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December 17, 2004
The divine thunderbolt of wisdom scores in Bhutan
The country in which I've spent the most time consecutively without actually living there is Bhutan. It's a little dictatorship in the Himalayas, and no, I wasn't imprisoned. Occasionally dictatorships prove that they are actually pretty cool, and the King of Bhutan does this quite frequently. Bhutan's environmental, cultural, and public health laws are some of the world's most enlightened. It may help that the country's patron saint is the 15th century "Divine Madman," whose oversized erect phallus is painted on houses around the country. With an attitude like that, you'd think Bhutan would soon set about legalizing marijuana or turning into another Amsterdam.
Instead, the Bhutanese government outdid itself today when Bhutan became the first country in the world to ban the sale of tobacco and impose 200% tarrifs on its importation. Three cheers for the little Bhutanese children who will grow up smoke-free. And to paraphrase the Divine Madman:
The sign of a rich man is a tight fist,
The sign of an old man is a tight mind,
The sign of a stupid man is a tightly-grasped cigarette
Posted by adrianjo at December 17, 2004 08:13 PM
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