IS HELP ON THE WAY?

During his presidential campaign, George W. Bush was fond of saying, "Help
is on the way." Given the mess he is inheriting from the Clinton-Gore
regime, that may be a tough promise to keep. William & Albert have
bequeathed to Mr. Bush a contracting economy, an energy crisis, the worst
Middle East violence in nearly two decades and a potentially explosive war
in a place nobody wants to talk about -Colombia. But you wouldn't know this
from the press coverage.

Mr. Bush started last week with meetings in Austin, Texas, on national
security issues.

The masters of the media found the collapse of Linda Chavez's nomination as
labor secretary to be more exciting.

By midweek, the president-elect was in Washington for detailed intelligence
briefings and meetings with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and outgoing and
incoming defense officials.

Their appetites whetted by the Chavez bloodletting, the potentates of the
press shouted queries at Mr. Bush about former Sen. John Ashcroft -
questions prepared by the "Opposition Coalition" in their effort to block
his appointment as attorney general.

Did they ask about the bloody war in Colombia that has claimed more than
30,000 lives in the last eight years and threatens the stability of this
hemisphere? No.

Having served for several years as the poster-child for the politics of
personal destruction, I am not surprised by the media's reaction to the
Chavez and Ashcroft appointments. I'm not even startled by efforts to dig
up dirt on the darling of the incoming Cabinet, Secretary of
State-designate Colin Powell. This is, as Mrs. Chavez so eloquently
observed, "a game of search and destroy." What astounds me is how long the
media will ignore the horrific carnage in Colombia - where the searching
and destroying are daily occurrences with deadly consequences.

What happened to the correspondents and "broadcast investigators" who
swarmed all over Central America covering every titillating tidbit about
the Nicaraguan Resistance? Where are the camera teams plunging into the
jungle to report what's "really going on" and "what the administration
isn't telling the American people"?

I asked some of those who covered me - and some I've come to know since
being in print and broadcast news. None would agree to be quoted - but the
responses are revealing nonetheless. "It's a matter of money," said one
news director, apparently indicating that the Clinton "economic miracle"
didn't reach the television networks.

But a reporter who covered Central America in the Reagan years was blunt:
"Colombia didn't matter to Clinton, so it didn't matter to us." That may be
true. But it had better matter to George W. Bush.

Jimmy Carter handed Ronald Reagan a mess in Central America. The Nicaraguan
communists who seized power during Mr. Carter's tenure were, with the help
of the Soviets and their proxies, fomenting revolution in El Salvador,
Honduras, Costa Rica and Guatemala when Ronald Reagan took the oath of office.

Mr. Carter publicly counseled concession and appeasement while covertly
authorizing the CIA to foment opposition. It took a decade to end the threat.

Bill Clinton leaves a parallel predicament for George Bush in Colombia.
Drug lords and narco-terrorists, subsidized by American cocaine and heroin
users, have all but divided this hemisphere's second-oldest democracy and
threaten the stability of Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, and Venezuela (which
exports 1.5 million barrels of oil each day to the United States). The
Clinton administration encouraged Colombia's democratically elected
President Andres Pastrana to negotiate with the narco-guerrillas. Now that
negotiations have collapsed, the Colombian army is too weak to reclaim
territory the size of Switzerland he ceded to the drug lords.

Thankfully, the similarities stop there.

George Bush has significant advantages in dealing with Colombia that Ronald
Reagan never enjoyed in Central America: First, George Bush will have
congressional allies like House Speaker Dennis Hastert, Government Reform
Chairman Dan Burton, and Foreign Relations Committee champions Ben Gilman
and Bob Barr, all of whom have visited Colombia to see for themselves what
needs to be done. Second, the desperately underfunded and poorly equipped
but well-led and heroic Colombian National Police (CNP) have a
well-deserved reputation for effectiveness in eradicating cocoa and heroin
poppy fields while demonstrating a remarkable record of respect for human
rights. The Bush administration won't encounter a buzzsaw of opposition to
increased support for the CNP.

Third, unlike the "Revolution Without Frontiers" that was sweeping through
Central America when Ronald Reagan came to office, the Colombian maelstrom
isn't Moscow's creation.

It is made in America. More than 90 percent of the cocaine and 80 percent
of the heroin consumed in the U.S. originate in Colombia. Deal with demand
- - and drug lords will dry up and blow away.

Finally, Congress has already allocated $1.3 billion to staunch the flow of
drugs, restore order and protect human rights in Colombia - help that's
already "on the way." Next week it becomes the job of President-elect Bush
to make sure it's not too little too late.

Oliver North is a nationally syndicated columnist.