President Bush can`t do much of anything right. Now, he`s getting dumped on by teenage girls.
The thrashing is found in September Sassy, for the teen crowd, which skewers Bush in ”How`s That Drug War Going, Guys?” a rather lucid, pointedly phrased critique of the administration`s anti-drug policies.
It lays out five ”lame strategies” propounded by Bush: invading drug-producing countries, notably Colombia; putting ”scary dictators on the payroll,” notably Manuel Noriega; building more prisons; viewing addicts as the enemy, not victims; and curtailing civil rights by giving law enforcement greater clout when it suspects someone of use or possession of drugs.
The monthly`s ”Lame Strategy No. 1,” the invading of the drug producers, is convincingly direct in explaining to its young audience how Bush is way off:
”Coca, the raw material for cocaine and crack, is grown in Central and South America and processed into drug form in Colombia. And all of these places are dirt poor-we`re talking an average income of less than $500 a year. . . . What saved (peasant farmers) was the unbelievable demand-mainly from America-for coca. The more success we have fighting drugs in South America, the more we damage their economy and the more we become the enemy.
”You`re probably thinking, So what if some scummy drug-producing country doesn`t like us?” it continues. ”But it`s way more complicated than that.” The magazine explains how the U.S. encouraged the drug business in South America, especially in backing anti-communist, coca-trading government leaders when the U.S. ”had a big, fat bug up its butt about Communists taking over countries.”
OK, so what does this teen favorite suggest Bush do? It calls for compassion via more funding of counseling and treatment centers (”after all, most people turn to drugs because their lives suck”). Then, it calls for understanding the problems` complexity, ”not just assuming Daddy`s gonna fix them”; demanding specific answers from politicians; and getting involved in the unsexy work of seeking change.
”We`re talking a change in national consciousness that would take years to accomplish,” it concludes. ”It would be very unglamorous. Maybe that`s why it`s never been tried.”
Quickly: Sept. 1 Family Circle`s ”The Pregnancy Puzzle” checks out the evolving body of law directed toward ensuring the health of the newborn, including the taking of legal action against pregnant women who take drugs (an earlier values survey by the magazine found that 68 percent of readers ”would treat women who give birth bunder the influence of drugs like anyone else who pushes drugs to children”). . . . The London-based Index on Censorship, a catalog of free speech and human rights abuses worldwide, does a terrific special section on hate speech, especially as it has inspired clashing views of what`s ”politically correct,” and as it has caused tough decisions for human rights groups faced with whether they should support governmental moves worldwide to curb such expressions. Some wonder if such laws will simply move prejudice underground rather than diminish it. ($39 for 10 issues via C&C Mailers International Inc., 900 Lincoln Blvd., Box 177, Middlesex, N.J., 08846.) . . . September Redbook leaves little to the imagination with its own list of hate speech. . . . August Harper`s Magazine gets six writers to craft fictional sequels to famous works. This includes Middlebury College professor Jay Parini`s look at a melancholy Nick Carraway returning from Jay Gatsby`s funeral in ”The Late Gatsby,” and author Jane Smiley poking fun at Franz Kafka via ”Gregor-My Life as a Bug,” a look at how Gregor Samsa, reduced to a giant dung beetle, is dealing with having been flung out to a dustheap by a cleaning lady (he does find one half-decent piece of mutton to eat). . . . If you`re looking for a Caribbean getaway, judging by September Architectural Digest, get rocker David Bowie and wife Iman (the former hotshot model) to invite you to their Indonesian-style refuge on the island of Mustique; it`s
”five years and more than fourteen cargo containers in the making, culminating in an Indonesian-style pavilion that horseshoes around two koi-filled ponds that descend burblingly toward the setting sun into a sort of trompe-l`eau sluice from which dark water appears to emerge magically pristine as it pours into the swimming pool.” It beats a Motel 6.
