afghanistan

Anyone eagerly awaiting a world in which all content is paid content would do well to observe Rolling Stone's clumsy handling of its General Stanley McChrystal blockbuster.

The international mining community has long known about the country's vast mineral resources. But most mining companies remain wary of starting big, long-term projects there. Among the problems: No peace, no stability and a fondness for bribery.

Newly located deposits in Afghanistan could be a source of wealth for an impoverished nation crippled by decades of war. But getting those minerals out of the ground will require years of development and billions of dollars in investment.

As the conflict in Afghanistan drags on, the U.S. has announced that the troubled Asian nation is sitting on upwards of $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits. However, the resources are likely to end up getting mined not by American but by Russian and Chinese firms.

The New York Times reports that "The United States has discovered nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, far beyond any previously known reserves and enough to fundamentally alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself."

Even as Xe -- formerly know as Blackwater, the infamous private security firm that provided mercenaries for the U.S. war in Iraq -- puts itself up for sale, it's opening a new line of "Blackwater Pro Shops" offering all the gear your local paramilitary may need. What's behind their move into retail?

TV news analyst Andrew Tyndall tracks every minute of airtime spent by the three nightly network news broadcasts. So which stories garnered the most airtime on each network?

Like the rest of Americans living in a time of great economic uncertainty, Timothy Bies is worried about his future. But Bies is at an even greater disadvantage than the rest of the country. Newly married and 20 years old, Bies is a combat arms soldier, training to deploy to Afghanistan. The job...

Yesterday President Bush signed bills that fund $162 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. That brings the total bill to about $650 billion for the Iraq war and roughly $200 billion for Afghanistan. How do you figure out what your financial share of the $850 billion war tab is?Your...

Recently, I came across an interesting figure. Congressional analysts estimate that the United States is currently spending $12 billion a month on its overseas wars. According to Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, co-authors of The Three Trillion Dollar War, an analysis of the U.S. interventions in...