MB Civic

http://select.nytimes.com/2006/09/23/opinion/23tierney.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fJohn%20Tierney&pagewanted=print

In discussion the Bolivian President Evo Morales’ speech at the U.N., in which “he denounced ‘the colonization of the Andean peoples’ by imperialists intent on criminalizing coca,” Tierney points out that, “The American policy is to keep attacking the crops, even if that impoverishes peasants – or…turns them into criminals. Drug prohibition in Bolivia and Afghanistan has done exactly what alcohol prohibition did in America: it has financed organized crime.”

Yet, according to Morales, ‘It has been demonstrated that the coca leaf does no harm to human health…,’ “a statement that’s much closer to the truth than Washington’s take…” Morales notes, “If the gringos are abusing a product made from coca leaves, that’s a problem for America to deal with at home.”

Ultimately, as Tierney points out cogently, “The Saudis can fight alcoholism by forbidding the sale of Jack Daniels, but we’d think they were crazy if they ordered us to eradicate fields of barley in Tennessee. They’d be even crazier if they tried to wipe out every field of barley in the world, but that’s what our drug policy has come to.”