"Captain Compassion" <daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net> wrote in message
news:789s12dtovqk6r0ii98bjuelp5bk5tfh67@4ax.com...

Bolivia urges UN to defy Washington and legalise coca
By Sophie Arie in La Paz
(Filed: 20/03/2006)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/20/wboliv20.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/03/20/ixworld.html

Bolivia is leading a Latin American campaign to legalise coca plants
despite them being vilified by the United States as the source of the
world's cocaine industry.

Coca leaves: fans claim it aids digestion and contains more vitamins
and nutrients than most vegetables

Under the slogan "coca is not cocaine", politicians, consumers and
growers across the Andes are promoting the leaf's qualities and
calling for coca-based tea, yoghurt, bread, toothpaste, shampoo and
soap to be mass produced and exported.

Its fans claim it helps digestion, provides more vital vitamins,
nutrients and fibre than most vegetables and can even combat obesity.

But the plant has been listed by the United Nations as a poisonous
species since 1961 because it also contains the alkaloid needed to
make cocaine.

Bolivia has this week been arguing the case for legalising coca to the
UN narcotics and crime agency in Vienna and hopes to change its status
by 2008.

Indigenous communities have chewed its leaf here since 2,500 BC and
brewed it as tea to boost their strength and stave off hunger and
tiredness.

Even today, Bolivia's tin miners, who work in appalling work
conditions, chew coca around the clock to stay awake and dull pain.

Prsident Evo Morales, a former grower who has campaigned for peasants'
rights to tend the crop, has vowed to crack down on cocaine production
in Bolivia, the world's third largest producer after Colombia and
Peru.

But he insists the country should be allowed to grow more coca for
natural, legal consumption.

And in neighbouring Peru a frontrunner in next month's election,
Ollanta Humala, has suggested baking 27 million loaves of bread from
coca leaves for school breakfasts daily.

Small companies in Bolivia, Peru and Colombia, have launched
coca-based energy drinks, biscuits, breads and yoghurts, all faintly
green in colour and supposedly providing invaluable nutritional
benefits.

And although not officially for export, leaf-shaped coca biscuits are
a popular buy at airport souvenir shops.

Some also claim that the leaf's ability to stunt appetite could
provide a natural cure to the world's obesity epidemic.

Maria Eugenia Tenorio, Bolivia's best known coca cook, even claims to
have lost more than two stone in eight months by eating large numbers
of coca biscuits.

"If Bolivians just started cooking with coca, they could solve most of
the problems of malnutrition here," she said in her La Paz kitchen,
kneading green coca flour into mashed potatoes to make a local version
of gnocchi.

The US spends up to $1 billion a year tackling drugs in the Andes.

The idea that more coca can be grown in Bolivia without boosting more
cocaine production is "pie in the sky", US officials say.


--
"There are no absolute certainties in this universe. A man must try to
whip order into a yelping pack of probabilities, and uniform success is
impossible." -- Jack Vance

"Civilizaton is the interval between Ice Ages." -- Will Durant.

"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography" -- Ambrose Bierce

"Long term commitment in relationships is only necessary because it takes
so damn long to raise children. Marriage may well be some kind of trick
to keep the males around beyond sexual satiation." -- Captain Compassion

"Progress is the increasing control of the environment by life.
--Will Durant

Joseph R. Darancette
daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net

As usual "US officials" talk out of superficial ignorance. Coca is
unsurpassed in many qualities unrecognized by the largest economy in the
world. Because we do not allow the use of coca in products that are sold to
the US........and consequently the rest of the world......the market for
coca is very local in the few countries that do recognize its utility.
Nothing is as good a base for toothpaste as coca, I'm told. For farmers who
grow coca........cocaine becomes the only viable market for their produce.

So, yes we have a right to ban coca from our nation whether it be legitimate
use or for illegal drug use. If we are not going to allow legitimate coca
out of our unenlightened narrow mindedness........then we should not export
our ignorance beyond our own boundaries.

We should not be destroying crops in other countries just because we can't
seal our own borders or discipline our own citizens to avoid contraband.

The concept of freedom is not hard to understand. Draw little circles
sub-divided from individuals to families to neighborhoods to communities, to
counties, to states, to countries. Everyone is free within their own circle
and when they step into someone else's circle they follow the rules of that
space.........and leave when they are disinvited or can't abide by those
rules.

Americans are arrogant and do not understand freedom or its
responsibilities. We constantly demand things from others that is not ours
to demand. I love Israel, but we turn a blind eye to Israel's nuclear
weapons and make demands upon Iran. Iran is scary, and we should use
diplomacy to prevent the growth of Nuclear weapons...........but it is
absurd to threaten attack if they don't bend to our will.

Whatever threat we see as necessary to prevent nukes............any
intelligent country would see as a mandate for nukes. If a powerful country
is threatening attack.........only nuclear weapons would stay their insane
hand in the event someone irresponsible like George W. Bush or Trigger happy
***** Cheney was given nuclear authority.

Iran has no choice but to seek nuclear weapons while we plan for attacks
upon them.

On Sun, 19 Mar 2006 19:48:11 -0800, Captain Compassion
<daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net> wrote:

Bolivia urges UN to defy Washington and legalise coca

The UN has no power to legalize anything anywhere, including
things they've already made a-okay (according to them) by vote.

By Sophie Arie in La Paz
(Filed: 20/03/2006)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/20/wboliv20.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/03/20/ixworld.html

Bolivia is leading a Latin American campaign to legalise coca plants
despite them being vilified by the United States as the source of the
world's cocaine industry.

Coca leaves: fans claim it aids digestion and contains more vitamins
and nutrients than most vegetables

Under the slogan "coca is not cocaine", politicians, consumers and
growers across the Andes are promoting the leaf's qualities and
calling for coca-based tea, yoghurt, bread, toothpaste, shampoo and
soap to be mass produced and exported.

Its fans claim it helps digestion, provides more vital vitamins,
nutrients and fibre than most vegetables and can even combat obesity.

But the plant has been listed by the United Nations as a poisonous
species since 1961 because it also contains the alkaloid needed to
make cocaine.

Bolivia has this week been arguing the case for legalising coca to the
UN narcotics and crime agency in Vienna and hopes to change its status
by 2008.

Indigenous communities have chewed its leaf here since 2,500 BC and
brewed it as tea to boost their strength and stave off hunger and
tiredness.

Even today, Bolivia's tin miners, who work in appalling work
conditions, chew coca around the clock to stay awake and dull pain.

Prsident Evo Morales, a former grower who has campaigned for peasants'
rights to tend the crop, has vowed to crack down on cocaine production
in Bolivia, the world's third largest producer after Colombia and
Peru.

But he insists the country should be allowed to grow more coca for
natural, legal consumption.

And in neighbouring Peru a frontrunner in next month's election,
Ollanta Humala, has suggested baking 27 million loaves of bread from
coca leaves for school breakfasts daily.

Small companies in Bolivia, Peru and Colombia, have launched
coca-based energy drinks, biscuits, breads and yoghurts, all faintly
green in colour and supposedly providing invaluable nutritional
benefits.

And although not officially for export, leaf-shaped coca biscuits are
a popular buy at airport souvenir shops.

Some also claim that the leaf's ability to stunt appetite could
provide a natural cure to the world's obesity epidemic.

Maria Eugenia Tenorio, Bolivia's best known coca cook, even claims to
have lost more than two stone in eight months by eating large numbers
of coca biscuits.

"If Bolivians just started cooking with coca, they could solve most of
the problems of malnutrition here," she said in her La Paz kitchen,
kneading green coca flour into mashed potatoes to make a local version
of gnocchi.

The US spends up to $1 billion a year tackling drugs in the Andes.

The idea that more coca can be grown in Bolivia without boosting more
cocaine production is "pie in the sky", US officials say.

That much is probably true, but there are solutions to
problems like this that tend to not profit the "elite" on either side,
and that's why they're most often against them.