Daily Archives: August 27, 2004

Drug War Result

This entry was posted in Capitalism Domestic Terrorism Drug Laws Economics Law Enforcement Libertarianism US Foreign Policy War on Terrorism on by

Science and the market are hard at work in the drug war:

DRUG traffickers have created a new strain of coca plant that yields up to four times more cocaine than existing plants and promises to revolutionise Colombia�s drugs industry.
Why was it worthwhile to traffickers to spend �60,000,000 on this effort:
Such an investment by drugs traffickers is small compared to the earnings from what is the most lucrative business on earth. Traffickers can produce a kilogram of cocaine for less than �1,500. That kilogram will sell in Miami for �14,000, in London for �34,000 and in Tokyo would bring �50,000.
We can all thank the articial pricing created by ongoing domestic and international terrorist activities conducted by US and foreign governments for what promises to be a substantial improvement in both quality and quantity of cocaine on the market.
Via Jacob Sollum at Hit & Run.
NB: At the moment �1 equals $1.79

The Class of 2008

This entry was posted in Culture on by

Entering Freshman members of the Class of 2008 live in a world where:

10. Alan Greenspan has always been setting the nation�s financial direction.

The Beloit College Class of 2008 Mindset lists 49 additional items that form part of the base experience of this years college freshman.
The Beloit Mindset webpage hasn’t been updated with the 2008 list quite yet (mid day) so for your reading pleasure I have included their news release below the fold.

(more…)

Global Terrorism

This entry was posted in War on Terrorism on by

There is good news and bad news on the state terrorism front. First the good news:

The downturn in weapons orders worldwide since 2000 has been notable. Global arms agreement values have fallen from $41 billion in 2000 to $25.6 billion in 2003.
And the bad news. First:
Global arms agreement values in 2003 were $25.6 billion.
and second, if you are a US citizen:
In 2003, the United States led in arms transfer agreements worldwide, making agreements valued at over $14.5 billion (56.7% of all such agreements), up from $13.6 billion in 2002.
These numbers are not big when compared to, for instance, the US war budget and to be fair the US has a lot of company in this business. The other top ten leading peace loving nations are Russia, France, Germany, United Kingdom, China, Israel, Ukraine, Sweden and Italy.
Read the entire report on Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations,1996-2003.
Via Secrecy News.