Is It Just Me?

There is a recent news item with which I have three problems.

This is that news item;

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Coca-Cola vs Coca Sek* in Colombia
By SERGIO DE LEON, Associated Press Writer Thu May 10, 3:19 AM ET

BOGOTÁ, Colombia - President Alvaro Uribe is taking the war on drugs to the supermarket, prohibiting the sale of products made from the coca plant.
With the help of more than $600 million a year in U.S. aid, Uribe has strengthened Colombia's anti-narcotics police, seized record tons of cocaine and extradited 520 drug trafficking suspects to U.S. jails.
But until recently, his hard-line government had not gone after natural coca products made by Indians, acknowledging that millions of peasants have chewed calcium-rich coca for thousands of years to stave off hunger and as a remedy for ailments from altitude sickness to stomach aches.
Uribe's presidential Web site even promoted natural coca products as a rare commercial enterprise for poor Indian communities, and the federal food-safety agency provided quality-control advice to the manufacturers of coca tea, cookies, shampoo and other consumer goods.

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Okay. About my first concern...

*His “federal food-safety agency provided quality-control advice to the manufacturers of coca”

The next sticking point...

**“Uribe's presidential Web site even promoted natural coca”

This fact, however, gives me the most cause for concern.

***Even though we paid him “more than $600 million a year in U.S. aid” to help stop this, he “provided…advice” to, and even “promoted” the very thing he was paid handsomely to prevent.

Does anyone in the government see this?

We pay him more than six hundred million dollars each year to do the opposite of what he's doing.

That's over $600,000,000.00 per year!

-Sigh-

Is it just I?

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FOOTNOTE: Coca Sek is a Columbian soft drink made by brewing coca leaves and results in a beverage that does contain cocaine. Here is the story of Coca Sek, and also a review of it.