Drug WarRant

That ain’t gonna happen, either.

The World Federation Against Drugs and the Swedish Society for Sobriety and Social Upbringing has published a rather massive (134 page) volume titled: The Protection of Children from Illicit Drugs – A Minimum Human Rights Standard — A Child-Centered vs. a User-Centered Drug Policy by Stephan Dahlgren & Roxana Stere.

Robert DuPont says “This book is a major landmark in human rights and international drug policy.” (Of course, if you have to turn to hack Robert DuPont for a book review, you’re in trouble.)

This rather interminable paper goes on and on — first in parsing various U.N. documents to support the position that the human rights of the child are the paramount consideration and that the various agreements don’t just mean that children should be protected from using dangerous drug themselves, but that they should essentially be protected from any societal use of those drugs deemed “illicit.” This justifies, to the authors, today’s prohhibition efforts.

The book then goes on to rail against the various harm reduction efforts world-wide, which it mostly dismisses as efforts to paint the drug user as a victim.

Where is really gets into the crux of the matter, however, is when they talk about the drug-free society.

The authors acknowledge that the notion of a drug-free society has been ridiculed as completly unrealistic and utopian. But that doesn’t bother them:

Nevertheless, the achievement of a “drug- free society” is an aspiration and the only reasonable one in the context of the present international legal framework.

As long as the UN drug conventions impose the limitation “exclusively to medical and scientific purposes the production, manufacture, export, import, distribution of, trade in, use and possession of drugs”; CRC Article 33 requests States Parties “to protect children from the illicit use of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances as defined in the relevant international treaties, and to prevent the use of children in the illicit production and trafficking of such substances” and International Labour Orga- nization Convention 182 defines “the use, procuring or offering of a child for illicit activities, in particular for the production and traf- ficking of drugs as defined in the relevant international treaties” as one of the worst forms of child labour, a “drug-free world” is the appropriate goal.

But of course, it does matter whether a drug-free society is a utopian ideal.

If a drug-free society is realistic and achievable through prohibition, then a prohibition regime could theoretically protect children from being exposed to illicit drugs, illicit drug use, and trafficking.

However, we know that a drug-free society is as impossible as a sex-free society. We also know that prohibition does little (or nothing) to
reduce illicit drug use (and any harms that may come from that use). Additionally, prohibition causes a laundry list of additional harms that can damage children, including:

• Empowering criminals, who have no compunction about selling to children, to control the sale of illicit drugs
• Breaking up and destroying families through excessive incarceration
• Turning children around the world into agents of drug trafficking organizations, due to the profitability of the black market and the fact that prohibition makes it advantageous to use children

It is admirable that the authors and the groups they represent care about the children, but it would be better if they actually promoted policy that helped children, rather than destroying the lives of children while chasing some utopian fantasy.

For those who continue to push the title of this post as a way to deny medical marijuana, I strongly recommend participating in this study

Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma related to gravitational challenge: systematic review of randomised controlled trials

Gordon C S Smith, professor and Jill P Pell, consultant

Abstract
Objectives To determine whether parachutes are effective in preventing major trauma related to gravitational challenge.

Design Systematic review of randomised controlled trials.

Data sources: Medline, Web of Science, Embase, and the Cochrane Library databases; appropriate internet sites and citation lists.

Study selection: Studies showing the effects of using a parachute during free fall.

Main outcome measure Death or major trauma, defined as an injury severity score > 15.

Results We were unable to identify any randomised controlled trials of parachute intervention.

Conclusions As with many interventions intended to prevent ill health, the effectiveness of parachutes has not been subjected to rigorous evaluation by using randomised controlled trials. Advocates of evidence based medicine have criticised the adoption of interventions evaluated by using only observational data. We think that everyone might benefit if the most radical protagonists of evidence based medicine organised and participated in a double blind, randomised, placebo controlled, crossover trial of the parachute.

Yes.

[Just in case anyone missed it, this “study” is a really hilarious satire making fun of those who demand randomized control trials before accepting anything.]

I made roasted chicken today, but I haven’t tried this recipe before:

Cocaine-stuffed roasted chicken found

Authorities in Nigeria say they arrested a man at an international airport who was bringing in roasted chicken with unusual stuffing: $150,000 worth of cocaine.

And I thought fresh basil was expensive.

I’ve gotta ask… bringing a roasted chicken on a flight into a country… is this a common thing? … you know, a way of keeping a low profile?

Using implied pot humor to court votes with one hand while locking people up on the other hand. But then again, the law doesn’t apply to everyone.

Certainly, the two parties are going to do everything they can to keep Johnson silenced and the chance of getting in the debates is remote, but now, with the RNC convention over, there are some signs that the Gary Johnson candidacy may have a receptive audience.

One of the prime reasons for this today is the way that Ron Paul was treated at the Republican convention.

This extraordinary extended interview for The Daily Show with former RNC head Michael Steele spoke volumes (here are some snippets)…

Stewart: “The way they treated Ron Paul and his supporters was nothing short of appalling. They didn’t give him any opportunity […]

Steele: “What the Republican National Committee did to Ron Paul was the height of rudeness and stupidity — for this reason: Why would you alienate an individual who has the ability to attract a new generation of voters?” […]

“They’re afraid of that which they cannot control” […]

Check out this article:

Ron Paul Supporters Warm to Gary Johnson, Not Mitt Romney at RNC Convention

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson’s pilgrimage to Tampa to seek more small government, big liberty adherents and additional publicity is paying off, at least with a subset of November voters.

Apparently Johnson was one of the few treating Ron Paul with respect. And now many Ron Paul supporters are looking at Johnson, which is also starting to cause the media to pay attention:

“When the media learned that Governor Johnson was in Tampa over the weekend, he didn’t have enough hours in the day to do all the interviews they requested. Why the attention?  They had heard about Gov. Johnson’s reception at the P.A.U.L. Fest – and they were talking to Republican delegates who are saying Congressman Paul’s treatment at the convention is causing them to take a close look at Governor Gary Johnson.” 

There may well be additional opportunities for a Gary Johnson message to be heard through the likely upcoming stupidity of the Democratic National Committee as well.

Could be interesting.

It’s fascinating that the parties go so far to try to silence a third-party candidate (all the fights over ballot access and debate participation). Nobody really believes that Johnson has a chance of winning the Presidency. All we want is for his message to be heard.

And that’s the part that terrifies the Democratic and Republican leadership.

Quote of the day:

Time is the great legalizer, even in the field of morals.

– HL Mencken

It’s a fair point, but we’re still going to do our part to speed it along a bit.

Pot-smoking driver in Saskatoon deemed not impaired

A woman who admitted to using marijuana before getting into her car has been acquitted of impaired driving, with the Saskatoon judge saying he was not convinced her ability to operate a vehicle was affected. […]

In his decision, the judge said he was left with several unanswered questions, including:

1. What signs of impairment would one expect to see in someone who has been using marijuana?
2. How long after using marijuana would you expect to see these signs and how long would they last?
3. Can the results of drug evaluation tests taken over 1½ hours after the time of driving be reliably related back to the time the woman was stopped?
4. Was the woman’s performance in some of the tests an indication of poor balance or poor co-ordination?

On the other hand, the judge found there was plenty of evidence to suggest the woman was not impaired, noting:

1. The officer did not observe any problems with her driving as she came to the check stop, when she was directed into the check stop or when she was directed to drive out of the line of cars to a nearby parking lot.
2. She had no problems understanding the officer or answering his questions and did not slur her speech.
3. She was able to provide him with her licence without any problems and had no difficulty following the officer’s instructions or getting out of her vehicle.
4. When he asked her to take her hand off her vehicle and step away from it, she did so without problem. She did not have to hold on to anyone or anything for balance and after he handcuffed her, she had no problems walking to his police car and getting into the back seat.
5. She was polite and co-operative with the officer.

What a unique concept. Don’t convict someone for being impaired unless there’s actually some evidence that they were… impaired.

Nuevo Leon: 48 hours, 33 executed (Google translation of page in Spanish)

Apparently, this series of murders was a coordinated effort to make a statement responding to military claims that the Zetas had been weakened in the area.

It has come to my attention that there’s some kind of gathering going on in Florida. I haven’t bothered paying any attention to it because I assume that nothing of substance will be discussed.

Have I missed anything?

How about the TV news? Are they covering the Caravan for Peace (which is actually relevant) or the nonsense in Florida?

Update: This, from Glenn Greenwald today is particularly relevant:

The reason I write so little about the presidential election is that it’s the ultimate expression of the CNN-ization of American politics: a tawdry, uber-contrived reality show that has less to do with political reality than the average rant one hears at any randomly chosen corner bar or family dinner. That does not mean the outcome is irrelevant, only that the process is suffocatingly dumb and deceitful, generating the desire to turn away and hope that it’s over as quickly as possible. […]

The election process is where American politicians go to be venerated and glorified, all based on trivial personality attributes that have zero relationship to what they do with their power, but which, by design, convinces Americans that they’re blessed to be led by people with such noble and sterling character, no matter how much those political figures shaft them. […]

The election process is where each political party spends hundreds of millions of dollars exploiting the same trivial personality attributes to demonize the other party’s politicians as culturally foreign, all to keep their followers in a high state of fear and thus lock-step loyalty.

It’s the supreme propaganda orgy, devoted to aggressively reinforcing the claim to American exceptionalism: the belief that even when things look grim, America will forever be that special God-favored land of freedom, opportunity, and prosperity, and all citizens should therefore be deeply grateful – quietly and passively so – for the privilege of residing in such a land, no matter how wretched are their circumstances and how pervasive is the corruption.

It’s what inculcates many Americans to believe that they enjoy vibrant political debate and stark democratic choice, even as so many of the policies that are most consequential and destructive for their lives – the “war on drugs”, the supremacy of the covert national security and surveillance states, vast inequalities in the justice system, crony capitalism that rapidly bolsters the oligarchy that owns the political process – are steadfastly ignored because both parties on those matters have exactly the same position and serve the same interests. […]

It’s where the handful of important issues on which there are genuinely sharp and clear differences – social issues, reproductive rights, jurisprudence philosophy, a few social program and tax policies – are endlessly exploited to heighten cultural divisions and, more importantly, to obscure the similarities on everything else.

The election year process could and should be a meaningful opportunity for real political debate: the one time every four years when the majority of the population that is too busy or uninterested to pay much attention becomes engaged and thus informed. Instead, the process is the ultimate deceit. And the ultimate distraction.