… it is one more nail into the coffin of the delusional American Right-Wing mind-set. Finally, the South Americans have had enough of pandering to American delusions. That’s what Nikolas Kozloff’s article in ALJAZEERA, “The Summit of the Americas, WikiLeaks and the failed war on drugs”, which gets right to the nitty-gritty:
Unhappy with the failed war on drugs, some Latin American leaders are calling for the decriminalisation of narcotics.
Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina, who is leading the charge, recently began openly advocating for decriminalisation of recreational drug use. Boldly, Pérez has labelled the war on drugs an abject failure and charges that the crusade costs Central American nations hundreds of millions of dollars every year, as well as the loss of tens of thousands of lives.
So, my guess is that this will be kept below the Gopper radar until after the American election in November, which Obama should win. Then I expect the South Americans to move on this and do a Portugal. The point is, should this come to pass, we may see the melt-down of the American conservatives as they have to face a public failure of a cherished delusion. Note to Canucks: Stevie ain’t gonna like this.
Some years ago I was skiing in BC, and I happened to meet up with a U.S. Army helicopter pilot who’d been seconded to the “War on Drugs.” We had a beer at the hostel one evening, and while it was a little surprising that he was willing to talk so candidly, he estimated that when you factored in all the maintenance, man-hours and logistical support, it was costing more than $50,000 to destroy one marijuana plant — and it wasn’t even making a dent in the traffic.
Can’t imagine that the results are all that different when you look at nose candy, but it does say something about the preference for expensive and ineffective policies that play well politically in the short term. In fact, you could almost call it an addiction.
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