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8:31	MSNBC Chat Moderator - Good morning everyone. We'll begin the live chat after Dexter finishes his Morning Joe appearance.

8:34	[Comment From Dexter Filkins] Hi everybody! Fire away please.

8:34	MSNBC Chat Moderator - We'll start with the email questions first. Question from Stephan Gregali: I haven't read your book... yet. How do the Afghan people really feel about our presence in their country and about Americans in general?

8:36	Dexter Filkins - Really good question. I just spent two months there, and I have to say I didn't get a strong sense of anti-Americanism there.My sense was that most of the Afghans realize that they need outside help.

8:36	[Comment From diane wolff] How great a role does the drug trade play in the Taliban's resurgence? Have you heard of Pakistani-BritishTariq Ali's idea about a South Asian Common Market as an antidote to military solution?

8:37	Dexter Filkins - The opium trade is a huge factor in the Taliban's resurgence. Huge. They collect an estimate $300 million a year from the opium trade. You can mount a lot of attacks with that kind of cash.

8:37	[Comment From Stake] Agree that the Pakistan tribal areas are key. Do you believe that the work Greg Mortenson (Three Cups of Tea) is doing to build schools in the region is helping locally?

8:38	Dexter Filkins - Greg M. does amazing work. But I don't think he's in the tribal areas. It's really hard to imagine any Westerners working there. There is really no place like it on earth.

8:38

[Comment From jeff]
Mr Filkins, I claim no intelligence on this topic, but it seems like are fight against al Qaeda is at best a leaf blower attack. Clean the debris out of one place and it ends up somewhere else. Can we achieve more than that? Or, instead of worrying about falling leaves, how do change the landscape to one that doesn't create the need for "leaf blowing" in the first place?

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