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| -Short Attention Span Theater- |
| Qat Bust in Northern Kentucky |
| 2004-03-30 |
| "This was a person the officer had stopped for a traffic violation and then for some reason he came across this stuff in the car," said Northern Kentucky Drug Strike Force Director Jim Paine. "The occupants told him it was `salad’ that was purchased at a specialty store geared toward people from African nations. That was the first time that any has been seen in this area." The substance is so new to this area, Paine said, that the officer only later learned that it was probably khat, an illegal Schedule I narcotic in this country. Heard this one on the radio this morning. If qat’s coming into the country, what’s coming with it? |
| Posted by:Robert Crawford |
| #13 Well, I can tell you that there are a few Jihadis that actually live in Lexington and Louisville, Kentucky. The U.S. government and some N.G.O.'s have a relocation program which placed many "Bosnians", Palestinians, Egyptians, Libyans, Saudis, UAE's, etc. in Kentucky. Many of these immigrants were jihadis/mujahadeen in various conflicts, or their fathers were. For example: marijuana and opium can be purchased in Kentucky that hails from Afghanistan (at least pre 9-11), so I would assume that these would be the same networks that brought in the qat. And it is illegal to have it here. The same networks that bring that stuff in could be used to bring in weapons, jihadis, etc. If I were in the CIA I would just follow the Qat to find the al-Qaida guys. The chew it. I would just put a tracking device in the qat shipments going to Pakistan, etc. They have in flown in so it's fresh as someone else stated above. Bin Laden & his boys may have picked up the habit while living in the Sudan. |
| Posted by: Kentucky Beef 2004-03-31 12:17:28 AM |
| #12 Maybe khat is the new cash crop Kentucky has been searching for to replace tobacco. I lived a year in Kentucky. During that year a bunch of agri-lobbyists were trying to convince the state that they needed to grown a variety of hemp that did not contain THC as a replacement crop for tobacco. The state decided not to allow cultivation of hemp, reasoning, I believe, that they would have too much trouble sorting the hemp from the other varieties that would surely be cultivated in the same field. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2004-03-30 7:04:03 PM |
| #11 Good stuff Sofia. Hmmm... Are there futures yet? A super short term vegetable just begs for a futures market. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-03-30 5:44:10 PM |
| #10 Thanks for the lecture, Sofia ;-) My understanding is that qat takes a lot of leaves and a long time to get the proper effect. Prolly a good time to review everything the imam told you down at the masjid, and to remember how humiliated you are... |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2004-03-30 2:27:19 PM |
| #9 Sofia: keep it up. I always enjoy your informative posts. |
| Posted by: ex-lib 2004-03-30 1:10:36 PM |
| #8 Don't apologize, Sofia--that was all very informative! Librarians like you, First Lady Laura Bush and a late friend of mine rock! |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-03-30 11:41:30 AM |
| #7 Jen, it contains something similar to ephedra and is a mild stimulant - more like caffeine or ephedrine than speed. According to first-hand reports, it isn't much of a high. The green drool is right, mostly because it makes your mouth numb. It also usually makes you thirsty and gives you a stomachache, and major bad breath. It's usually chewed like tobacco and has a similar ick factor. It apparently is only rarely addictive. It's sold in a bundle called a maduf, weighing about half a pound, for $30-40 per maduf. It's ususally wrapped either in plastic or banana leaves and sprinkled with water to keep it moist and potent. The stuff is popular in eastern and southeastern Africa (Somalia, Kenya, Mozambique, Madagascar, etc) and Yemen. There's good evidence that most of the gunmen of the warring factions in Somalia were continually high on the stuff. Most of it was flown in fresh daily from Kenya - about $300,000 worth a day, according to one estimate - at the same time that it took the USMC to deliver food. It has to be used fresh as within 48 hours of picking it dries out and all the "good" chemicals evaporate or decay into harmless ones, so chances are, if the guy's story about buying it at an African grocery are true, the store is either growing it, trucking it in from Florida, or flying it in from Africa. One estimate is that about 2000 maduf are flown into NYC each week from Yemen. It grows well only in lousy soil - sandy, rocky, and dry - and dies on you if you water or fertilize it too much. It grows outdoors well only in Florida and California but has been grown indoors as far north as Yellow Knife, Canada. It's now a Schedule I drug (the most illegal), as is the main active ingredient, cathinone, which some people synthesize in garage labs. The decayed checmical, cathine, is a Schedule IV drug (you're supposed to have a prescription for it). Apparently, however, it's still legal to grow the plant in the US. What's interesting is that over-the-counter cold and allergy remedies that contain pseudoephedrine produce approximately the same effects as qat and are entirely legal. And this is way more than you wanted to know. Sorry. Being a librarian can be habit-forming ... |
| Posted by: Sofia 2004-03-30 10:53:11 AM |
| #6 Men with missing teeth, green droowl...running machine guns in the back of small white pickup trucks. They'll stand out in Kentucky, the good old boys there with missing teeth have brown Skoal drool and drive big pickup trucks with shotguns in the cab. |
| Posted by: Steve 2004-03-30 10:32:10 AM |
| #5 I tried some at The Notting Hill Carnival. Made me a tad squiffy.(and the green drool reference is quite correct too) |
| Posted by: Howard UK 2004-03-30 10:24:32 AM |
| #4 Some people will always try a new high. |
| Posted by: Hiryu 2004-03-30 10:06:23 AM |
| #3 Dragon, isn't it like an amphetamine? Heps you up? Supposedly, the Somalies were all hopped up on this when our guys were ambushed in Mogadishu--they love qat in Somalia. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-03-30 10:02:37 AM |
| #2 What does it do and how much for a quarter bag? |
| Posted by: Unmutual 2004-03-30 9:53:26 AM |
| #1 ...what’s coming with it? Men with missing teeth, green droowl...running machine guns in the back of small white pickup trucks. |
| Posted by: Dragon Fly 2004-03-30 9:32:50 AM |