This has been only somewhat frustrating for me, as anytime I mention where I live, people make cocaine jokes. Ha ha ha okay its not really funny anymore. When I say I'm going to drink some hot cocoa, I really mean it. But @nealmcspadden shared a link with me today in the LEO discord that makes me think cocaine discussions are going to be all the rage over the next year.
Colombia is considering Legalizing its Massive Cocaine Industry
All images here are going to be sourced from the VICE article, let's try to unpack what is being proposed.
Lots of USAID goes to Colombia to fight 'the war on drugs', this 'AID' is not money, it is primarily bullets, bombs and roundup poison. Leave it to the US to start a bunch of wars against concepts in an attempt to sell more agrochemicals and then tenaciously defend these failed policies for 40 years. How is the war on terror going? Is anybody less afraid now? That one's only been going on for 20 years.
Just remember that as we move forward, all the 'aid' goes to monsanto, all the cancer to the peasants.
But back to cocaine, it comes from a plant, a plant that people grow, the loveable and medicinal coca plant, used by indiginous people as a medicinal and dietary supplement and transformed into the product known as Mambe.
Whats the proposal?
Now, all you economists might already be able to detect a pricing problem here. Most likely if this program is implemented, farmers will produce more coca. But the increased supply and weakening of the black market should also drive prices down. Whether the black market weakens will also be the result of what other governments do, most influentially the US, as that is where all the dollars are demanding more cocaine.
Dealing with this problem on the supply side has been very detrimental for the Colombian people, when really its just been the hyper gringos demanding these high quality drugs.
Here is the plan, the government will sell leaves on to produce dietary supplements and medicinal products. I agree that there is an intense issue with trusting the government to get involved, instead of just making it all legal and being done with it. But here is where it gets interesting:
The Colombian government will produce the cocaine. Already I see this policy is aiming to benefit the coca farmers principally, since there are a number of health concerns associated with the harsh, cheap catalysts used in the coca transformation into 'pasta', the primary ingredient of cocaine.
Here, the government would do that part. This might also drive the price down, by removing some of the (highly dangerous) value added processing currently being done by peasant farmers, often leaving them will peeling and bleached skin and other conditions.
Colombia would then sell cocaine, as a product, to researchers, and USERS. If you didn't know, 'personal consumption' is a protected right in Colombia, so much for the US being 'the land of the free' am i rite?
Of course this right is complicated by the black market around production and distribution, which this law would solve.
If throwing money into the garbage sounds like 'just another day in government', then I think this policy, even rich with potential corruption and heavy handed government involvement as it is, is a step forward in the conversation we need to be having about how to stop doing the same worthless, ineffective shit that we've been doing since the 80's.
What are your thoughts? Leave me a message down below!
Freedom and Friendship!
PS anyone who spells Colombia with a 'u' will get a flag from me because I feel like it! Fair warning! Columbia is in Canada and they don't have the climate for these plants!