Drug WarRant

I found this article mildly amusing: Tattoos linked to deviance?

Texas Tech University’s study, which will be published in March in the Social Science Journal, says that people with two or more piercings or tattoos are more prone to deviant behaviour, which includes excess drinking, smoking pot, being promiscuous and being willing to cheat.

Ah, yes. Deviant behaviour. Of course, even today, where tattoos and piercings have become quite mainstream, those young people who are willing to commit to body modification are naturally more likely to be open to trying other experiences as well, so the study results are not surprising. But… deviant?

And yes, I understand that the textbook definition of deviance as a sociological study includes breaking the law, yet it seems oddly strange to call smoking pot “deviant” when 42% of the population have tried it, including Presidents and people in every walk of life, 14 states have legalized it for medical purposes, and multiple states are considering legalizing it for recreational purposes.

Just sayin’.

I’ve made a slight advertising change on the site. I was really unhappy with Google ads since the move to the new URL. It seemed that they were feeding the site almost nothing but drug rehab ads, which aren’t of much interest to public policy activists, and the ad revenue dropped by over 60%.

I’ve started working with AdBrite, which will hopefully deliver some more interesting ads. Additionally, if AdBrite doesn’t have any ads for me, it’ll go ahead and let the Google ads run, which is useful.

It’s now possible to purchase ads specifically for this site, and reach a politically active, motivated group of readers.

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By the way, thanks for all the well-wishes. I’m making progress on the cold and have the weekend to keep making chicken soup (I make an outstanding homemade chicken soup), drink liquids and rest.

Some excellent detailed features on President Obama’s decision to keep Michele Leonhart on officially as Director of the DEA over at Drug War Chronicle and Sterling on Justice and Drugs. It’s nice to see some of the things I reported about her past back in 2003 surfacing again.

There’s no way I can see that this nomination will be derailed. It will go through without much of a hitch. But, if we’re thinking that it’s at least an opportunity to air a few things in a Judiciary Committee hearing, then it seems to me that Senator Durbin is the one to reach.

Durbin is, after all, the only one to take on Karen Tandy during her confirmation hearing. Check out his questioning of her here. It was one of our better days (of course, she still was confirmed unanimously).

IAEE Says No to Drugs

The Intl. Assn. of Exhibitions and Events has adopted a policy aimed at achieving drug-free workplaces in the exhibitions and events industry. Its first step: random drug testing for all IAEE employees.

Really? Exhibition and events employees? Cause like, there’s so much satisfaction in such a job that you shouldn’t care that they’re invading your privacy and punishing you for what you do on the weekend?

In A New Jim Crow? in Newsweek, Ellis Cose says that Obama should tackle the jails.

Given that, now (as midterm panic has broken out in Democratic quarters in the wake of the Massachusetts Senate defeat) may not be the best moment for Obama to tackle the matter head-on. But at some point any president aiming for greatness must grapple with a set of policies that have forced us to build prisons instead of schools. And ultimately even the most hardheaded critics must concede that rethinking a failed policy is not weakness but the only wise way to proceed.

DrugSense Weekly – a weekly review of the most interesting or relevant articles in the press and on the web related to drug policy reform.

Drug War Chronicle – weekly update of drug war news and analysis from Stop the Drug War.org.

I’ve always been fed up with the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime as the international arm of the prohibitionist movement. But there’s a deeper concern.

Supposedly, being part of the United Nations, they are bound to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And Director Costa often talks a good game in speeches about how important it is that human rights not be abused in the name of drug control. And yet, when abuse occurs, who is not out front condemning it? You guessed it. Countries know that they can commit atrocities of any kind in the name of the drug war and they won’t hear a peep from the U.N.

The UNODC also goes around the world and offers its “expertise” in setting up drug control offices and drafting drug control legislation — always with the mindset of promoting prohibition, and rarely with promoting human rights.

Cambodia is a prime example.

Here’s a country where there have been significant incidents of “drug treatment patients” (read “prisoners”) being abused, raped, and tortured.

Now the UNODC comes in and helps them draft new legislation. Take a look at what’s included…

The right to drug treatment

Article 67(5) “Officers who implement drug treatment and rehabilitation measures in accordance with the right to drug treatment shall not be prosecuted for their activities.”

Compulsory drug treatment

Article 71(4) “If a person is drug dependent to any substance as specified … a guardian, relative or authority can refer, or arrest and refer, the person to drug treatment at a hospital, public drug treatment facility, or any drug treatment facility.”

Now does that look like a way to reduce human rights abuse? No, it looks like a way you can get any relative you don’t like committed and then officials there can’t be prosecuted for what they do.

The UNODC should be condemning this, not helping write it.

Supporters turned in more than 700,000 signatures today. That should be sufficient.

Signatures were to be submitted today to elections officials in all 58 California counties, who will then begin the process of validating that those who signed are registered voters. Only about 433,000 valid signatures are needed.

Full text of the initiative after the jump.
Continue reading →

I’ve been struck with a nasty cold, so I’m going back to bed. Have at it.

Take a drink every time President Obama fails to mention the drug war when he talks about something that is affected by the drug war.

I’d heard it was coming, but that doesn’t make it any better. President Obama officially announced his intent to nominate Michele M. Leonhart, Administrator of Drug Enforcement, Drug Enforcement Administration, Department of Justice.

We had talked about how maybe, just maybe, the DEA might change a little bit after they got the hold-outs from the last administration out of there. Now he’s making her permanent. To recap, here’s the story I wrote about her years ago. The only silver lining is that the rank and file DEA agents can’t stand her.

Fascinating article by Bruce Mirken at Alternet on the potentials and the need for human research regarding cannabis and curing cancer. Ignore the misleading title of the article.

I’d like to see some proof of these stats…

He also said the percentage of marijuana-related domestic violence and property crimes in Clark County are higher than those that were alcohol related.

Schwartz said, “Gammick feels that marijuana users are less responsible than alcohol users.”

Remember Change.org? They’ve got another voting thing for putting legalizing marijuana into the top categories.

A very interesting read by Gene Weingarten in the Washington Post: On the jury, Gene Weingarten didn’t believe the D.C. police’s eyes

Weingarten tells of being an alternate on a jury for a small-time drug case. He was convinced the suspect was guilty. So was the other alternate. So, apparently, were most if not all the regular jurors.

And yet, 10 of the 12 regular jurors voted to acquit and both alternates would have done the same. Clearly this was a form of jury nullification. Did they vote to acquit this scumbag drug dealer because they opposed the drug war? No.

It was the lyin’ eyes.

You see, in the drug war, the police often feel that they’re at a disadvantage — after all, nobody reports consensual crimes, so the police have to be the aggrieved party, the witness, the investigator and arrestor. This leads to the temptation to “firm up” their case, particularly in those rare cases when a defendant chooses to go for a jury trial.

In this case, the “eyes” (policeman who witnesses the transaction) gave a nice detailed description of the suspect: “black male, black jacket, royal blue baseball hat, v-necked white t-shirt, sneakers, key on a chain around his neck, carrying a bottle of ginger ale.” Two other police officers agreed that they had heard this exact description over the radio, and then they moved in and arrested the suspect, who matched the description in every particular.

Turns out, the “eyes” was 172 feet away from the transaction.

The jury members were sure the defendant was guilty, but they didn’t like being lied to by the police.

Says Gene:

I believe they knew they had the right guy and were willing to cheat a little to assure a conviction.

I believe they had the right guy, too. But the willingness to cheat, I think, is a poisonous corruption of a system designed to protect the innocent at the risk of occasionally letting the guilty walk free. It’s a good system, fundamental to freedom. I think a police officer willing to cheat is more dangerous than a two-bit drug peddler.

Bingo.

And that’s another reason to get rid of this corrupting drug war.

Via The Agitator…

In the New York Post: Two Bronx men free after ‘drugs’ turn out to be candy

Two Bronx men were locked up and left to rot in a filthy jail cell for nearly a week after a pair of cops mistook their candy for a bag of crack.

The “drugs” were finally tested five days later and determined to be popular Coco (coconut) Candy. The charges were dropped.

The trouble began the night of Jan. 15, as José Pena, a 48-year-old plumber, and his longtime pal and colleague Cesar Rodriguez, 33, were headed to a party, and decided to stop at a bodega on 181st Street and the Grand Concourse.

When they came out, cops were waiting and asked to search their Ford minivan. “I said ‘Go search.’ I even opened the door,” Rodriguez told The Post.

Lesson #1: Never, ever, ever, ever, agree to a search. If you’re guilty, you’re helping them catch you. If you’re innocent, you’re wasting your time, you’re taking a chance since they aren’t required to fix anything they break, you’re leaving yourself open for being charged for something you didn’t know about that fell out of a friend’s pocket, and you’ve got the possibility that a couple of morons will think your coconut candy is crack and throw you in jail for a week.

An officer rummaged around, came out holding a “Hello Kitty” sandwich bag, and shouted “Bingo!” the men said.

“It’s only candy!” Rodriguez said, as the cops handcuffed him and Pena, and several other police cars rushed to the scene. […]

“Can you test it? Can you taste it?” Rodriguez asked the cops. “Shut up!” they replied.

“I didn’t know having candy was a crime,” he said. […]

The Bronx District Attorney’s office confirmed that the case was dropped after authorities realized there were no drugs. The NYPD had no comment.

Today’s drug war. Guilty until proven innocent.

Check out some of the comments…

why should the cops be suspended???? if it looks like crack and is in a plastic bag they should be arrested regardless, if they didnt arrest them and it was crack and they sold it to one of your kids you liberals would be going nuts on the cops, and as for tasting it?? wtf if some1 asked me to taste crack and risk my life with all the chemicals its cut down with i’d tell them to screw themselves its my life or thiers, this is a no brainer, both men arrested and have the alleged drugs sent to the lab for testing

Lock em” up anyhows……

Just because they didn’t find drugs on these two this time doesn’t mean that they’re not guilty…

Lesson #2: There are a few real knuckledraggers who read the NY Post.

Why there isn’t a shield law everywhere that prevents prosecuting anyone who calls 911 to report an overdose… well, it’s beyond me. The fact that activists have to work hard to even get such a bill considered is ridiculous.

That means that a majority of politicians are essentially saying: “No, I’d prefer that they die.”

Kathleen Kane-Willis has been doing a great job trying to get this kind of legislation passed in Illinois (often referred to as Good Samaritan laws), and now the New York Times has an article about her efforts.

State Representative Constance A. Howard, Democrat of Chicago, sponsored a bill in 2008 modeled after a New Mexico law that gave limited immunity to overdose victims and witnesses. The bill stalled in the House Rules Committee over concerns that it would conflict with the state’s prosecution of cases involving drug-induced homicide.

That’s right. They want you to be afraid to call for help so you hesitate, and then they hope that when you finally do call it’s too late so your overdosing friend dies, and then they can charge you for murder for being involved in obtaining the drug.

Sado-moralists, all.

They say that karma is a bitch. I hope so.