Liberal Talk Radio

I would love to believe that the Global War on Terror (GWOT) is entirely fought on the battlefields, or in dank, dusty alleys by guys as cool as George Clooney. For example, I share Peggy Noonan’s desire for a suitably dramatic version of the apprehension of UBL, complete with a Paul Simon soundtrack, but I fear that reality might be less exciting than that, that GWOT is more about accountants and analysts working in John Snow’s Treasury Department to cut the flow of funds supporting terrorism.

So it’s concerning — in that big, yawning of-course-I’m-listening sort of way — that the Treasury Department and Department of State can’t figure out who’s doing what:

The government’s efforts to help foreign nations cut off the supply of money to terrorists, a critical goal for the Bush administration, have been stymied by infighting among American agencies, leadership problems and insufficient financing, a new Congressional report says.

. . .

In at least one case, the State Department refused to allow a Treasury official to enter an unidentified foreign country last year to help with strategies to fight terrorist financing because of turf battles, investigators found. Because the country had recently been upgraded to a priority, State Department officials wanted to do their own assessment first before allowing the Treasury Department to conduct its work, causing a delay of several months.