Marketplace®

Daily business news and economic stories
Aug 21, 2017

08/21/2017: Two very different kinds of war

You can look at the costs of increasing the number of American troops in Afghanistan in a couple of ways, right? There are lives, of course, the most basic measure. The easiest way is probably in dollars and cents, billions of them. Trump makes his first prime-time address as president tonight, talking about how America will move forward in a war that’s been going on since 2001. There’s a stability question here, too: Despite, or maybe because of, 16 years of American and allied involvement, the Afghan economy is still in trouble. Then: The president is settling back into the White House and Congress is getting back to work, but over the recess, the media balance has shifted. Steve Bannon walked out of the White House and back into his website Breitbart. We’ll talk about what that means amid a busy fall at the capital. Plus, just as the U.S. started to catch up on credit card security, scammers have moved on to a new target: your phone.

US troops from the 2nd Platoon, Charlie Company, 2-87, 3BCT under Afghanistan's International Security Assistance Force.
US troops from the 2nd Platoon, Charlie Company, 2-87, 3BCT under Afghanistan's International Security Assistance Force.
ROMEO GACAD/AFP/Getty Images

Subscribe:

Segments From This Episode

Music from the episode

You can look at the costs of increasing the number of American troops in Afghanistan in a couple of ways, right? There are lives, of course, the most basic measure. The easiest way is probably in dollars and cents, billions of them. Trump makes his first prime-time address as president tonight, talking about how America will move forward in a war that’s been going on since 2001. There’s a stability question here, too: Despite, or maybe because of, 16 years of American and allied involvement, the Afghan economy is still in trouble. Then: The president is settling back into the White House and Congress is getting back to work, but over the recess, the media balance has shifted. Steve Bannon walked out of the White House and back into his website Breitbart. We’ll talk about what that means amid a busy fall at the capital. Plus, just as the U.S. started to catch up on credit card security, scammers have moved on to a new target: your phone.