Soldadito de Bolivia, soldadito boliviano ...

October 16, 2003 9:35 AM

Coca culture (NYT) I am a cocalera. I owe my life to coca. My father died when I was 2 and my mother raised six children by growing coca. I was a farmer myself, growing coca for traditional purposes. But the United States says it is better for us to just forget about coca. In the early 1990's, Bolivian officials distributed American money — $300 to $2,500 per farm — and told us to try yucca and pineapples. But 60 pineapples earn us only about eight bolivianos (about $1). And unlike coca, yucca and pineapples are difficult to carry to the cities to sell, and they spoil. So many farmers returned to growing coca.
posted by magullo (34 comments total)

*sniff*
posted by jonmc at 9:41 AM on October 16, 2003

jonmc: Are you a sympathiser or a user?
posted by biffa at 9:43 AM on October 16, 2003

Title reference: Soldadito Boliviano by Nicolás Guillen as sung by Paco Ibañez
posted by magullo at 9:47 AM on October 16, 2003

jonmc: Are you a sympathiser or a user?

a wiseass.
posted by jonmc at 9:59 AM on October 16, 2003

Here's an idea. This will solve the drug problem once and for all. The war on drugs will end. Here's my idea.

Let's take the billions (trillions?) of dollars we're going to spend on interdiction, incarceration, rehabilitation, legislation, arrests, PR, prosecution, etc, for illegal drugs and related issues, and develop a series of drugs which have similar effects without the side effects.

We then release the formula to the public domain and let anyone make and sell it.

Why won't this work? Do people really think we couldn't come up with something like this if we spent even a fraction of the money we'd save? We make drugs to make your dick hard why not safe hallucinations?
posted by y6y6y6 at 10:02 AM on October 16, 2003

y6y6y6: You can't be serious. A drug without side effects would quickly become its own side effect.
posted by jon_kill at 10:08 AM on October 16, 2003

Now tanks surround the presidential palace in La Paz. Fourteen people died in riots there on Monday alone. Unless the United States and its allies like Mr. Sánchez de Lozada stop their war against us, Bolivia will have neither peace nor a future.

I'd like to think that Metafilter readers are at least somewhat aware of the current Bolivian situation, with the government besieged by the masses led by a cocalero leader who almost won the past elections.
posted by magullo at 10:23 AM on October 16, 2003

cocaine does not induce hallucinations as it's primary desirable (from a users viewpoint) effect.
posted by quonsar at 10:23 AM on October 16, 2003

"...similar effects without the side effects."

I'd been thinking that the 'side effects' were the good parts? I've been going about this all wrong.
posted by cedar at 10:28 AM on October 16, 2003

Well, I was thinking of the side effects being cardiac arrest, nasal destruction, brain damage, toxicity, etc.

And we already have a system in place to dissuade people from driving or working while impaired.

We can't get rid of drugs. It just doesn't work. So why not replace them?
posted by y6y6y6 at 10:47 AM on October 16, 2003

develop a series of drugs which have similar effects without the side effects.

You want a new drug?
posted by homunculus at 10:49 AM on October 16, 2003

The protests in Bolivia are about exporting oil, not about coca.

Having been many times in Bolivia, I can witness to the fact that coca is a huge legitimate business, especially for the discriminated and poor indian majority, as well as an important part of their culture, going back to the Inkas and Aymaras.

Cocaine |= Coca, not by a long shot.

The tendency by some large northern nation I won't name to treat its local public health issues as macho foreign shoot-the-bad-guys adventures has done untold damage to Latin America, with the victims in this case being some of the poorest people on the face of the earth.

Way to go.
posted by signal at 10:51 AM on October 16, 2003

i'm *totally* with y6y6y6.

if drugs were legal to create and sell, yet highly regulated for addictive and dangerous health effects, they would be a whole lot better and a whole lot safer.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:15 AM on October 16, 2003

The protests in Bolivia are about exporting oil

More precisely, natural gas via Chile. As far as I understand it, the popular revolt against this is partly articulated via the anti-government movement sparked by the cocaleros led by Evo Morales. Morales lost the bid for the presidency by 1% in the last elections.

Part of the reason why I posted it here is to see if I would get first-hand accounts - thank you.
posted by magullo at 11:16 AM on October 16, 2003

y6y6y6, you will never make a good public health official. Legalization (or decriminalization) perhaps, but formulating cloned synthetics seems to me to be an odd use of the money saved, which could be more effectively allocated to treatment and rehabilitation, or a variety of other public health pursuits.

Although, with the current administration and political climate, the government would probably just return the money as a tax refund.
posted by amauck at 11:30 AM on October 16, 2003

"I'd like to think that Metafilter readers are at least somewhat aware of the current Bolivian situation, with the government besieged by the masses led by a cocalero leader who almost won the past elections."

That's interesting to me, 'cause my government is run by a cocaine user who almost won the past election.

Someone had to say it
posted by mr_crash_davis at 11:47 AM on October 16, 2003

magullo: as far as I know, the protests are partly anti-Chile, which from my experience is probably political manipulation, as you don't get a lot of actual face-to-face resentment against us chileans there.

The other issue is the selling of resources (mainly) to the US, which is seen as the government selling-out the nation's wealth with no benefit coming to the poor.

You have to keep in mind that Bolivia harbors some strong socialist and communist ideologues, and people there have no empirical reason to trust the free-market, globalization, etc., as they've consistently been acquainted with the shorter end of many, many sticks.

And to just to go on a complete tangent, I think we (Chile) should give them an out to the sea.
posted by signal at 12:02 PM on October 16, 2003

A new drug? I think I'll call it *CAKE*

/obscure reference?
posted by devbrain at 12:11 PM on October 16, 2003

"which could be more effectively allocated to treatment and rehabilitation"

I find your logic confusing.

We shoud spend the money we'd save on treatment and rehabilitation on treatment and rehabilitation?
posted by y6y6y6 at 12:12 PM on October 16, 2003

Billion-dollar pharmaceutical companies can't even produce your regular aspirin without side effects. I find it somehow hard to believe it would be so easy to slash the side-effects from hallucinogens... drugs by their very nature will always cause one or another side effect. Pumping anything artificial into your bloodstrem is bound to have an undesirable effect, especially longterm. I'd love to know where you got the idea that moola will solve any problem... you wouldn't happen to be American?
posted by degnarra at 1:26 PM on October 16, 2003

I am a Bolivian living in La Paz, Bolivia. More than seventy people have died in these clashes with the military.

The protests were started about the fears of selling gas to the US and using Chilean ports. The real reason for the protests is that this President, his second time in office, has done nothing. His is a coalition of very different parties that are still, one year since the election, fighting over jobs and power quotas.

The protests are not being lead by anybody really. There are people that are the sort of leaders. Evo Morales, who I voted for, is one of them. (I voted for him because I wanted to vote against the other politicians and I believe that Evo speaks for a large portion of the population that has no voice in this incredibly racist country.) I think it is more of a popular uprising that have agreed on the fact that the political classes have betrayed this country and we won't take it any more.

The real problem is that the government refuses to notice the real social and economic problems that this country is going through and their disproportionate effect on the mainly rural and native population. Two thirds of the country are campesinos, peasants or farmers, that live in rural areas. We are the poorest country in South America.

The President, Goni Sanchez de Lozada, won by the lowest percentage since democracy was reinstated 23 years ago. He won 22.5% of the vote while the runner-up Evo Morales won 19%. We don't have run-offs in Bolivia so Goni was elected president by the Congress by forming a coalition.

Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada was raised in the US, so he has a distinct American accent when he speaks in Spanish, one of his many monikers is "Gringo." The first time he was president he sold most of the national industries to foreign countries. This money was supposed to fuel his policies and pull Bolivia out of its economic slump. It didn't and Goni and his cronies pocketed millions of dollars in consultancy fees and commisions.

The sale of gas that was proposed by the previous administration was supposed to fund even more reform, but nobody trusts the guy.

Lots of people want him to resign so that we can have a democratic transition. He won't because he knows that if he does his party and those of his allies will disappear.

One of the things that coca has done for many of the poorest farmers in this country is raised their standards of living. It has allowed the more power and education. The American initiatives of replacing coca with other crops was under the condition that the US would be a major buyer of these crops. The US has not lowered tarrifs or given preferential treatment to these exports. So the money never appeared.
posted by jlbartosa at 2:00 PM on October 16, 2003 [1 favorite]

devbrain: "Cake" is a made-up drug. Do you want to be part of the summer of death?
posted by John Shaft at 2:07 PM on October 16, 2003

If the United States was truely serious about winning the war on drugs...

...take the billions (trillions?) of dollars we're going to spend on interdiction, incarceration, rehabilitation, legislation, arrests, PR, prosecution, etc, for illegal drugs and related issues... Coutesy y6y6y6

...and subsidize farms in South America, etc just as they do here for non-drug related agriculture. I realize that would require coorperation from the gov'ts involved, but I keep hearing our's is serious about this problem.
posted by LouReedsSon at 2:29 PM on October 16, 2003

jlbartosa, thank you for sharing your first-hand perspective of what is happening there.
posted by homunculus at 2:52 PM on October 16, 2003

" I'd love to know where you got the idea that moola will solve any problem... you wouldn't happen to be American?"

Jeez. It was just an idea. We're already spending the money, I just thought there might be a better way to spend it. You know? Solve the problem rather than just paying for it over and over? What's with the attack? I don't think I've ever had the idea that money will solve everything.

"If the United States was truly serious about winning the war on drugs.. [...] ...and subsidize farms in South America, etc"

Well, I like that idea too. But when I think about how badly we've screwed things up with previous attempts to effect change down there I tend to lose confidence. And then I look at the results of our attempts to "rebuild" Afghanistan and Iraq. We really suck at this sort of thing. Eliminating the demand sounds more effective than trying to stamp out the supply.

And besides, I don't think the United States is even marginally serious about winning the war on drugs. But, if we could build a $100 billion industry to produce happy pills........ Now that's something everyone would take seriously.
posted by y6y6y6 at 2:55 PM on October 16, 2003

happy pills? There have been a number of new drugs invented that are much like what you seem to be looking for. LSD comes to mind. It certainly was "taken seriously."
posted by sfenders at 3:26 PM on October 16, 2003

ME NO WANT CAKE ME WANT COOKIE!!! AR ARG AR ARGH ROM ROM ROMPH!!!
posted by pekar wood at 5:43 PM on October 16, 2003

Ken Lay used those same arguments.
posted by HTuttle at 6:41 PM on October 16, 2003

Bolivia's Battles
posted by homunculus at 7:39 PM on October 16, 2003

I mean, LSD and Ecstacy were both invented in labs and used in science and medicine. They were made illegal when the government realized they could also be used for fun. (If it makes you feel pleasure, and not just relieve suffering, it's bad.)

I think instead of fighting drugs, we should regulate the drugs that do come in for quality and tax them. Cut down on those heroin overdoses because a guy got product ten times stronger than he thought. (Happened to a friend of a friend.)
posted by nath at 12:51 AM on October 17, 2003

i think the chilean news might be slanted towads the chilean part of the bolivian crisis - either that or the emphasis has shifted (perhaps both?). when it all started, it appeared, at least here in santiago, to be strongly related, but then i went to the "first world" for a couple of weeks or so and i don't recall analysis mentioning chile at all. i must admit i haven't checked the news here since i've got back (just got in; really should go and have a shower...)

to what extent are the opposition fanning the flames? is their behaviour reasonable for a democracy (shouldn't opposition oppose with arguments, rather than inciting violence in the streets)?
posted by andrew cooke at 8:04 AM on October 17, 2003

Bolivian President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada has agreed to resign, according to a senior government figure.
posted by homunculus at 3:13 PM on October 17, 2003

Across the Americas, Indigenous Peoples Make Themselves Heard
posted by homunculus at 8:28 PM on October 18, 2003

California energy: Bloody chaos over California gas deal
posted by homunculus at 5:02 PM on October 19, 2003