Drug WarRant

In announcing some annual celebration of work through the Department of Labor, drug czar John Walters notes:

75 percent of the nation‰s current illegal drug users are employed.

So much for Pete’s couch.
Thanks, John, for taking the time to acknowledge the contributions that drug users are making every day to save the economy that your administration has destroyed.
(Another thing that’s inspiring about that number — since the drug czar keeps saying that young people are the ones using drugs, then young drug users must be particularly motivated to be getting jobs at an early age.)
Drugs: motivating the young to work at real jobs that don’t have “czar” in the title.

Condoleeza Rice is going to Puerto Vallarta.

Jag Davies has an excellent post at the ACLU blog: Cascade of Reports Condemn Drug Czar‰s Office
Certainly, I’d like to see the drug czar’s office disappear into a sink-hole caused by the office’s own black-hole-like lack of integrity.
However, if the ONDCP is to continue, Davies is absolutely right that we must advocate for new metrics for measurement.

Rather than measuring success based on slight fluctuations in drug use, the primary measure of ONDCP‰s effectiveness should be the reduction of drug-related harm. If ONDCP is reauthorized, it should be charged with reducing problems associated with drug use itself (overdose, addiction, disease transmission) and problems associated with drug prohibition (over-incarceration, collateral sanctions, loss of civil liberties, racial disparities in enforcement, prosecution and sentencing).

That’s exactly right. Although, I would, just to make things as clear as possible, modify that statement slightly with a few word changes:

Rather than measuring success based on slight fluctuations in drug use, the primary measure of ONDCP‰s effectiveness should be the reduction of drug-related harm and drug-war-related harm. If ONDCP is reauthorized, it should be charged with reducing problems associated with drug use abuse itself (overdose, addiction, disease transmission) and problems associated with drug prohibition (over-incarceration, collateral sanctions, loss of civil liberties, turf violence, corruption, law enforcement trust, drug safety, environmental damage, breakup of families, racial disparities in enforcement, prosecution and sentencing).

Could still stand a bit of tweaking, but perhaps a coordinated effort to pass on such language to Congress, when the ONDCP is up for reauthorization, is in order?

Sometimes I wonder if I have anything new to say about this. The constant litany of articles about the drug war in Mexico are depressing:

• Soldiers beheaded in Mexico, drug war suspected
• Violence Escalates
• At least 21 dead in Mexico prison riot
• Mexico’s deadly drug war takes its toll on children
• 9,000 ‘ordinary people’ flee Mexican drug war
• Mexico’s Drug War Turns Into Terrorism After Grenades
• Drugs kidnap of child shocks US

One of those articles above actually made a connection between the violence now and the violence in the alcohol drug wars, but generally, there is no attempt made at any kind of perspective other than “Isn’t this terrible. Gee, I guess we’d better crack down some more.”
And, of course, the news naturally gets some people worked up …

What‰s worh Going to War For? Iraq – No, not in my opinion. Drug Lords from Mexico that Kidnap little children from their homes, yes this is worth going to war for. This is worth losing the Iraq war. This is worth pulling the troops out of Iraq immediately to protect our borders. Isn‰t this something that we need Federal Troops for.

… somehow unaware that we’re already at war. Have been for decades. That’s what brought us to this mess. That’s what caused this mess.
Scott Morgan makes it clear

If our drug policy made sense, 6-year-old children wouldn‰t be kidnapped in blackmarket business disputes […]
Cole is safe now, thankfully. But as long as the drug war continues, these kinds of things will never stop happening and they won‰t always end peacefully. There‰s a reason Anheuser-Busch and R.J. Reynolds don‰t kidnap children when a retailer is late on a payment.

Unless the news media is willing to do its job and make the historic connections clear, each escalation of violence will continue to be met with a further escalation, and the people, uninformed and uneducated about the economic laws relating to black market economies, will continue to push for more gasoline to be put on the fire.

Oh, yes, it was Red Ribbon Week again. This is that annual celebration where, in memory of one person who died in the drug war, the DEA encourages school children to celebrate the drug war and ignore all the other deaths it has caused.
The celebrations reach incredible heights of absurdity.
Throughout the country

Each school may have different activities, but for the most part they’ll follow the same agenda. Students will follow a different anti-drug theme each day of the week and dress accordingly, such as wearing camouflage to “join the fight against drugs.”

I guess they don’t actually issue them guns… yet.
But they sure tease them.

Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent Jodie Underwood — dressed in black and packing her service revolver — looked armed and dangerous until she turned toward a bunch of 8-year- olds with a grin on her face and asked: “Are you guys having fun?

All right, kids! War is fun! And you might get to shoot people!
It was unclear who was having more fun, the kids or the cops, at the culmination Thursday of several days of drug prevention programs at the Holy Rosary School in West Seattle.
The three letter agencies were there: DEA, ICE, FBI. As children wearing red sweaters and blue pants or tartan skirts lined 42nd Avenue Southwest, agents in raid jackets, swat gear and even hazardous-material suits slapped palms with the pumped-up youngsters.

Ah, but what if hazardous material suits aren’t sexy enough?

It’s not enough to just tell kids not to do drugs. It takes a helicopter, the military, a federal agent, a professional sport team’s mascot and cheerleaders to send the message.

That’s right — these grade school kids celebrated the war with “soldiers from the Colorado National Guard’s Counter-Drug Program, accompanied by a special agent from the Drug Enforcement Agency, two Denver Nugget dancers and Edson the Eagle, the mascot for the Colorado Rapids.” Now that should make a 12-year-old boy sit up straight for the war on drugs.

One lucky student, Louis Morales, 12, got a photo with the ladies.
“It was awesome, especially because of the cheerleaders,” Louis said. “We have a lot of homework so we are in class a lot so it was nice to get out of class for a bit.”

And for those not interested in the cheerleaders, you had the helicopter.

“It was awesome, because it’s a helicopter and helicopters are awesome,” said Zach Glynn, 12.

Awesome.
Tarika Wilson, 26, shot to death in her home by police while holding her baby. Kathryn Johnston, 88, shot to death in her home by police. Ashley Villareal, 14, shot to death in her car outside her home by DEA agents. Xavier Bennett, 8, shot to death in his home. Veronica Bowers, 35, and Charity Bowers, 7 months, shot down and killed in their missionary plane over Peru by drug enforcement operations. Patrick Dorismond, 26, shot to death by undercover drug police on the streets of New York. Tony Marinez, 19, shot to death while sleeping on the couch. Lynette Gayle Jackson, 26, shot to death in her bed by a SWAT team. Alberto Sepulveda, 11, shot to death by SWAT while lying face down on the floor in his home. Esequiel Hernandez, 18, shot to death by drug war Marines on U.S. soil while herding his family’s goats. …
Awesome.

I was driving on Cicero Avenue in Chicago yesterday and passed a beer billboard (Miller, I believe) that said:

“Tell the recession where to go. Miller High Life. It’s common sense.”

It’s a rather odd billboard, and I wish I had taken a picture of it (and can’t find one online). It was in a pretty low income area of the city and appeared to be saying more than just that Miller Beer is a good value.
And it got me thinking about the fact that if we indeed face a long and severe recession, there will be many things cut from personal budgets, but people will always find a way to afford a little mind-altering escape. Even more so when times are tough.
And so if we really were to face a severe recession and I was in the position to advise governments how to deal with it, one of the things I would tell them is to stop wasting tons of money and productivity on prohibition and, at the very least, legalize marijuana for financial reasons.
But I would also ask them: “If you are looking at inner city areas with massive unemployment, would you rather have large numbers of angry drunk poor people on the streets, or mellow stoned poor people on Pete’s couch?”
Seriously.
Sure, Miller High Life is probably a quality product, and I have nothing against choosing beer, but a legal pot patch in the back yard in bad times (or good, for that matter) really is common sense.
After all, it’s worked for relaxing soccer fans.

“bullet” The Committee on Oversight and Government has issued a report critical of the Drug Czar’s office and others, for their efforts to help the Bush Administration get Republicans elected in 2006. It’s something we talked about at the time. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be as interested in the ONDCP’s efforts to undermine state and local initiatives and legislative efforts.
“bullet” The Daily Mail just has no limit to its absurdity.

A senior police officer delivered a fierce attack on the reclassification of cannabis yesterday after a long-term user who ignored medical pleas to kick the habit was jailed for murdering his girlfriend.
Detective Superintendent Andy West said the decision to downgrade the drug from Class B to C was the ‘worst thing’ he had seen in 28 years of policing. […]
Middlebrook, the 27-year- old son of a teacher, had been a cannabis user for ten years when he stabbed Miss Barton 15 times with three knives as she lay naked in his bed. […]
‘This man is going to serve over 12 years so when people say this is a safe drug I don’t agree.’ […]
Police and paramedics reported the pungent smell of cannabis in the room and empty beer cans. […]
Middlebrook told police he acted because he feared for his life and that ‘she was in cahoots with a group of lads who are trying to kill me’.
A post-mortem examination found Miss Barton had also smoked cannabis before her death.
The case is the latest involving a cannabis user who carried out a violent crime.

I wonder if Middlebrook was a milk user, and whether they considered that aspect…
“bullet” In the “we already knew that” category:

New research finds that a national campaign‰s anti-drug TV ads failed to convince young children and teenagers to stay away from marijuana and actually might have encouraged some to try smoking pot.
In their 1999 to 2004 incarnation, the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign‰s TV ads ‹either had no effects on kids or possibly had a boomerang effect,Š said Robert Hornik, lead author of a new study and professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania.
The U.S. Congress created the anti-drug campaign in the late 1990s and gave almost $1 billion to it through 2004, according to the study. The taxpayer-funded campaign continues to create anti-drug advertising today.
The study appears online and in the December issue of the American Journal of Public Health.

“bullet” Senator Jim Webb is continuing his efforts to address sentencing issues with his symposium on Wednesday: Drugs in America: Trafficking, Policy and Sentencing
“bullet” R.I.P. Beth Wehrman
Beth was a leader in the field of harm reduction.

Known as the “Needle Lady of Illinois,” Wehrman is estimated to have exchanged more than 11,000 needles to help prevent the spread of HIV.

A classy lady. She will be missed.
“bullet” How dense does the media have to be to continue reporting these marijuana destroys the environment stories?

“People light up a joint,” said Cicely Muldoon, deputy regional director of the Pacific West Region of the National Park Service, “and they have no idea the amount of environmental damage associated with it.”

And why aren’t they finding clandestine tobacco fields? Hmmm…
Fortunately, the Marijuana Policy Project is publicly responding. (although if anyone has Cicely Muldoon’s email address, I wouldn’t mind getting it).
“bullet” “drcnet”

Tarika Wison is still dead

LIMA, Ohio (AP) – An outside review has concluded that a Lima
police officer didn’t violate any department rules in the fatal
shooting of unarmed woman during a drug raid.

Let’s see if I’ve got this straight.
He didn’t violate any rules when he shot and killed a mother and mutilated her baby.
Hmmm… Let me try this again.
The Lima Police department rules find breaking into a house to look for drugs, shooting the dogs and shooting a woman to death while she’s holding her baby… acceptable.
You know….
I’m generally in the camp that isn’t looking for extra rules and regulations, but I would think that I would want my police department to actually have a rule against going into somebody’s home and shooting them to death. Particularly if they don’t have hostages.
Am I crazy?

via Cato is this article:

President Manuel Zelaya proposed legalizing drug use, which he said would free up Honduras’s financial resources and defang international traffickers.
“The trade of arms, drugs and people … are scourges on the international economy, and we are unable to provide effective responses” because of conventional legal restraints, Zelaya said Monday at the opening of the 18th meeting of regional leaders against drug trafficking. […]
“Rather than continue to kill and capture traffickers, we could invest in resources for education and training,” the Honduran leader said.

He figured it out.

“bullet” Via Transform, comes the interesting case of a man who is taking his drug charges in the U.K. to the High Court on the basis that it’s an arbitrary abuse of power to charge him for cannabis when alcohol and tobacco are legal.

Edwin Stratton, 43, of Leyton, London, is charged with production of cannabis under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 (‹The ActŠ). He has today given notice of his intention to challenge the legitimacy of this prosecution in the High Court as an abuse of process. This assertion is evidenced by the bias and discrimination inherent in the policy that equally harmful drugs and those exercising property rights in such drugs should be treated differently in law. The defence claims a majoritarian abuse of power by the executive in the administration of drugs legislation. The rights afforded under the Human Rights Act 1998 guarantee freedom from arbitrary discrimination: this claim is grounded in the unequal protection afforded to drug property rights between ‘licit’ and ‘illicit’ drugs. This challenge seeks to hold the government and the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (‹ACMDŠ) to account for an alleged irrational administration of the law which has led to countless thousands of lives lost and destroyed in the so-called ‘War on Drugs’.

I really know too little about England’s legal system to say just how how unlikely anything would come from a case like this, but I like it. I love the audacity of it, and the fact that it’s likely to add to the conversation.
“bullet” There’s a lot of depressing stuff in the news about the drug war violence in Mexico, as the deaths keep piling up, and I tend not to want to be overwhelmed by it. But worth reading is Silja J.A. Talvi’s excellent article in Alternet: As the Violence Soars, Mexico Signals It’s Had Enough of America’s Stupid War on Drugs.

…a national poll published on October 4th indicated that more than 40% of Mexicans felt less secure since Calder÷n’s drug war offensive began. Another poll published by the Mexico City daily, Reforma, showed that more than half of Mexicans believed that the cartels, not the government, were winning the drug war. […]
On October 2, Calder÷n proposed legislation that would decriminalize drug possession, ostensibly for personal use. Not just for marijuana, as one might have expected in a country where pot smoke has not been demonized to the same degree as in the U.S., but for cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin, as well.

Some good quotes from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition members in the article.
“bullet” So Deputy Drug Czar Scott Burns flies to Michigan on the taxpayer’s dime to campaign against a medical marijuana initiative, and what expert opinion does he provide?

“Proposal 1 is bad for Michigan and it is bad for America,” Burns said.
“This issue is about dope, not about medicine.”

Yep, that’s what he has to offer. Pretty pathetic.