By Luis Yerovi Jr.

For the past three decades, Washington's battle against illegal drug use (the Drug War) has resulted in a myriad of negative effects, both at home and abroad, without any discernible decrease in drug use.

Among the effects at home, America now imprisons more of its citizens than any other country in the world. With a preponderance of prisoners being black and Hispanics, questions of a biased system have been raised. Prisons have become so overcrowded with drug users and nonviolent offenders, that violent criminals, such as rapists, are sometimes paroled early to make room for Washington's prisoners of War.

Abroad, the pernicious effects of Washington's Drug War has been felt most keenly by Latin America's Andean Nations--Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. In the name of the Drug War, America has intervened with direct and indirect military aid. In some cases, this has led to the arming of rogue paramilitary groups. These groups continue to grow and spread their terror through the drug trade.

Washington has promoted controversial aerial spraying of large areas of land, populated with indigenous people, with toxic herbicides. This has led to wide spread ecological and public health problems.

To monitor their efforts, the Pentagon has established controversial air force bases on Latin American soil (most notably a base in Manta, Ecuador, with more bases in Ecuador pending). As can be seen, the Drug War has left the Andean nations in a virtual state of siege and with a loss of autonomy.

In order to enforce that local governments back this war, the United States has tied economic trade and political status to a country's effort to combat illegal drug trade. Similar to the war on terror, the Superpower's dictum has been "you are either with us or against us" in the fight against illicit drug use.

Until recently, most Andean governments were all too willing to cooperate with Washington for obvious reasons. However, the promises of globalization and expanded economic trade have failed to improve the lives of the majority of the population in these Andean countries. The IMF's (International Monetary Fund) policies have been exposed as emanating from the ideological backwaters of market fundamentalism whose primary mission, it is felt by many, is defending Washington's interests over true third world development. Thus, the less fortunate citizenry of Pax Colombia, as well as some of their leaders, are beginning to question the blind allegiance to what most people in Latin America believe to be Washington's hypocritical War on drugs. After all, they say, it is America's voracious appetite for drugs which keeps the drug trade growing.

Last week, in Bolivia, a new front against American Drug War imperialism arose in the form of one Evo Morales. Morales, son of a poor Bolivian peasant farmer, started out as a local indigenous leader. He is now an upstart politician who vows to end Bolivia's support for Washington-backed efforts to eradicate drug crops. Morales surprised pundits by placing second in Bolivia's recent presidential election. His candidacy seemed to get a boost after he was publicly denounced by Manuel Rocha, the American ambassador to Bolivia. The boost was interpreted as a sign of latent anti-Americanism among Bolivia's indigenous majority. The election of the new president now lies in the hands of the Bolivian congress who, on August 6th, will choose the country's new leader. America now faces the prospect of having a regional leader who is diametrically opposed to current US Drug War policy.

In Colombia, evidence for a change of heart towards the Drug War is also evident. A few days ago, the following editorial (which has been roughly translated for the purpose of this editorial) appeared in El Tiempo, Bogota Colombia's leading daily newspaper: