[Marxism] [CubaNews] JR: Venezuela Strikes Back Against Drug Trafficking and US Agency

[Shane Mage]

On Sep 4, 2008, at 8:50 AM, Walter Lippmann wrote:

> JUVENTUD REBELDE
>
> Venezuela Strikes Back Against Drug Trafficking and US Agency
> Cooperation, yes. Demands, no

What a stupid article!  The quantity of cocaine seized in Venezuela  
says nothing about the quantity originating from or transshipped  
through the country, because the amount seized always and everywhere  
reflects the amount being produced or shipped.  Seizures and bribery  
are the price paid for police cooperation with the mafia/CIA  
criminals. If anything, increased seizure is evidence of increased  
production/flow.

But even more idiotic than that is the Cuban line that coca is   
"beneficial" (presumably because Hugo and Evo would take offence if  
they didn't say that) while "poppy and marihuana" are noxious weeds  
worthy of police repression!

The "war on drugs," we all know, is an imperialist war against freedom  
and the main method for the racist imprisonment and permanent  
"felonization" of millions in this country.
Why ever does Walter praise Cuban/Venezuelan "cooperation" with  
imperialism to wage that war?

> By: Marina Menéndez Quintero, special correspondent
> ... Since the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) stopped “cooperating”  
> with that country in the fight against this scourge, local  
> authorities have almost doubled the confiscation of cocaine going  
> through Venezuela on its long journey north, where its greatest  
> number of consumers is found.
>
> The fact is that while an average of 27 metric tons were confiscated  
> between 2002 and 2004 under the leadership of the DEA, the  
> consignments intercepted by Venezuela increased to an average of  
> 43.5 metric tons in the period 2005 to 2007 – without the  
> involvement of that sacred agency...

> ... Other accomplishments are...arrests of citizens involved in the  
> business, and operations to manually destroy poppy and marihuana  
> fields...

Shane Mage

"Thunderbolt steers all things...it consents and does not consent to  
be called Zeus."

Herakleitos of Ephesos