Worst fears confirmed...

According to this BBC report, the escape of bin Laden from Afghanistan happened exactly the way that Kerry charged during the campaign-- our 'outsourcing' of the job to Afghani warlords led to his escape. From the article:

"Osama Bin Laden gave US forces the slip by bribing the Afghan militias tasked with tracking him down, according to Germany's spy chief, August Hanning.

Mr Hanning told German newspaper Handelsblatt that using Afghans was the key mistake in the hunt for Bin Laden.

He said Bin Laden paid "a lot of money" to buy a safe passage from the Tora Bora caves, which he had retreated to during the US assault in 2001.

The US has said it used Afghan fighters to reduce casualties among its troops."

To paraphrase Al Franken speaking on this issue, "The trouble with bribing people to do your job is that they're likely to accept bribes from other people, too." And it looks like the warlords made out like bandits-- they got paid twice for ultimately doing nothing.