DID THE WHITE HOUSE GIVE THE TALIBAN $43 MILLION?

In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, a little-noticed decision by the
Bush administration last May has emerged as a powerful symbol of US
fecklessness.

According to commentators of all ideological stripes -- from the Nation's
Christopher Hitchens on the left to the New Yorker's Hendrik Hertzberg in
the center to the Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly on the right -- the US
gave $43 million to Afghanistan's Taliban government as a reward for its
efforts to stamp out opium-poppy cultivation. That would have been a
shockingly inappropriate gift to a government that had been sanctioned by
the United Nations for its refusal to hand over international terrorist
Osama bin Laden.

Would have been, that is, if it had really happened. It didn't.

The truth is contained in the transcript of a briefing given by Secretary
of State Colin Powell, who on May 17 announced the $43 million grant; it
was aimed at alleviating a famine that threatened the lives of four million
Afghans. Far from handing the money over to the Taliban, Powell went out of
his way to criticize them, and to explain the steps the United States was
taking to keep the money out of their hands.

" We distribute our assistance in Afghanistan through international
agencies of the United Nations and non-governmental organizations, " Powell
said. " We provide our relief to the people of Afghanistan, not to
Afghanistan's ruling factions. Our aid bypasses the Taliban, who have done
little to alleviate the suffering of the Afghan people, and indeed have
done much to exacerbate it. "

Powell did say one favorable thing about the Taliban: "We will continue to
look for ways to provide more assistance for Afghans, including those
farmers who have felt the impact of the ban on poppy cultivation, a
decision by the Taliban that we welcome." The bottom line, though, was --
or should have been -- easy enough to comprehend: humanitarian aid for
Afghans, yes; money for the Taliban, no. (On Tuesday, the Taliban reversed
themselves, announcing that opium production will resume if the US
attacks.) Most media reports of Powell's announcement got it right. Within
days, though, the commentators began making hash of it. Among the first was
Los Angeles Times columnist Robert Scheer, who on May 22 criticized the
Bush administration for its "recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban
rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human
rights in the world today." Scheer did not respond to my requests for
comment, so I can't be sure where he got his information. But his Web site
credits a New York Times article of May 18 that, though accurate, glosses
over the matter of who precisely would receive the $43 million. Scheer
apparently drew the wrong conclusion.

A computer search for "Taliban" and "$43 million" since September 11 shows
that Scheer's error has become accepted wisdom. News organizations from
Salon to the Denver Post have all repeated it as proof that the US has been
coddling terrorists. Locally, Jay Severin, a talk-show host on WTKK Radio
(96.9 FM), has been eviscerating the Bush White House. Asked where he got
his information, Severin cited a column by the New York Post's Michelle
Malkin. Now, I'll concede that Malkin got it more right than most. She
noted that the money was intended to relieve Afghan suffering, but went on
to say, "It's money the Taliban don't have to spend feeding their people,
buying them medicine or building them houses," thus freeing them to buy
"guns and bombs ... missiles and aircraft" and "pilot training and living
expenses for bin Laden's followers in the US." But that's a specious
argument, given that the Taliban have never shown the slightest inclination
to feed, clothe, or otherwise care for the people of Afghanistan.

Eli Lake, who covers the State Department for UPI and who wrote an accurate
report about the $43 million grant last May, calls the notion that the
White House gave the money to the Taliban as a reward for their anti-drug
efforts "just absurd" He notes that one of the Bush administration's first
actions upon taking office was to shut down the Taliban's mission in New
York, in compliance with UN sanctions.

Lake recalls a conversation he had with Andrew Natsios, the former
Massachusetts politico who is now the White House's point man for foreign
aid, around the time that the $43 million grant was announced."

He explained that the Bush administration, as a matter of policy, did not
want to link needed aid to political considerations, " Lake says -- whether
it be in Afghanistan or in other rogue states with starving, suffering
populations, such as Sudan and North Korea.

It's too bad, but not surprising, that some elements of the media couldn't
get it right. After all, no good deed, as they say, goes unpunished.

Note: After this item was posted, I heard from Brendan Nyhan, of the Web
site Spinsanity.org, letting me know that he had reported on Scheer's error
last June - and that he, in turn, had picked up on this from the Web site
LeftWatch.com, which got the goods on Scheer way back on May 22, the very
day his column appeared in the Los Angeles Times. Nyhan's Spinsanity piece
can be found at http://www.spinsanity.org/posts/200106-3.html, and that, in
turn, includes a link to the original LeftWatch.com report. Obviously I'm
going to have to start reading both Web sites more regularly.