Drug WarRant

I’ve put together a page about Congressional requirements that the ONDCP and the drug czar must lie to you

The SOS unit in Chicago covered dealt with drug and gang busts, and like so many of these “special” task forces, became a law unto themselves, not only violating the Constitutional rights of the citizens, but extending their lawbreaking into robbery, kidnapping, and even murder for hire.
Check out the Chicago Tribune video, where the SOS was caught on camera illegally raiding a bar and searching all the patrons without a warrant
There’s a certain inevitability of this kind of result from drug task forces due to both the nature of the enforcement tactics that a prohibition regime tends to demand, and the type of officer drawn to such enforcement tactics (and the good officers may not stay. That’s not to say that a drug task force can’t avoid corruption, but to do so it must actively work to counter its own nature.

“bullet” Stupid OpEd of the week in Human Events. Robert J. Caldwell fellates the Drug Czar in a piece that is both intentionally deceitful, and historically revisionist in terms of prohibition and “the historical examples of Turkey, Southeast Asia and Colombia.” Naturally, the Drug Czar got off on it.
“bullet” Another, much more sane conservative view can be found at the corner by Andrew Stuttaford.

The drug warriors are, it seems, continuing in their efforts to sabotage the war against Islamic extremism in Afghanistan. […]
Of course it’s ‘crazy’, Matt, it’s the drug war.

“bullet” This is from last week, but in case you missed it… The Drug Czar actually tried to take on Milton Friedman regarding the drug war. (Friedman bitch-slapped him from the grave.)
“bullet” In the New Haven Independent, there’s a fascinating discussion about corruption in a narcotics unit and whether even the idea of a narcotics unit makes sense. Not all the players are up to speed on the big picture, but the fact that such a conversation is taking place, is positive.
“bullet” In an effort to separate drug users from the black market, The Czech Republic is considering decriminalizing the growing of marijuana for your own use. Via Transform.
“bullet” At Alternet: “New York City has the most marijuana arrests in the world (but don’t worry, white people, it won’t be you)” by Ezekiel Edwards
“bullet” From Alas, a blog: A Sentence to Prison Is A Sentence To Be Tortured
“bullet” In the Nation, Prison Reformers Finally Set Free

Is the nearly 40-year-old, bipartisan “let’s get tough on crime” mantra getting old– even for politicians?

I have often railed about the stupidity of our drug warriors when it comes to basic principles of economics. With the Drug Czar crowing about the temporary increase in the price of cocaine, Robert Guest of I Was the State provides a very concise lesson:

When supply is reduced and demand remains the same, prices rise. Rising prices signal new suppliers to enter the market. Demand creates supply.
The price of cocaine has risen to $118 per gram. Any product worth $50,000 a pound will find drug cartels lining up to supply it. Mass incarceration and “Just Say No” ads won’t change the simple law of supply and demand.
This drug war “victory” will be short lived. Drug cartels will find new ways to import the goods that Americans demand. We give the drug cartels a monopoly on the American cocaine market which in turn gives the cartels billions to import their wares.
We can only win the drug war by choosing new suppliers.

Of course, then the Drug Czar would be out of a job. Hmmm, maybe he does understand economics…

So on Thursday, Stephen Harper’s government announced plans for a dramatic increase in the war on drugs in Canada. Apparently, he’s jealous of all the drug war fun in the U.S. and wants some of it for himself. His ideas have not been greeted with universal warmth.
In the Guelph Mercury

VANCOUVER – Critics of the Conservative government’s new anti-drug plan are calling it everything from naive to politically opportunistic and a threat to the civil liberties of Canadians.
A coalition of Vancouver health and social groups says prison terms and attempts to scare users straight won’t solve Canada’s illegal drug problem.
“You just can’t incarcerate your way out of this,” former Vancouver mayor Philip Owen, a member of the Beyond Prohibition Coalition, said yesterday. “The United States locks down 2.3 million people every night.”
Owen, an architect of Vancouver’s drug safe-injection site, told a news conference the Tory government’s adoption of policies similar to the failed war on drugs in the U.S. is “uninformed.”

An editorial in the Globe and Mail:

‘The party’s over,” federal Health Minister Tony Clement intoned this past weekend. Mr. Clement was talking about drug users, but it wasn’t entirely clear which ones. It might have been otherwise law-abiding citizens who occasionally smoke marijuana. Or perhaps it was all those partiers suffering from debilitating addictions to hard drugs such as heroin and crack cocaine. Either way, Mr. Clement appears to have borrowed his rhetoric from the 1980s. To go with it, he appears set to borrow the disastrous “War on Drugs” strategy from south of the border. […]
This new strategy may play well with some members of the Conservatives’ base. But as evidenced by what has transpired in the United States, it will do absolutely nothing to reduce drug use. Its only effect will be to make the effects of substance abuse all the more painful.

The always excellent Dan Gardner writes in the Ottawa Citizen, What’s Harper smoking?

Stephen Harper’s announcement Thursday of a new national drug strategy served at least one valuable purpose: It conclusively demonstrated that the prime minister knows nothing about drugs or drug policy. […]
So what does Stephen Harper have to say about this? At the press conference, he complained about drug references in Beatles songs and the fact that drugs have been romanticized “since the 1960s.” So naturally he wants to put in place the same policies that failed to stop Lucy from floating into the sky with diamonds — a conclusion that seems perfectly reasonable, I assume, shortly after one drops acid. […]
Righteous ignorance does fog the mind.

And there’s this excellent piece by Jody Paterson in the Times Colonist

The problems of ideology-based governance clearly must be more obvious from afar. Otherwise, Canadians wouldn’t be able to bear the hypocrisy of railing against oppressive and backward regimes elsewhere in the world while committing ourselves anew to the folly of a war on drugs. […]
Here’s the thing: Health issues can’t be resolved through ideology. […]
So why do we continue to let our elected politicians ignore the science when it comes to drug issues? Why should anybody’s poorly informed position around drug use be the lens that we apply when trying to address complex health and social problems that are far too important to be left to political whim?
I respect the right of Stephen Harper and his MPs to believe that using illicit drugs is bad. It’s a free country and they’re welcome to their opinions, […]
But why would we want to base something as important as our national drug strategy on opinion and belief?
We’ve got six decades worth of scientific studies underlining the importance of an informed, health-based approach in reducing the harm and societal costs of drug use. Yet we’re still letting vital public policy be decided by people who would rather maintain their personal fictions than take steps to fix the problems. […]
So with all due respect, Mr. Harper, believe whatever you like in your personal life. But as prime minister, please run this country on facts and not fiction.

More coverage of Harper’s drug war at Blame the Drug War.

“bullet” David Guard has a recap of the Mass Incarceration Hearing yesterday
“bullet” Drug Sense Weekly
“bullet” “drcnet”

… one of them, anyway.
The Onion

WASHINGTON, DCÖThe National Anti- Quartering Association, America’s foremost Third Amendment rights group, held its annual gala in Washington Monday to honor 191 consecutive years of advocating the protection of private homes and property against the unlawful boarding of military personnel.

Funny. And sad.

I’ve been tagged through Blawg Review’s La Meme Chose: Simply the Best. Thanks to Jeralyn at TalkLeft and Austin Defense Lawyer for the compliment.
So let me continue the meme with a list of 10 blogs that I read on a regular basis (in addition to those two) for inspiration or information about drug policy reform and the related fight against authoritarianism.

• Radley Balko’s The Agitator
• Scott Morgan at Stop the Drug War
• Reason’s Hit and Run
• Transform Drug Policy Foundation Blog
• Alex Coolman’s Drug Law Blog
• Scott Henson’s Grits for Breakfast
• To the People
• Unqualified Offerings
• Glenn Greenwald’s Unclaimed Territory
• ScotusBlog

Be sure to check out all of these wonderful blogs. Of course, as always, this is an incomplete list off the top of my head at the moment — there are many others whose wonderful blogging inspires and informs me.

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom went ballistic on the drug war

“If you want to get serious, if you want to reduce crime by 70% in this country overnight, end this war on drugs,” he told reporters at City Hall on Thursday. “You want to get serious, seriously serious about crime and violence end this war on drugs.”
[…]
“It’s laughable that anyone could look at themselves with a straight face and say ‘oh,we’re really succeeding.’ I mean it’s comedy. And as I say, shame on my party, the democratic party, because they don’t have the courage of their private thoughts, because we don’t want to appear weak on this topic,” Newsom said.

Sheriff Mike Hennessey agreed.

“No, the war on drugs is not working. The war on drugs is not working because we are relying on law enforcement instead of on treatment,” Hennessey said.

Watch the video.