clearly, if people actually look at everything we’ve been telling them to look at, it is difficult to continue disagreeing with us.

the really good news is that we don’t actually have to convince everyone — just slightly more than half of them.

we may need to come up with a different name than “Grand United Theory of Drug Policy” though — that one just doesn’t condense to a pithy acronym ;^)

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One week.

I think that’s amazing. Might take a couple of weeks to cover all the drug issues and make people understand the “Grand United Theory of Drug Policy”.

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seriously dude, i mean you no harm — but what we need is less talking and more doing. what we need to be doing to get the job done is exposing the public to the *entire* truth about the honking evil pile of manure called “the war on drugs.” we have all of the ammo we need for the job and the most incredible method of interpersonal communications yet devised by man. when people see the entire poo pile, they usually come to the same conclusion — LEAP proves this over and over. and they (LEAP) actually go talk to the people who contribute the big money to the political machinery.

when people get to see all of the pertinent info about the situation, it makes it easy to understand why it all needs to go.

as to my site, it is actually a bit more than simple data pages, so cruise around. strangely enough, some people have seen fit to write about my work and site in their books — several of which are included in this list.

i certainly apologize if i haven’t done enough work for the cause, but i’m pedaling as fast as i can.

if you truly came to discuss policy and strategy, however, i suggest that the time is ripe to put the discussion in the forum, where someone started a thread a while ago, that seems like it will suit the purpose well.

and tune in (and chime in) to tonight’s (12/17/09 9pm eastern US) show at the Opium Den — i’ll be tuned in.

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You don’t persuade people in a democracy by hectoring or shaming them. Nor do you simply assemble a database of facts and statistics, insist or imply that they speak for themselves, and brook no challenge to your stated conclusions. You have to debate your challengers. They’re liable to bring up objections, and it’s your responsibility to answer them, counter them, clarify them, and elaborate on your case. And that is the case no matter how well-grounded you may feel your rationalism to be, and no matter your ideological views.

That’s part of what democracy is about. To some extent, I’ve been raising objections as a proxy for the opposition. Better you find a sparring partner for your ideas here than out in the public arena. Simply directing me to a database is not a substitute for open discourse.

And if you’re going to hurl moral accusations or attempt to impugn the character of the opposition, you damn sure have to have caught them out doing something unethical. Because those allegations and imputations of motive are not to be put forth simply based on the fact that someone disagrees with your position.

I’m not a professional politician. But if you’re going to accomplish anything in public policy in this country, a generous measure of political sense is more than important- it’s imperative. Unless you intend on shooting your way into power, that is.

And I’m not ready to sign on to the Jacobin approach to politics in this country, right yet- certainly not based solely on anti-Prohibitionism. I’m even less interested in fronting on Jacobinism as a pose.

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“What I find appalling is the attitude from the “legalize only cannabis” group when they try to get their ONE DRUG legalized “because it’s safer”, while at the same time they employ the other drugs – and by proxy their very human USERS – as an argument for their one drug.”

I think that qualifies my statement and makes it specific and not sweeping.

Clearly lots of people, even those who choose to work single-mindedly for cannabis legalizaton, have the solidarity and deep enough understanding that allow them to attain their own goals without needlessly trampling on their brothers and sisters.

A bit of your other arguments seem to rest on that misunderstanding and I’ll try not to fault you for kicking over that straw man.

So … the questions …

Well, cannabis users have it easy. Cannabis users have never seen the stigmatization that other drug using groups have endured. It is simply less expensive to “out” one self. That, and MUCH fewer people use those other drugs, meaning that the cannabis movement has a vast amount of people to recruit from.

On the street – as you put it – it doesn’t LOOK good with heroin addicts, does it? Well, I agree. Totally agree. Yet I also know the score off the streets, away from the media, and well – everybody’s afraid to admit much in the way of opiods outside the scene. The pot “user losers” are just pathethic stereotypes hitting way too much cereal while laughing themselves silly into academic oblivion, but the stereotypical “hard drug loser” has open sores, blood borne diseases like HIV and Hep. C. and they look half-dead to begin with.

Hell, *I* don’t even particularly flash the fact that yes, occasionally I use opiods – including heroin.

There’s a huge gap there. It sure gotta take balls that clank to equate the two.

I’m sure you’ve seen things with your own eyes on the street. You should be aware that’s exactly what your opponents are saying about cannabis – they just KNOW how that terrible substance with fry your brain and make your future into pulp. They’ve seen it with their own eyes.

Personally I find very little reason behind or use for the “soft” and “hard” drugs distinction. It’s a made up distinction that obscures the much more fundamental question of how a particular drug is dangerous. And even that sentence fraks up the fundamental question which is about how to use a particular drug with the least amount of risk involved.

The hard drug/soft drug distinction applied to my kitchen would mean a separation of kitchen utensils in a “safe” and “not so safe” group. At which point we get to silly points such that sugar is “safe” while my chef’s knife is “not so safe”, because that sugar can’t kill you outright. It’s easy to make the case for sugar killing all of us before the knife does the same.

So basically my position is that drugs are different, and that completely made-up categories like soft and hard drugs are counter-productive and can’t tell us anything meaningful about what their legal status should be.

It even leads some people to write: “Coke users, smack users, meth users, on the other hand…they all have an extensive and well-deserved reputation for being sketchy and behaving antisocially”

Next time you hear someone say “Don’t smoke pot. Pot user are …. and pot is dangerous because …”, ’cause if you can deal it out, you gotta be able to take some back.

You’re taking some high profile abusers and extending their stereotypical behavior to the users.

I know many occasional users who use the stuff you mentioned above, and they’re by no means a bunch of bastards, nor are they anti-social.

Now, I would have loved to say the following: you are absolutely, 100 percent WRONG when you say …” Trouble is I haven’t the faintest idea what you mean when you say “hard pleasure drugs are, at their core, private pursuits“.

It’s hard to compete with the unrivaled niceness of sharing a joint between friends, laughing, eating and having a blast.

Heroin certainly wouldn’t go on my “social” list, but then again I don’t particularly rate that drug as a very pleasurable drug that makes you go “yay”. It seems, though, to cause the same kind of pleasure in some people as if you and I had a knife removed from our backs. When you’re in pain the absence of pain can feel like nothing short of paradise pleasure. Out opiods into a body that isn’t in pain and it’s such a dull drug unless naseau is your thing.

In terms of it’s effects I would put MDMA (Ecstasy) in the “hard pleasure drug” category, but that’s a drug almost impossible to enjoy completely without other people. You couldn’t find a more social drug in terms of enhancement and smoothness and it’s not for nothing they call it the “hug drug”.

Depending on your temperament mushrooms, LSD, MDMA, methylone, AMT, cocaine, amphetamine/methditto and 2C-B can be used with other people and even in public places with hundreds or even thousands of people around you.

I could go on forever on this topic, but I’m drifting off topic. On topic is, however, that to someone like me who has built up a fair bit of personal experience with a variety of drugs you sorta kinda sometimes come off a lot like those anti-pot drug virgin people who their fair share of opinions he drug.

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Ironically, DdC, you’re accusing me of being an “incrementalist”, a sellout, etc.- when I find myself in pretty much complete agreement with your personal position- or that portion of it which I’m able to winnow out of your more general commentary, at any rate. I can’t say that I’ve seen it put forth as a clearly outlined and comprehensive policy prescription. Perhaps you have a link to that somewhere.

For that matter, I don’t see why your posts aren’t being criticized as “incrementalist”, DdC. Their content is overwhelmingly concerned with the single issue of cannabis law reform. I don’t hear you bringing up anything about how you’d handle putting a legal cocaine or heroin market in place, or how you’d deal with drug law reform on any other substance.

Finally, as for this:

“You’re armed with ms cleo predictions of the future that never pan out or are directly caused by the prohibition, you wish to maintain, except not for your own selfish piece of the pie.”

I don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about. I’m not gaming for some piece of any pie.

Show me these “predictions” I’ve supposedly made. I realize that it makes for a more extensive post, but unless my words are excerpted and counterpointed, I have a tough time getting a clear read on what’s being alleged. I have to infer it, instead- without a guarantee of anything like success in that regard. And if I get that wrong, we could go on for pages, fruitlessly talking past each other.

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I invite everyone to tune in, and call in. The number: 727.493.2205

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I’d say it’s going to be very difficult to do much with the CSA
Cabby the Hack?

Then I’d say we’re a country of cowards and don’t deserve Ganja or Hemp and should just stop whining about our kids getting Asthma and Cancer cause it is what it is not a Constitutional attempt at democracy, with some controlled fascism. This greedy spoiled brat yuppie crap is not America. Banksers stealing are Bank robbers same as the crackhead with a gun that cost less than a bag of reefer.
Pathological liars are not selective. Lying to obtain money may seem out of context for Wallmart Street? Or politicians?

A.S.A. and others have petitioned for rescheduling and the DEA always ignores or turns it down. They are infallible after all. Science needs some guts to stand up to the politicians if nothing else but for their own integrity. 30 inch yardsticks to economize? Yet we let them and cops. Of all authorities on health and medicine, cops aren’t the ones that pop into my mind. Junkie pharmacologists or dosage titrations with outlawed paraphernalia serves the snitch pool/80% of cases. Serves the propagandist with real statistics not found with Ganja unless it’s made up with DAWN BS. Turn it upside down. Why would someone want crime? If we have spent $1 Trillion dollars arresting people for Ganja since 1937, who gets the money and do they want to fess up and give it back? It gets Uglier and this is only a brief contemplation.

Scheduled drugs fall under parameters and definitions that cannabis doesn’t fit. Hemp is totally ridiculous. The fact the Feds roll and send joints proves its medicinal, the patents on cannabinoids also prove it has medicinal value and therefore can not by definition be a schedule#1 drug. Though that is the kicker, rescheduling to a #2 would free the Pharm fascists to exploit and still keep the plant outlawed. But it also states for a schedule #1 has to be a menace with no redeeming values and again Ganja doesn’t fit. No one has even overdosed. Not many rob banks to fund their doobie habit. European cops prefer it at soccer matches for quelling riots over booze rage. Driving too. The third stipulation is it has to be highly addictive, which past research proves it is not and no one has ever suffered debilitating results from quitting. Habitual to some but not by definition addictive. So it doesn’t fit.

It was only included by Nixon to lump Hemp and RxGanja for the corporate world, not the citizens safety. During the red herring Watergate. Same as Booze prohibition and Ethanol. So if any Senator has integrity they should challenge its placement and remove it. The voters are ignorant only because of censorship, that has a cure called total transparency and basic Botany. It tis or it t’aint dude. Incrementalists appease the liars, ConPromise on human lives, 30 shekels of silver and a pat on the head. Anti-Choice Abortionists. Dead babies for oil we can grow in our own soil. Nutrition banned unless its imported, 98% of the vulgar term “marihuana” appeasers agree with is nothing but burlap. The same gullible nitwits prohibiting cigarettes, blaming tobacco for the chemicals added. Causing the poor to buy cheaper with more poisons to get sick being saved while second hand smoke from car tailpipes and smoke stacks choke more citizens, that Ganja might prevent. As it has done since the Gardening began. Good lapdoggies, now go fetch.

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http://www.briancbennett.com/

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