Drug WarRant

An interesting article in Newsweek: Colombia’s Failed Drug War.

By some measures lvaro Uribe is the world’s most successful head of state. Since taking office in 2002, the president of Colombia has routed the ELN terrorist group, broken the FARC guerrillas, demobilized their right-wing paramilitary foes and made Colombia’s cities safe again. Homicides are down 40 percent nationwide since his term began, and economic growth is up, from just 2.5 percent in 2002 to 8.2 percent in 2007. Result: 66 percent of Colombians approve of Uribe even during a global financial catastrophe Ödown from the 80s a few months agoÖthe highest of any president in a democracy.

This is quite positive stuff (at least positive-sounding). At this point, the U.S. government would tout this as proof that the drug war is working. Which, of course, is nonsense. Whether or not you agree that the developments listed above are positive for Colombia and/or the United States, it takes a certain level of self-delusion to use them as measures of drug war success.
Newsweek’s Adam Kushner is not deluded.

U.S. policymakers have also hailed Uribe: President George W. Bush has feted his “determination to rid the country of narcotrafficking.”
Determination is not, however, enough to win the war on drugs. Since 2000, the United States has sent more than $6 billion to Bogot½ to help Uribe and his predecessor stabilize the Andean region, stanch the flow of drugs into America’s cities and cut drug production. In what is known as Plan Colombia, Washington sent pilots and choppers to Colombia, trained commandos and furnished weapons to fight traffickers and terrorists. For his part, Uribe and his predecessor raised the military budget from 4 to 6 percent of the national GDP. But instead of cutting drug production in half by 2006, as Plan Colombia intended, the acreage of land dedicated to coca cultivation is up 15 percent since 2000 and now yields 4 percent more cocaine than it did eight years ago. An October report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, an oversight agency, says Plan Colombia’s goals “have not been fully achieved.”

A doozy of an understatement by the GAO. The notion that Plan Colombia could ever be considered a success with billions of dollars spent and cultivation and output going up is simply bizarre.
Kushner goes on to explain why economics, geography, and logistics actually make it impossible to win the drug war.

To a certain extent, Uribe is struggling against impossible odds. […]
All of which means that the drug war in Colombia may be at a stalemate. With diminishing returns on enforcement, American and Colombian officials are at a loss to say what, exactly, their endgame is. […]
So for now, Colombia and the United States will have to come to terms with the fact that even a popular president has limited power to fight drug traffickers.

Kushner’s article isn’t perfect. He blames neighboring countries for not participating enthusiastically enough, even though he doesn’t show that such participation would make a difference. He also neglects some of the important economic considerations.
However, this is an important moment.
An article in a major national magazine is saying, essentially, that the drug war (at least in Colombia) cannot be won. There is no quick answer, no option for solving it by simply throwing more money at it.
The conventional wisdom about Colombia has gone through quite a transition:

1. We will win the drug war through Plan Colombia.
2. We are winning the drug war in Colombia. We just need more time/money.
3. While there have been some set-backs, if we redouble our efforts, we will win.
4. We need to come up with some different options and get some more help from neighbors, and then we’ll win.
5. There’s no possible way to win this war no matter what we do.

This is good progress. And now we have to help lead them to…

6. What’s next?

And?

Massachusetts officially decriminalized possession of small amounts of marijuana yesterday, but many police departments across the state were essentially ignoring the voter-passed law, saying they would not even bother to ticket people they see smoking marijuana.

OK.
I think that was kind of the idea, you know. I don’t know why they were having such a difficult time figuring it out. It’s marijuana. No big deal.

It seems that the incessant complaining by law enforcement in Massachusetts about the problems they’ll have administering the new marijuana decrim is starting to get some blowback.
Herald News Editorial: Don’t Complicate Pot Law

The only ones unclear about what Question 2 intends are law enforcement officials who act like a civil violation is some radical idea no one ever heard of. […]
This reefer madness is spreading. […]
The public’s response to the educators, police and prosecutors should be simple: You’re the professionals; work it out. […]
The campaign is over and the voters have spoken.

Eagle Tribune Editorial: New Marijuana Law Shouldn’t Pose Problems

Today, the new law takes effect. Yet some local police departments, as well as others across the state, say they are uncertain about how to enforce it. […]
Nearly two months have passed since 65 percent of Massachusetts voters changed the law. Despite their lack of enthusiasm for the law, state and local law enforcement agencies have had time to prepare. […]
This should not be so difficult. Massachusetts is not the first state to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana. Eleven other states have done so. Is there no experience from those states that Massachusetts law enforcement officials can draw upon? […]
The public doesn’t see small amounts of marijuana as a problem. Neither should police.

Well, I’m finally back from some excellent quality time with family (which did include some good discussions about drug policy — they’ve come so far…).
I’ve been really out of touch (having to depend on television(!) for news and information), so it’ll take me a bit to catch up.
“bullet” Scott Morgan has the story of another botched raid. The only thing we can be sure of is that these will continue to happen more often as long as law enforcement policies continue in their current direction. And there will be more dead cops and dead innocent civilians.
“bullet” Massachusetts marijuana decrim law goes into effect today. It’s unlikely to change things much, but it does make it clear that Massachusetts law enforcement is apparently populated primarily by whining, confused incompetents. After reading their complaints, I’m really glad I don’t have to depend on them to, oh, say, investigate anything.
“bullet” Judge blasts plan to randomly drug test teachers.

A federal judge halted the Kanawha County school system’s plan to randomly drug test teachers.
U.S. District Judge Joseph Robert Goodwin said the drug testing plan would force teachers to submit to an unconstitutional and unjustified search. He also gave a scathing rebuke of the policy and the school board that approved it. […]
He said that the school board’s argument that something bad could happen while a teacher under the influence of drugs was supervising children was based on an unreasonable kind of worse-case-scenario thinking. Goodwin asked why the board had not also passed a policy to randomly test teachers for tropical diseases.
“Total security for us and our children is only possible — if unlikely — in a totalitarian state,” Goodwin said.
He added, “Who wants to live in a society when a government will stop at nothing to prevent bumps and bruises.”

“bullet” “drcnet”

I got a moment to get to the library in Antigo, Wisconsin and get me some internet, and lo and behold, the questions are back at Change.gov!
I couldn’t put in the full question I had intended in my earlier post (the character count maximum is frightfully small), but I was able to put in the following

“76% of likely voters think the drug war is failing. Yet suggestions from opponents of the drug war are often dismissed. Will you appoint a blue-ribbon commission to look at all aspects of drug policy, including examining alternatives to prohibition?”

There are already close to 1000 questions including the word “marijuana” and quite a few with “drug policy”
Get over there and vote for the ones you like.

Had a brief window of internet access in Iowa, but expect very little where I’m headed next in Wisconsin.
What are your hopes for the New Year?

“bullet” (Arizona) Goddard Might Consider Legalized Marijuana

Attorney General Terry Goddard said Tuesday he might be willing to consider legalizing marijuana if a way can be found to control its distribution – and figure out who has been smoking it.
Goddard said marijuana sales make up 75 percent of the money that Mexican cartels use for other operations, including smuggling other drugs and fighting the Mexican army and police.
He said that makes fighting drug distribution here important to cut off that cash. He acknowledged those profits could be slashed if possession of marijuana were not a crime in Arizona.

Recognition of actual facts. Wow.
“bullet” Blast from the past… Weed Delivery Guy Saves Christmas

“It wasn’t long before all through the house, not a creature was stirring up off the couch. The boys opened the baggie and packed a bowl with delight, murmuring, “Happy Christmas, weed delivery guy. You did us one right.”

“bullet” Draft of Michigan med-cannabis rules wants to require that “caregivers or patients provide detailed cultivation records and track where each and every plant goes.”
“bullet” Children Stare with Heroin Eyes

Legislators in Suffolk County, New York, have passed a bill
that creates a Web site to show heroin-related arrests by location, frequency and the age of the culprits. […]
A website that tells everyone where the drug cops have been active? What could possibly go wrong with that?

“bullet” Another really, really, stupid lawmaker…
Drug Paraphernalia Tax Proposed

Rep. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg, has an interesting idea for raising revenues during these tough times.
House Bill 99 would add a “surtax of 5 percent” on items described as “drug paraphernalia” in Florida statute.
That includes not only “bongs” and “hypodermic syringes,” but also, according to state law, common items that can be fashioned into drug tools including “a balloon,” a “2-liter-type soda bottle” and “duct tape.”

Happy Holidays!
I’m off to visit my dad in Quincy, Illinois, my mom in Indianola, Iowa and my sister in White Lake, Wisconsin. For the next week or so, I’ll have very limited access to the internet. I’ll try to pop in if I can.
Use this thread to pass on any news, and to share your holiday wishes.

There appears to be no rush to re-open the “Open for Questions” at Change.gov, although there are discussions going on there. However, the questions are speculation are not going away, and I think that’s a good thing.
“bullet” If Obama Is Pro-Science and Honest, He’ll Put the Kibosh on the Drug War by Alexander Zaitchik at AlterNet:

Nobody expected Obama to tap Tommy Chong to run the Office of National Drug Control Policy. But maybe, just maybe, Obama would have the political courage to publicly acknowledge what an emerging majority of Americans now grasps: that the war on drugs is a failure, that it is unjust, and that it is an epic waste of law-enforcement time and resources.
Still a month before inauguration, the hopes of drug-policy-reform advocates have had their wings clipped several times… […]
Advocates may have their best ally not in the White House or in Congress, but in the economy. As state budgets shrink across the country, legislatures are often forced to choose between education and prison budgets.

“bullet” Why Obama Really Might Decriminalize Marijuana by John H. Richardson in Esquire

The stoner community is clamoring to say it: “Yes we cannabis!” Turns out, with several drug-war veterans close to the president-elect’s ear, insiders think reform could come in Obama’s second term — or sooner.

Let’s keep the conversation going. I know that there are some who support drug policy reform who believe that we have to save the conversation for the “right moment” (and, of course, there’s always a reason why that moment isn’t now). But that’s wrong. The more the conversation happens, the more people come to realize the importance of reform.
There’s a lot you can do. Talk to your family at the holidays. Write a letter to the editor. Reward and thank journalists and others who talk about reform. Encourage others to do so.
Update Reactions to the Esquire article:

• Obama to Decriminalize Marijuana, Claims Really High Person

(Gawker)

• Will he legalize it? (No.) (Culture 11)

The L.A. Times reports that New Hampshire, due to financial crises, is putting a freeze on jury trials!
Hmm… I seem to remember reading something about jury trials before… Oh yeah, in the Constitution of the United States

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed….

If there’s anything you’re not going to cut, I’m guessing it should be what you’re required to do by the Constitution.
The article goes on to talk about justice cuts all over the country – and at this point it’s showing up mostly in reduction of quality of justice rather than selectivity in prosecution. And that’s really dangerous in an already overloaded and poorly served function of government.
This could really blow up eventually.
The drug war is, of course, a huge part of this issue. The immense volume of drug prosecutions nationwide has completely overwhelmed and undermined the concept of justice and jury trials. This led to the use of over-charging (and the assistance of the legislature in passing overkill drug laws) in order to force plea bargains. In other words, they charge you for possession, trafficking, manufacture, paraphernalia, conspiracy, and tax evasion adding up to 5,000 years so you’ll plead guilty to whatever they want (whether you’re guilty or not), avoiding the jury trial you’re entitled to by Constitution. (And if you’re innocent, you’re really screwed.)
You know, instead of saving money by denying Americans their rights under the Constitution, perhaps the government should save money by restoring rights under the Constitution…