
The world's first cocaine bar - chaostheory
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/19/bolivia-cocaine-bar-route-36
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dylanz
Putting coca leaves in your mouth before you start your work day is typical in
many parts of South America. It's like drinking your cup of coffee.

However... drying and powdering it, cutting it with a handful of chemicals,
and illegally distributing it is what gives it a bad name. Same goes for those
pushing for more and more potent strands of marijuana. Many people think that
"faster", "stronger" and "more" is always an improvement.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
It's possible that the existance of "more potent strands of marijuana" is
intentional scaremongering propaganda:

<http://www.badscience.net/2007/03/reefer-badness/>

 _"And in fact, what’s most amazing is that this scare isn’t new. In the US,
in the mid 1980s, during Reagan’s “war on drugs”, it was claimed that cannabis
was 14 times stronger than in 1970, which rather sets you thinking. If it was
14 times stronger in 1986 than in 1970, and it’s 25 times stronger today than
the beginning of the 1990s, does that mean it is now, in fact, 350 times
stronger than 1970?

That’s not even a crystal in a plant pot. That’s impossible. That would
require more THC to be present in the plant than the total volume of space
taken up by the plant itself"_

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profquail
If you've never seen how cocaine powder is made, watch this video:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_bZZt1zs60>

I saw it a while back, and it provides a pretty unique insight into the source
of all that cocaine. Did you know that gasoline is used as a solvent to
precipitate the actual cocaine salts out of the leaves?

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sayrer
There used to be one down the street from my apartment, and there is a
magazine article about it:

[http://www.viceland.com/int/v15n1/htdocs/kokies.php?country=...](http://www.viceland.com/int/v15n1/htdocs/kokies.php?country=us)

The first? Or is that just its name? Could work. I know a chinese place named
The New Good One.

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dusklight
Ok that was an interesting article but why is it on hacker news?

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chaostheory
because it's about a business trend =)

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electronslave
Having watched a dear friend lose all his social capital, put his entire
savings up his nose and nearly burn us both to death in a house fire, I can
safely say that I'm disgusted.

However, from a third world entrepreneurial standpoint, I can see how this is
a great business opportunity(?) / disaster waiting to happen. Quick, someone
make an iPhone app.

~~~
elai
If cocaine wasn't illegal and costs $2 a day, would any of that happened? Was
it the cocaine or the society at large that caused those consequences.

~~~
helveticaman
That's what cocaine costs in Brazil and Argentina. $2 a line.

I've read that in Australia there are heroine addicts on whom everyone has
given up hope of rehab who have normal, janitorial jobs to pay for their
habits. They get the horse from government sanctioned farmacies at low cost.

