#2684: Politics of Drug Certification: Kozyn comments

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From: John C. Kozyn <jckozyn@mnsinc.com>

From: Merrill Smith <advocacy@bellatlantic.net>
 
> March 1, 2000
> The drug certification dance
> Helle Bering

Thanks much, Merrill Smith, for this post. I must admit that I love 
it when the far-right and the progressive left dovetail!  Always keep 
'em guessing  :)

Apropos the above, didn't Madeleine, oh, excuse me, _Doctor_ 
Albright, do the same thing the other day? I'm not sure but maybe you 
or someone else knows.

You know gang, even the State Department's own 1999 Narco-Repo 
ackowledges significant proactive behavior on the part of the Haitian 
Government's efforts in arresting traffickers, especially foreign 
ones. Just check out the table at the end of their document.

Although Merrill included way too much Mexico/Colombia info in his 
post on our "Haiti" list, it was nonethless very interesting to note 
the dramatic dichotomy between U.S.standards viz. narcotics-producing 
countries and those which are so-called trans-shipping ones.

I think Haiti is doing a pretty damned good in combatting drug 
trafficking. If the United States would do something about reducing 
demand in that country and maybe persuade the Colombians to do more 
to lessen production - oh, wait, they are doing that already aren't 
they? - then maybe less cocaine would be floating into coastal 
Haitian communities from aborted maritme or aerial transfers 
prompting sensationalistic reporting from in-country foreign 
reporters. I mean, if the transfer was aborted so that cocaine falls 
like manna from heaven or loaves on the sea, then traffickers felt 
threatened right? So, someone's doing their job, right? 

Right. 

Do we read this in our American press? 

No. 

We do not.

Maybe Mr Chapman or Ms Baudruy et al (I appreciate your willingness 
to assign your names to your posts, contrary to several media-type  
lurking cowards here ;) would like to take that tack the next time 
South American drug smugglers off their cargo and get themselves 
arrested in Haiti.

John Kozyn