Lesson' column. They probably would have both in the Americas to cover all bases.

I'm not advocating being some sort of 'good news only' person. But, you have to appreciate how far they have come, not how far they have yet to go.

Puts that `quagmire', Gulf WarII, into perspectve.

Bit of a different rock patrol to the one the Taliban used to run.

Speaking of quagmires, Geoffrey Barker in today's (Fri 3/10) Financial Review says the Americans are losing the equivalent of a company a week in dead and wounded.

Now I might be out of date, but when I was a weekend warrior, a company was around 110 men.

The latest figures I've heard are average one fatality a day - don't know about wounded. Seven deaths a week isn't even a section (Australian) or squad (US), let alone a platoon or company - unless we're talking 80-90+ wounded a week.

Best of luck to them.....but I had to wonder. Is the Afghan FM cruiser stolen from the U.N. and what's with the blonde babe on their contact page?

ARMAN is apparently owned and operated by Time-Life.

Denying people music - Now that IS a quagmire!!!

The most common element of all ethnic groups around the world is music. (An origins legend and a flood legend come in number two and three.)
Our brains seem to be hard wired for music, both to express it and consume it.

I've wondered about the origin (etymology) of the term Taliban
Does anybody know?

lol E.A., I remember the "brutal Afghani winter". That's a trip down memory lane *gets all misty eyed*

Jericho I think the meaning of Taliban has something to do with Talib, the Book, or the Word of God. Taliban means by or of that book or word. Something like that.

I had forgotten the Brutal Afgani Winter (TM) myself - they don't write them like that anymore. Hang on, they do: The Americans Went In There And Destroyed The Place And Had No Idea What They Were Going To Do Afterwards, And Now They Wonder Why Theyre All Dying.(TM).

This one is best delivered complete with eye roll and "morons" muttered under the breathe at the end.

Jericho,

I think it translates to student movement.

Jericho, combining the above, I believe that originally Talibs were students who studied "the Book." They regard the Koran as the only legitimate source of any kind of authority, and they (or Mullah Omar) are the only proper interpreters. Think of Jerry Falwell on steroids and all those dark-suited Hallelujah shouters running a government on the basis of Jerry's intrepretation (and selected passages of a very long, very contradictory book -- much like the Koran) pushed to the limits.

Having grown up in a small, relatively religious Baptist community, seeing the Taliban makes me absolutely sure of the value of separation of church and state. My neighbors were basically pretty kind and decent folk, but I'd prefer not to loose the above scenario.

And, much like the Afghani, they might find that once the religious govt is imposed, it's not what they expected.

Hope this helps.

The Top Level Domain .fm (as in www.arman.fm ) is for the Federated States of Micronesia, one of only four countries to vote in Israel's favour with a recent UN resolution. There some zionist neo-conservative plot at work here?

/sarcasm

http://www.arman.fm/competitions_and_giveaways.htm mentions city and country on postal addresses for writing in.

Also, http://www.arman.fm/media_releases.htm mentions Its signal can be received as far out as Logar, parts of Ghazni, Panjsher, Jabel Saraj and Paghman. According to http://medlem.spray.se/afghan/Logar1_eng.htm Ghazni is a state that doesn't touch the state Kabul is in.

What about a world where music is possible?

Forget "No peace without justice", how about "no peace without music"?

Talib is a Pashto word that means "religious student". Taliban is the plural.