Drug WarRant

I’ve always been pretty big Doonesbury fan, and have recently found myself pulling out some of the old books of strips from the early years. And I also happened upon a Knight Lecture talk given by Garry Trudeau at Stanford University in March, 2000 titled “What a Long, Strange Strip It’s Been” — now available for free on iTunes. Quite delightful.
Here’s a little piece of it…

Given the sea change in attitudes, it seems even to me, quite incredible that I could have depicted a culture so tolerant of recreational drugs, but in fact that was our reality. That tolerance, which is now largely forgotten, is what has made the past so haunting and difficult for baby boom politicians when confronted with queries about past behaviors.
As you know, most public figures have used the budding scientist defense — the claim that they were engaged in experimentation. Thus when President Clinton finally came clean, it was only to admit that he too had been bitten by the research bug, but had been plagued by flawed methodology.
Many other public figures have used this approach, from Al Gore, to Newt Gingrich to Mustang Sally – Susan Molinari, but all of them have adhered to the confessional guidelines laid down during the Ginsburg Supreme Court hearings.
Judge Douglas Ginsburg, you may recall, conducted his experiments while he was law school professor, at which exalted station one is expected to have already concluded one’s benchwork and re-joined one’s better senses. Having forfeited the youthful indiscretion defense, Ginsburg was toast.
In contrast, Justice Clarence Thomas, another confessed lab rat, wrapped up his experiments by senior year, so he now occupies the chair that would have been occupied by Justice Souter had Judge Ginsburg completed his experiments in a more timely fashion. The irony, of course, being that Justice Souter, who didn’t conduct any experiments at all, is the only one of the three who probably could have benefitted from them. […]
How refreshing it would be to hear a baby boom Congressman step up and say “Hey, I don’t remember my Freshman year. Get over it.”
The fact is an estimated 80 million of our countrymen have used Cannabis to date. At one time such unlikely sources as Jimmy Carter, and Dan Quail, and Richard Nixon’s Marijuana Commission all favored decriminalizing the stuff, but since the early 80’s nearly 5 million people have been arrested for marijuana-related offenses.
One of the weirder outcomes of the drug war is that much of America has to behave like the criminals they technically are. They have to lie. A lot. Job applications, medical forms, insurance forms, recruitment papers, all of them are opportunities to deny “youthful indiscretion.”
So. Would I ever admit to using pot? Of course not. I never experimented with marijuana. Nor did I every drive a motorcycle, or have an alcoholic beverage until my 21st birthday, or have a sexual experience of any kind until well into my third year of marriage.
In other words, I’m a parent. […]

A disturbing article in the New York Times: Drugs Banned, Many of World‰s Poor Suffer in Pain

Like millions of others in the world‰s poorest countries, she is destined to die in pain. She cannot get the drug she needs Ö one that is cheap, effective, perfectly legal for medical uses under treaties signed by virtually every country, made in large quantities, and has been around since Hippocrates praised its source, the opium poppy. She cannot get morphine.
That is not merely because of her poverty, or that of Sierra Leone. Narcotics incite fear: doctors fear addicting patients, and law enforcement officials fear drug crime. Often, the government elite who can afford medicine for themselves are indifferent to the sufferings of the poor.
The World Health Organization estimates that 4.8 million people a year with moderate to severe cancer pain receive no appropriate treatment. Nor do another 1.4 million with late-stage AIDS. For other causes of lingering pain Ö burns, car accidents, gunshots, diabetic nerve damage, sickle-cell disease and so on Ö it issues no estimates but believes that millions go untreated.

Pain is dangerously under-treated in the United States, and yet…

In 2004, consumption of morphine per person in the United States was about 17,000 times that in Sierra Leone.

What kind of sick, sadistic drug policy would spend billions of dollars and countless lives to eradicate useful drugs, while doing nothing to help those in pain?
Oh yeah. Ours.

Link

(AP) BOGOTA, Colombia – Colombia‰s vice president said Sunday that a U.S.-backed program to fumigate coca fields is failing to stem cocaine trafficking and called for anti-drug efforts to shift away from the practice.

Hmm, not so well, then.
…
So, How’s that war going?
Link

Local law enforcement still fighting war on drugs

Narcotics officers and recovering addicts alike agree that drug-related crimes like murders, thefts, rapes and domestic violence will plague local communities until an end comes to the war on drugs.

Hmm, not so well, then.

Apparently, if you don’t actually put your name on every one of your possessions, police are entitled to take them for their own personal use.

More unsurprising bombshells in Colombia. Today in the Washington Post

BOGOTA, Colombia — An investigation by the Colombian Defense Ministry has found that drug traffickers and rebels from the country’s largest guerrilla group infiltrated the U.S.-backed military here, paying high-ranking officers for classified information to help elude capture and continue smuggling cocaine.

It is part of a set of immutable laws of economics (informally stated):

• When a product in high demand, supply will find a way to meet demand.
• Prohibition of a demand product causes high black-market profits, as supply is forced to operate outside of legal commerce.
• High black-market profits are always protected, inevitably through non-legal means, including violence and corruption.
• Government pay cannot compete with what the black market can offer.

IAt TalkLeft:

An appeals court in Tennessee has ruled the state’s tax on illegal drugs unconstitutional calling it “arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable.”

I’ve mentioned the Tennessee Tax before and I’ve talked about the whole notion of state illegal drug taxes several times.
In case this is new to you, the idea is that the state requires you to purchase a stamp for your illegal drugs (sort of like the state stamp on cigarette packages, but an actual stamp). You’re supposed to affix this to your illegal drugs to show that you’ve paid your tax. Of course, the real intent of the law is nothing of the kind. What they do is after they’ve arrested you for drug possession, they weigh the drugs, figure out how much tax you should have paid and then seize that amount of money/possessions/house from you and then still prosecute you for drug possession. It’s really just another way to have the government rob people, and part of the despicable drug war tactics of “piling on.”
About the only ones who actually purchase drug stamps are stamp collectors or those looking at them as novelty items. I have Tennessee (unauthorized substances), North Carolina (marijuana), Utah (marijuana), Texas (marijuana), and Massachusetts (marijuana) stamps, and would love to add to my collection….
Wisconsin’s drug tax law was rendered unconstitutional several years ago by a federal appeals court saying it amounting to double jeopardy.
In the Tennessee case, Judge Sharon G. Lee wrote:

“Because it seeks to levy a tax on the privilege to engage in an activity that the Legislature has previously declared to be a crime, not a privilege, we must necessarily conclude that the drug tax is arbitrary, capricious, and unreasonable, and therefore, invalid under the constitution of this state,”

This is good news, and I hope that the drug tax will be challenged elsewhere.
Of course, there’s one way that the drug tax stamp would get my support.
As Ben Masel famously said:

No taxation without legalization.

Update: SayUncle isn’t holding his breath regarding any actual changes as a result of the ruling.

“bullet” Excellent article by Juan Forero: New gangs challenge Colombia’s drug war — demonstrates the absolute destructive futility of our drug war in Colombia (although that doesn’t stop Walters from spouting inane claims of victory).
“bullet” The Trouble with Plan Mexico from the Guardian
“bullet” From the left: The War on Drugs’ Bloody Face by Joseph Grosso
“bullet” Senator Durbin supports medical marijuana
“bullet” In case you missed it… The Ethan Nadelmann article in Foreign Policy was not fully available when I blogged about it — here is the full text.
“bullet” Drug forfeiture funds used to purchase tasers — turning recreational drugs into weapons. [Via]
“bullet” Why are doctors such opiate prudes?by Brianna Hersey [Thanks, Ben]
“bullet” Breaking taboos: – it’s time we recognised that illegal drugs are fun by Michael Duffy [Thanks, Richard and Allan]
“bullet” “drcnet”

This is a major downer. We had a really good thing going — John Singleton directing Halle Berry and Billy Bob Thornton in the movie about the drug war travesty in Tulia, Texas.
Now reports are that the project has been scrapped because Halle is pregnant.

It‰s been reported that after she‰s had her child the movie might be picked up again and put into development once again but at this point Tulia won‰t be made.

Scott at Grits for Breakfast has this piece about a former police officer who talks in a new book about his steroid addiction as a cop, and his dealing in steroids and paraphernalia to cops and firefighters around the country.
Here’s the part that blew my mind:

‹The public is clueless about how many policemen and firefighters are on steroids,Š Johnson said, adding that he believes the drugs should be legal.

‹Steroid laws are a waste of taxpayer money,Š he said. ‹I can understand why psychoactive drugs are illegal — they get you high. But steroids help you with recovery from personal injuries.Š [emphasis added]

Talk about rationalization.

Look — I don’t care if he wants to use steroids. But to simultaneously defend laws against recreational drug use is rank hypocrisy.

And what’s this irrational objection against getting high?

Very often I hear that recreational drugs should be illegal because the only purpose they serve is to get “high.” They’re incorrect, of course — many of them serve other purposes as well — but what’s wrong with getting high?

One of the most outrageous examples of this rationalizing hypocri-speak is in this famous tape of Richard Nixon and Art Linkletter:

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.”

Well, first of all, that exchange is simply bizarre, in a very creepy way. And the attempted claim that alcohol has nothing to do with getting high is laughable.

But what’s wrong with getting high? 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.

With opium production again at new record levels, the Afghan drug effort is regularly being called a failure in the press these days, so naturally officials are calling for stepped up efforts (rather than smarter ones).
But it’s getting harder for them to get away with the usual. More and more these days (stimulated by Misha Glenny’s earlier article in the Post), we’re starting to hear the statement (as in this excellent OpEd by Neal Peirce) that The drug war is directly feeding international terrorism. Not drugs. The Drug War.
And even the public is catching on — in a recent poll (conducted by Senlis), almost half of Britons opposed destroying the poppy fields, 74 percent opposed spraying, and 80 percent said they would support “Poppy for Medicine” programs.
Jacob Sullum has more in America’s Taliban-Support Program:
With luck, Afghanistan could become the Colombia of the Middle East