Drug WarRant

Kudos to Illinois State University chapter of SSDP for a very nice Hempfest event today out on the quad (and a beautiful day for it).

While I was out there, one of the students asked me what, if anything, Prop 19 had to say about industrial hemp. “Nothing, really.”

Of course, I suppose that any of the provisions of the act could apply to industrial hemp (you could grow and keep as much of it as you wanted to within a 5’x5′ plot, and you could transport an ounce of it), but that’s fairly meaningless within the context of the kinds of amounts that you’d need to, say, build a hemp home.

It’s an unfortunate fact, but industrial hemp will not be solved through state referendum. Why? It’s too big.

The problem is that, while recreational marijuana state law creates a situation where there’s no possible way for the feds to arrest even a tiny fraction, a hemp farm is too easy a target, since the feds could even come in and seize the land.

The prime example of this is in North Dakota, where the state actually did legalize the growing of industrial hemp and issued licenses to farmers. But no farmers were willing to proceed without permission from the DEA (or at least assurance that they wouldn’t be hassled), so no hemp has been grown.

This train of thought led to another…

For those people who fear that Proposition 19 will lead to marijuana big business, the fact is that federal law pretty much insures that it won’t.

If there’s anyone that the feds can go after once Prop 19 passes, it’s anyone making a big business out of it. That gives the advantage to the small guy — the 25 square foot do-it-yourself grower — the person with an ounce. The ones the feds can’t touch.

I sometimes forget that we’re not the only ones with them…

This stunning public policy communique from the home office as a result of a fact-finding international trip…

Home Office minister James Brokenshire has warned of the severe consequnces of smuggling drugs when he visited Sarita Colonia jail in Peru.

During his visit, part of a week-long trip to South America, including Columbia and Venezuela, the minister spoke with UK citizens convicted for drugs offences about their experiences and harsh conditions in the prison. They included Nick Jones who is serving six years and eight months for trafficking cocaine.

James Brokenshire said the inmates’ experiences should send a message to would-be smugglers: ‘Think twice, because the consequences are quite significant’.

‘The chance of being caught is very high’, he added.

Now there’s a government with a plan.

Of course, then there’s our own drug czar…

Preventing drug use before it starts and having programs in place to assist substance abusers before they become addicted simply makes sense.

Actually, it makes no sense at all. Are you suggesting we should steal prescriptions from people so they don’t use drugs? Is all use abuse?

When they don’t have an agenda that actually, you know, works, politicians end up with nothing to say but the silly and banal.

As the prohibitionists scramble to come up with every weak argument to bolster their position that they can find, and the stink of fear permeates their scribblings, it’s been interesting to see the re-appearance of the old argument that alcohol is the only drug that is consumed without “getting high.”

This is, of course, the argument that Art Linkletter brought up in his famously recorded personal conversations with President Nixon.

Linkletter: “Another big difference between marijuana and alcohol is that when people smoke marijuana, they smoke it to get high. In every case, when most people drink, they drink to be sociable. You don’t see people –”

Nixon: “That’s right, that’s right.”

Linkletter: “They sit down with a marijuana cigarette to get high –”

Nixon: “A person does not drink to get drunk.”

Linkletter: “That’s right.”

Nixon: “A person drinks to have fun.”

Linkletter: “I’d say smoke marijuana, you smoke marijuana to get high.”

Nixon: “Smoke marijuana, er, uh, you want to get a charge of some sort, and float, and this, that and the other thing.”

Of course, this is just bizarre, but it keeps popping up. Even recently in comments here, we got:

The difference between alcohol and drugs is that one can consume 1-2 drinks and still maintain total lucidity, whereas other drugs have immediate damaging effects.

Of course, the first objection I have to these arguments is: What’s wrong with getting high?

To quote myself from a few years ago…

It’s an important, even essential, part of life.

We all spend much of our time trying to get high. The rush when you have a particularly rich piece of chocolate — you’re getting high. That perfect coffee drink in the morning. Three-inch thick filet mignon that’s charred on the outside and still red in the middle. Sex.

(And I’m not just speaking metaphorically here. All these activities actually cause the body to produce chemicals that make you high.)

Jogging does it for some people (not me, but bike-riding can get me high). Tiramisu with Sambuca and double espresso at Ferrara’s. A sunset. The smell of fresh air. The smell of fresh baked bread.

Solving a puzzle, winning a game, taking a bow at the end of a great performance in a packed theatre with hundreds of people on their feet.

A photograph. A poem. Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon.”

Getting an “A”. Getting a raise. Being employee of the month.

Helping someone out.

Getting high is not only part of life — life without it is no life at all.

And these highs are not always consequence-free. Try eating all the chocolate you want.

Then there’s the drug that gives you the most intense highs and crashing lows — the most dangerous addiction of all…

Love gives you wings. It makes you fly. I don’t even call it love. I call it Geronimo. When you’re in love, you’ll jump right from the top of the Empire State and you won’t care, screaming “Geronimo” the whole way down. I love her so bad, I just… whoa, she wrecks me. I’d die for her.

Getting high isn’t always good for you. But don’t you dare tell me that it’s wrong.

The thing is, of course, that even when they say “high,” that’s not what they really mean. They mean “stupid.” The kind of high when you’re no longer able to communicate clearly. And yes, you see that with some folks with pretty much all drugs (very much including alcohol, of course).

But pretty much every drug can be used in a sociable way, where you’re not getting “wasted.”

Now, it’s possible that someone without any firsthand knowledge (and pretty poor secondhand knowledge) might think that illegal drugs are primarily used to get “wasted.” But that’s a function of prohibition.

During alcohol prohibition, it’s been reported that per capita consumption increased 500%. When it became illegal, there was a push toward binge drinking, (and also prohibition meant that it was unprofitable to provide low-potency options).

Today, with the 21-year-old drinking age, we have unhealthy binge drinking on college campuses, due in part to the partial prohibition.

Drug prohibition has similar effects in that some people will tend to consume as much as they can when something is illegal.

Today, there is plenty of (non-wasted) social use of marijuana and other illicit drugs. But I do look forward to legalization when it becomes easier to consume drugs that way.

When I was in college (some years ago), there was a bit of a tradition of some of my friends going to the soccer games and bringing a couple of joints to enjoy along the sideline while watching the game (they didn’t do this at the football games, because the alumni were there, and the soccer team was grateful to have an audience at all). It was the equivalent of having a couple of beers with a game, and it was a wonderful way to enjoy beautiful weather and a great game on a sunny afternoon.

There are so many ways that cannabis can be used to enhance a sociable and non-wasted experience, from a gourmet meal, to a good movie, to hanging out with friends, to hiking in the mountains, to putting on some tunes and cleaning house!

It’ll be nice when people have more non-legally-threatening options to enjoy it that way.

Attorney for San Jose Cannabis Buyers Collective who has been litigating marijuana cases for 18 years analyzes Prop 19 and finds that the fears expressed by the medical marijuana community to be completely unfounded.

Holland’s and Portugal’s experience will shed light on what will happen when Proposition 19 passes. Holland decriminalized marijuana possession and use for those 16 and older in the early 1970s, and several years ago, the minister of health was quoted as saying that they have only half the marijuana usage, per capita, as we do in our country — both for adults and teenagers! “We have succeeded in making pot boring,” he said.

Of course, our country glamorizes marijuana by making it illegal, and also by having such obscene profit motives in getting others to sell it to you, your neighbors and your children. And you will also note that today young adults are not selling Jim Beam bourbon or Marlboro cigarettes to each other on their high school campuses. But they are selling marijuana to each other all the time.

Butt jokes aside, here’s the part that really annoyed me:

He then told the two deputies to search his car.

What does it take for people to realize that consenting to a search is the stupidest thing anyone can do?

This is an open thread.

It’s a nice day. And we need to avoid getting too wrapped up in the constant stress of fighting against prohibition (yes, I’m looking at you, darkcycle) or we’ll burn out. So I’ve recycled one of my old musings. I think it’s still enjoyable today. See what you have to add….

I have occasionally imagined how I would realistically change drug policy if I was President, or had some other poliitical power, and perhaps some day I’ll share that with you. However, today I decided to be different and imagined I was some kind of arbitrary King and decided to retaliate by being contrarian.

DEA agents who investigate doctors for prescribing pain medication must have other DEA agents perform any medical procedures (like heart transplants and brain surgery) that are needed by the agents. After all, if DEA agents know so much about medicine…

Putting a positive choice spin on drug testing, only those students not participating in extra-curricular activities can be drug tested, and only if there are extra-curricular options available and they still choose not to participate. In a related area, felons on parole can avoid drug tests by getting involved in community service volunteer projects. (actually, this one makes a little sense)

Law enforcement officers who are part of no-knock drug task forces must publicly list their names and addresses. Ordinary citizens are allowed to wander through their home between the hours of 11 pm and 4 am and look through their drawers.

Officers wishing to search a car for drugs must get a search warrant from a judge specifying the make, year, color and VIN, along with specific descriptions of the particular drugs they expect to find.

Law enforcement agencies wishing to keep proceeds from Asset Forfeitures must put up as bond an amount equal to the value of the assets seized. If a judge rules for the property owner, the property owner gets his assets back plus the bond, making a nice profit for his trouble.

School Principals who enforce zero-tolerance policies must get written permission from one of their students before taking an aspirin or any other medication (any time of day or night).

Any laws passed that have criminal penalties are automatically infinitely retroactive for those who voted for (or signed) the law. This means, for example, that any Congressmen who vote for enhanced drug possession penalties would be immediately liable under that law for any drugs they took when they were young.

The Drug Czar must wear a silly hat and a sign saying “I am a liar” whenever he goes out in public, and whenever he talks about drug statistics he must perform a leprechaun dance.

All DEA paperwork must be printed on hemp paper.

Inmates in federal prisons construct bongs and waterpipes, and these are sold through an online store run by the Justice Department, and administered by Tommy Chong.

Smugglers who are caught are sent back to their home country with their drugs and told to try again.

All law enforcement uniforms are made with material that smells just like marijuana to drug-sniffing dogs.

When I wrote this, Walters was the drug czar, but I think the “silly hat and leprechaun dance” mental image works even better with Kerlikowske.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill making simple marijuana possession an infraction with a $100 fine and no criminal penalties.

“In this time of drastic budget cuts, prosecutors, defense attorneys, law enforcement and the courts cannot afford to expend limited resources prosecuting a crime that carries the same punishment as a traffic ticket,” wrote Schwarzenegger, who opposes Proposition 19, the marijuana initiative.

Outstanding. And despite the Governator’s views on Prop 19, this signature provides great momentum for going into the voting booth one month from now and finishing the job.

With the new bill, you take away the jail time for possession — the next thing to do is take the control of marijuana away from the black market with all of its destructive elements.

Sure, a spokesperson for No on 19 says “takes away the last reason anyone would have to vote for Prop 19,” which is, of course, ridiculous, but what else is he going to say?

For those idiots who think that this bill is all we need, try giving a call to some friends in New York City. Simple possession is also just a fine there, yet New York City still manages to arrest a whole lot of people for marijuana, and to stop and frisk African-American men at sickening rates.

“Decrim” is not “legal.”

I’m going to go out on a limb, here, and I could be completely wrong. I don’t know all the laws around the world, but…

This could be the first real opportunity to re-legalize cannabis in the entire world. Now that’s something I want to be a part of.

After all, it’s not really legal in Amsterdam. Sure you can posses and buy it, but you can’t legally produce it. The coffee shops have to buy it on the black market.

Even with the stupid federal laws hanging over this enterprise, there will be, with Proposition 19, a legal system of some sort for honest people to produce, sell, purchase, possess, and consume cannabis for recreational purposes.

Where else is this true? (Let me know if you know of a place.)

Pretty exciting.

Is Prop 19 perfect? Of course not.

There’s a lot I’d like to see different in the law. (I imagine if I crafted the law the way I wanted it, the poll numbers would be a lot worse right now.) Down the road, there are things we’ll change. Washington State will pass their own law and it’ll be different, and we’ll look at those differences, and then Massachusetts will pass theirs, etc. Each law will be tweaked and adjusted as reality interacts with it. And drug policy reformers will have to be there to push for the right changes.

In one month, Californians will have an opportunity to vote. With whom will they side?

Seems that the choice is pretty clear. Time to start changing the world.

By the way, for those looking for an opportunity to get active… Just Say Now’s Online Phone Banking for Marijuana Reform.

Just Say Now is proud to announce a new tool to put marijuana reform directly in the hands of activists: online phone banking to identify supporters of marijuana reform before November’s election. There are thousands of voters in Arizona, California, Oregon, and South Dakota who we need to vote for marijuana reforms. We’re targeting calls to young voters and “surge voters” – people who turned out in 2008 but who are not yet likely to vote in the midterm elections.

Johann Hari nails it:

In the Western world today, there is a group of people who live in a haze of unreality, and are prone at any moment to break into paranoia, hallucinations, and screaming. If you try to get between them and their addiction, they will become angry and aggressive and lash out. They need our help. I am talking, of course, about the Drug Prohibitionists: the gaggle of politicians, bishops and journalists who still insist that the only way to deal with the very widespread drug use in our societies is for it to be criminalized, where it is untaxed, unregulated, controlled by armed criminal gangs, and horribly adulterated.

Hopefully, we can get these folks into rehab quick. They’re dangerous out on the streets.

Keith Humphreys, who has been blogging over at Mark Kleiman’s place (and yes, this blog consistently performs a Mark Kleiman Drug Policy Watch function) has been joining in with Mark in lamenting the sad state of affairs that is the less-than-honest arguments used by both sides of the legalization debate. “Didn’t you notice a powerful and obnoxious odor of mendacity in this room?” (OK, so they don’t actually talk like Big Daddy from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof).

Of course, this is usually done by pointing out a specific example of lying on the part of the prohibitionists, and then balancing it by saying “and the other side is just as bad.” Or, they may trot out an argument that is used by some legalizers (legalization may bring in as much as $X in taxes, for example – something that we’ve never given much of a damn about compared to reducing the harms of prohibition), point out how that full dollar amount is unlikely to be achieved and use that as justification to tar all legalizers as dishonest.

As always, they pose as reasonable moderates who abhor the excesses of prohibition, and long for a legalization of marijuana that fits their specific requirements (ie, is not legally sold by anyone, ever), while still resisting any efforts to consider real reform, which means replacing prohibition with an actual regulatory scheme. But always, they complain about arguments on both sides lacking valid support.

Let’s see how Keith does in presenting the facts in a debate about legalization. He pointed out that he was nicely captured by Paul Rogers in this debate with Joe McNamara, so I thought we might look at it.

Let’s start with one of my pet peeves in dishonest arguments:

Q: Mother’s Against Drunk Driving opposes Prop 19. Is highway safety an issue?

KH: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration did a roadside survey and showed on a weekend evening something like one in six people had a legal or illegal substance in their system. At least some of them are going to be high. When you are driving down the road, are you happy that one in six people have a drug in their system? I’m certainly not.

OK, Keith. You worked in the Drug Czar’s office. You know how data works, and clearly you learned how to work data. Which means straight out lying. Let’s review the study you reference once again.

“The reader is cautioned that drug presence does not necessarily imply impairment. For many drug types, drug presence can be detected long after any impairment that might affect driving has passed. For example, traces of marijuana can be detected in blood samples several weeks after chronic users stop ingestion. Also, whereas the impairment effects for various concentration levels of alcohol is well understood, little evidence is available to link concentrations of other drug types to driver performance.” (Page 3, boxed for extra visibility)

Also:
“Caution should be exercised in assuming that drug presence implies driver impairment. Drug tests do not necessarily indicate current impairment. Drug presence can be measured for a period of days or weeks after ingestion in many cases. This latency of drug presence may partially explain the consistency between daytime and nighttime drug findings.” (Page 3)

This study didn’t measure anything other than a base line to use in future studies. Nothing meaningful in itself, except in terms of intellectual curiosity. Most of us have some kind of drug in our system at one point or other.

In other words, it is intellectually dishonest to use this study in the way you did (and the way the drug czar did until I corrected him). Period. Oh, sure, you can say “Well, I didn’t claim that they were all stoned. I just said that some of them were probably stoned.”

Then why reference the study? You could have said that you assume that some drivers on the road are stoned, and nobody would have disputed that, but no, you had to go and use a study dishonestly so as to appear to back up your story. That’s a powerful and obnoxious odor in the room.

KH: However you respond to addictive substances there will be costs. You can’t make tobacco illegal. You can’t go back. But I could say “400,000 dead a year.” Is that working?

And just what does 400,000 dead a year have to do with marijuana?

The horrible [gang] violence in Mexico has killed probably 30,000 people in Mexico in the last six years. But 40,000 Mexicans a year die from smoking, according to the Mexican Department of Health. In the United States, tobacco products kill 400,000 people a year. So if you look at who is going to end up in the grave prematurely, it’s wrong to think that if we move from an illegal market to a corporation we will reduce death. We won’t.

Again, what does that have to do with marijuana? Tobacco causes lung cancer. Marijuana doesn’t. Period. So why bring up all these dead smokers as a reason for not saving dead Mexicans from violence?

Ah, but you have a connection…

In a lot of the world people smoke cannabis and tobacco together. What do you think will happen to health when there are products that are cannabis-tobacco mix products like they have in Europe? When Madison Avenue is cut loose on cannabis? When you have marketing to kids?

In what fantasy world do you live? Sure, across the pond, that may be the way they like the cannabis, but not here in the States. And given the negative public relations that surrounds tobacco and the tobacco companies right now, there’s absolutely no reason to believe that such a move would be forthcoming. In fact, legalisation in England might allow a situation where you could actually have public service announcements warning people not to add dangerous tobacco to their relatively safe skunk.

At one point, Joe McNamara pointed out that the big danger with decrim (fines for possession, but still criminal to sell) rather than legalization is the problems involved with the sales of marijuana being controlled by the black market and that a legal industry would reduce the harms. Keith responded:

KH: To say that a legal industry will make the product safer, then you have to say that the tobacco leaf is more dangerous than a Marlboro. It is the legal industry that makes that raw tobacco leaf into a deadly product.

JM: That’s not a good comparison.

KH: It’s a very good comparison. It’s the one we have.

Um. No, it’s not.

It’s abundantly clear that Humphreys shares Kleiman’s fear of the tobacco industry (although I dare say that Mark would never descend this far into mendacity).

McNamara got him good right off the start, though, in a way that helps us really see what’s going on…

KH: Number one, this is about the business side, rather than the user side. The legislature has already decriminalized marijuana, so it’s going to be like a parking ticket in California.

(The California legislature approved SB 1449, by State Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, on August 31, sending it to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s desk. The bill would reduce possession of less than an ounce of marijuana from a misdemeanor to an infraction, meaning those in violation of the law would not be arrested, booked or forced to appear in court. They would continue to pay a $100 fine.)

So you should really be voting on this based on whether you want an industry that delivers marijuana. Because what will be legal, which is legal in no other part of the world for marijuana, will be marketing, lobbying, sports endorsements, celebrity endorsements, labs that spend all day trying to figure out how to make the product more flavorful and addictive. And if it sounds like I am describing the tobacco companies, I am. But that’s the question that’s really before us. Do you want that industry? What’s been our experience with tobacco, and are we satisfied with that experience such that we want to repeat it with cannabis?

Q: Your thoughts, chief?

JM: The industry is already here. The industry as it is now produces incredible amounts of crime and violence.

That’s right. Keith Humphreys would rather have large, violent, criminal enterprises control the distribution and sales of marijuana than risk even a long-shot possibility of an American corporation selling it.

That’s pretty bizarre.

It’s also pretty paranoid. There’s no reason that cannabis legalization is going to result in Philip Morris. It could just as easily (in fact, perhaps more likely) result in Starbucks. About the only things that cannabis and tobacco have in common is that they can be smoked. But then, cigars can be smoked and they’re marketed and managed a whole lot differently than cigarettes.

The culture surrounding cannabis is going to produce a different kind of commercialization than cigarettes.

It’s also unrealistic to think that the rise of a Cannabis Morris could occur today with the same dangerous characteristics of chemically manipulated cigarettes as they were developed and marketed in the past century. We’ve been through that once and are aware of it, and unlike in the 20th Century, we’ve got a raging Nanny State that is examining everything we even consider consuming with a magnifying lens on steroids.

We’re also much more of a socially conscious consumer society that is interested in things like gourmet and organic together, and is willing to pay $4 for a coffee. That’s more likely to result in a craft beer version of cannabis than a Budweiser. And yes, I’m mixing coffee and beer and cigars and cigarettes because cannabis is none of those things. It will have its own characteristics of commerce. It won’t be Marlboro.

Keith Humphreys does a nice job now and then of pointing out the problems with prohibition, and is quick to note when he parts company with the excesses of prohibitionist views, and that I appreciate. However, the arguments that he uses to oppose Prop 19 himself range from the hysterical to that powerful odor of mendacity.

The CCPOA came out with its final endorsements for the election, and it expresses an opinion on most candidate, but only on one proposition (opposed to Prop 22).

That’s good news. It appears that Prop 19 has been getting all the endorsements of those unions expressing an opinion, including the big one — SEIU.

David Harsanyi has a particularly ignorant column at Reason about legalization, which is a real surprise. Waiting for the Man
The long road to marijuana legalization

This is someone who is in favorof legalization. He seems to be saying that nothing is going to come of legalization because the politicians aren’t ready to act, and we don’t have any arguments that will sway them (or sway the people enough to make them act).

His conclusion is:

The minority that wants real reform? Politically speaking, our bad arguments are terrible and our good ones are worse.

Really?

Well, maybe if you look through the arguments that he cherry-picked to represent us, and ignore all the arguments that he chose to leave out, then maybe you’d get a little of that feeling, but even then, you’d have to take his sarcasm seriously (I’m halfway wondering if his OpEd was supposed to be sarcastic and he really means the opposite, because he jokes a lot in it, but I’m having trouble reading it that way).

Sure, we can claim that illicit drugs are harmless. But having partaken in youthful “experimentation,” I can say with empirical certainty this is untrue. If drugs are harmless, why did I try to convert Pez dispensers into bongs or choose journalism as a career?

What a strange person.

Besides, we don’t claim that all illicit drugs are harmless. We claim that drug prohibition is harmful — much more so than drugs, without the benefit of reducing any of the harm of drugs. Now that’s a solid argument with traction. One he leaves out entirely.

Or we could keep pretending that pot has profound medicinal value. In Denver, a sham medical pot industry has blossomed, and coincidentally there have been mass outbreaks of Andromeda strain and cooties among 20-somethings. This makes a mockery of real sickness and threatens to turn one-time public support into deeper skepticism.

Pretending that pot has profound medicinal value? It does, and the fact that others want to use it as well doesn’t change the medicinal value.

We could argue that legalizing drugs would provide government with a great source of revenue. (No worries; the “wealthiest among us” would pay their fair share.) But a new Cato Institute study by Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron and Katherine Waldock at New York University finds that there would be a rather unexceptional $17.4 billion in yearly national budgetary improvement from legalizing marijuana.

Unexceptional. In today’s economy? Let’s see, with that money, you could send over two million young people to a state university for a year.

There are plenty of other solid arguments that can resonate with the people (and thereby to the politicians). Reducing corruption. Starving the black market. Reducing the collateral damage to society of being over-reliant on prisons. Improving the relationship of cops to the community. Doing a better job of helping those with drug problems.

I don’t know what Harsanyi was thinking, but it sure wasn’t Reasonable.