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The Truth About Mutation MongersThere is substantial evidence that host-specific plant pathogens can be quite stable and that they do not mutate in nature as so many recent fearmongers have suggested. Not only is such evidence against mutation well known to scientists, but is well known to the general public. Two prime examples are Dutch elm disease and Chesnut blight. In both cases the disease pathogens involved continue to attack their hosts, but after almost a century have never attacked another species nor mutated in nature; they have not become killers of another species. As the View From Science introduction of BUZZWORD points out, plant protections for tomato, peanut and other plants have also remained stable in nature for many years. This is not to say that a mutation is totally impossible, but that pathogens and hosts maintain very stable relationships when care is taken in the selection of biocontrols. The statistical chances of the mutation mongers theory does much to discredit it. In instances where scientists have suggested otherwise, it is quickly discerned that the term scientist does not always convey that the speaker is properly qualified to speak with authentic authority. For example, in a recent New York Times article about proposed biocontrols for marijuana, Florida State Environmental Director, David Struhs stated: “It is difficult, if not impossible to control the spread of Fusariuim species. The inability to guarantee that the organism will not mutate and attack other plant species is of most concern.” When contacted at a later date about the scientific inaccuracy of that statement, the Public Affairs officer of Florida’s EPA expressed regret that Mr. Struhs comments were ill advised and not based on either his own research, personal knowledge, or the established facts. Explaining the episode, it was said that the Director was under the gun because of public publicity to say something, so he did. However, no apology or retraction was made to, or by the press over the misinformation, or the false light in which the proposed drug control program and its Director were placed. As with so many political blunders, Mr. Struhs took the path of least resistance, hoping nobody would notice. But they did. Picking up on their own state EPA Director’s blatant inaccuracy, the St. Petersburg Times called the marijuana biocontrol project one perpetrated by “botanical bullies.” Because of Florida’s EPA Director’s misstatement and their own shoddy lack of research, the Times compounded the disservice to the public and the Florida Office of Drug Control. A problem in the entire fiasco is that so few scientists and fewer media commentators have a sufficient and specific background in plant pathology, which is the particular branch of science most likely to know the facts related to plant diseases and biocontrols. A Ph.D degree in physics or even botany qualifies its holder as a scientist, but it is most likely that their opinions on the intricacies of pathogenic host-specificity, plant disease and mutation are merely that, opinions, not established scientific facts. This is not to say that mutations in pathogens have never occurred in nature, or cannot be induced or speeded up under certain laboratory conditions such as with ultraviolet light, X-rays, or by chemicals. However, pathogens residing in the earth’s soils are highly reluctant to mutate under natural conditions. This is what plant pathologists refer to as part of the description of a pathogen being ‘stable’. Fusarium fungi, for example, are found in almost every soil in the world. If they were to mutate to endanger a new host, they would do so on their own. A Fusarium strain enhanced in a lab as a biocontrol for a specific host target like the coca plant would not increase or decrease the statistical chances of a naturally occurring mutation. Therefore, suggesting that this is so, is fearmongering not based on scientific fact. When such fearmongering is then repeated over and over with the knowledge that it has no scientific basis in fact, it then becomes deliberate demagoguery—fear for the purpose of intimidation. Therefore, as with any use of biocontrols, whether it is to preserve the tomato, or to destroy a weed or a weevil, proper testing under stringent conditions must be a legitimate part of any respectable biocontrol project. As to whether anyone can make an ironclad guarantee that a pathogenic mutation is impossible, such a guarantee in itself is not possible, nor was it possible when we protected our peanut and tomato crops. (We have protected many other species using the same techniques) Such a guarantee is presently, and probably forever, impossible. If such guarantees are being suggested as the new criteria, that notion should be rejected as the foolishness it is, or, more likely, recognized as a strategy for an otherwise unspoken or unpublishable agenda. NORML, the organization for the modification of marijuana laws, may have such an unspoken agenda. Even if one were to concede that marijuana for certain medical uses had great merit, the amount of marijuana that would be required for legitimate medical uses would be quite small, certainly not thousands of metric tons. It is always possible to permit the growth of just enough of any narcotic to satisfy proven medical demand. We support that. Growers to fill such demand could be closely regulated. When organizations like NORML extend their arguments to include a general passivity to narcotic drug use and removal of legal sanctions against it, then they cross into the territory of what we have called the “unspoken agenda.” The ‘unspoken agenda’ is that they want the legal right to get high without consequences, and not just on marijuana. It is really a libertarian agenda, not as they state for public consumption to be ‘medical use only’ marijuana. It is also clear that the established medical needs for morphine call for a certain amount of that substance to fill legitimate demand. However, it is also well known what that amount is, and that its demand could be easily filled by a few regulated growers. Therefore, when we speak of the extinction of narcotic producing plants, such destruction can be both extensive and at the same time less than total. Finally, now that the uses of cocaine in nasal surgery are a thing of the past, there seems little need to preserve the coca plant in any of its present growth ranges. Even Coca-Cola has done away with using the real stuff, so things can go better without coke. Anti-biocontrol activists against the targeting of narcotic plants like to use terms like ‘secret research’ to imply that the clandestine nature of the laboratory work somehow tarnishes the merit or spirit of the research. That is purely well-motivated strategy, not any true indication of sinister forces at work behind closed doors. By its nature, the research is of a sensitivity that it cannot be exposed to well financed and motivated criminal enemies. NORML takes significant pride in having forced the disclosure of Montana State University’s research into marijuana biocontrols through a lawsuit. That was the first delivery of useful information into criminal hands by legal means. They then planted the seed of fear within the University administration that drug lord retribution was certainly not out of the question, and that a university with thousands of innocent potential student victims was not a proper place for such scientific research to occur. How about Universities that do other defense weapons research, but with much more substantial budgets? Is that to be made public? Montana State was cowed into submission, and NORML thinks of their intimidation tactics as being laudable; while at the same time calling $2.9 million in legitimate research spent over ten years by law-abiding citizens at a state university, “Scary”. It is likely that future research may be conducted under circumstances that are not covered by the Freedom of Information Act, for example, privately sponsored research. Unfortunately, what is scary is the immense power conveyed to criminal
organizations with $700 billion dollars in illegal income to spend each
year, year in and year out. Seven trillion dollars in just ten years!
You do the math. Given that power to corrupt, there should be little
convincing needed that research to destroy such illegal income should
be accomplished without the bright searchlights of disclosure exposing
legitimate research to the bad guys. In our opinion, the Clinton Administration’s
decision to declassify anti-narcotics research projects is just as ill
conceived and irresponsible as was their decision to declassify certain
nuclear information and to reduce needed security surrounding it. Someone
seems to have forgotten that the first responsibility of government
is to provide for the security of its citizens. Both our national defense
against nuclear terrorism and against illegal narcotics have been compromised.
Anti-narcotics research must be given the full protection of classification
by future administrations. That is a principle upon which there should
be no compromise. The Freedom of Information Act was not put in place
as a declaration of every citizen’s right to know everything. The
book makes a case for plausible deniability and we concur in that opinion. It will be instructive to watch the stand NORML takes for or against biocontrols against the coca shrub and the opium poppy. A quick reading of Cannabis News and the Internet chats will determine if their real agenda is the full legalization of drugs, not merely the normalization of marijuana laws to accommodate the sick. We are willing to postpone further speculation, and even to hold intimidation tactics of the past at arms-length until we determine if ‘scary’ is a term better applied to law abiding citizens or to more sinister others hiding in seemingly normal clothing.
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