LISTEN TO PASTRANA

As President Clinton was about to arrive Wednesday with a $1.3 billion
aid package, Colombia's president was impolite and refreshingly
candid. "Colombia can put a stop to drugs here at some point," Andres
Pastrana said, "but if the demand continues, somebody else somewhere
in the world is going to produce them."

With drug trafficking "the most lucrative business in the world," as
Mr. Pastrana puts it, he is asking the right question: What if nobody
bought? Before America pours more money into fighting drug exports
from other countries, we should spend to reduce demand at home.

More than 25 percent of America's prisoners are addicts or chronic
drug users. Two years ago, when Arizona began to treat all nonviolent
drug offenders rather than lock them up, the state saved more than
$2.5 million the first year alone and recidivism went down. But
Americans should not have to commit a crime to get help. Just as the
law requires a hospital to treat any ill or injured person in its
emergency room, people who abuse drugs need treatment before they
damage society, their families or themselves.

Ninety percent of Colombia's cocaine comes to the United States.
Colombia will use the aid to reduce its coca cultivation by 50
percent. But if that simply pushes production into other countries, it
won't solve the problem. It only will move it around.