From PRI, Public Radio International and KCRW Santa Monica, this is To the Point.

Illegal drugs, politics, and the war in Afghanistan.

Hello again, I'm Orman Alney, and this is To the Point from Public Radio International,

a daily look at the issues Americans care about most.

Opium from Afghanistan's responsible for 90% of the world's heroin. It's the cash crop

that's enabling resurgence of the fundamentalist Taliban. But the State Department's former

coordinator for counter-narcotics says the Karzai government, supported by the U.S., depends

on opium too. On to the point, is growing opium poppies the only way poverty-stricken farmers can make a

living? Or is that a myth perpetrated to cover up incompetence and corruption?

Does aerial spraying pose a greater threat to the Taliban or the Karzai administration?

On reporter's notebook later on, Natural Gas means big money

where it's least expected.

First, here's the news.

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comes from subscribers of KCRW Santa Monica

and from the Public Radio International Program Fund,

whose contributors include the Ford Foundation

and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Hello again, I'm only back with To the Point. The Opium Poppy is financing the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan,

but President Hamid Karzai is protecting opium traffic in order to stay in office.

On To the Point, we'll hear that dramatic claim from a high-level U.S. official who says he can tell his story now that he's resigned.

On reporter's notebook, a down-at-the-heels part of Louisiana may be transformed by new riches from natural gas.

...