In case you haven't heard, an AP story on Oct 22 claims the government may have the "silver bullet" to end use of narcotics. The Agriculture Dept. is experimenting with mycoherbicides - fungi that will kill the narcotics plants. Apparently, once an area is doused with the fungus it takes decades before the area is able to grow narcotic plants again.

Donald Silberger, reporter-on-the-scene, writes:

Hm-m-m... that's an interesting class of fungi you've mentioned there! Whatchacallit? Mycoherbicides, you say? Salting the earth with 'em the way the Romans salted the earth of Carthage, so that the narcotics will never arise again! Way to go! I can imagine this discussion now in Fungus Field Headquarters:

GENERAL ERGOT: "General Mushroom, let's go out and slaughter those damned narcotics plants. Make the world pure according to the lofty moral standards of Norbert the Narc!"

GENERAL MUSHROOM: "General Ergot, we haven't yet decided how to distinguish the narcotics plants from Grandma's California poppies. We don't want to piss off Grandma."

COLONEL DERMATOMYCETES: "Gentlemen, how does one classify the herbs, Cannabis Sativa and Cannabis Indica? They seem to be closely related neither to the opium poppy nor to the coca bush. "Shall we treat the cannabinols as narcotics? Or what?"

GENERAL ERGOT: "Hey, we want action, Saprophytes! Not quibblings! "If the Drug Enforcement Administration, with the backing of the White House and Capitol Hill, classifies that weed as a narcotic, then we go out and infect it. We wipe 'em out! Orders are orders!"

MS. AGNES MILDEW: "You don't think there might result a case of pandemic herbicide resulting from your patriotic efforts, do you, officers?"

GENERAL ERGOT: "Ms. Mildew, I appreciate your concerns. But we can't let such negativity interfere with the vigorous support of our project, as Fungal Special Agents, to win the War on Drugs for God and Country. If a desert will result from our efforts then maybe a desert'll have been what it takes."

AGNES MILDEW: "Thank you, General Ergot. I am relieved to have my worries addressed by a gentleman officer with a competent command of the future perfect passive verb tense."

Ten Four, over and out. Surveyance of mycoherbicies completed.

Yours for motherhood and virginity,

Donald Silberger
Libertarian for Lieutenant Governor