Drug WarRant

The Drug Czar’s latest “report” on teens, drugs and violence is the usual mishmash of distorted statistics and implied conclusions not drawn from the data, all in an attempt to scare people.

Today ONDCP released a new Special Report showing that teens who use drugs are more likely to engage in violent and delinquent behavior and join gangs. Early use of marijuanaÖthe most commonly used drug among teensÖis a warning sign for later gang involvement.

Of course, when the Drug Czar brings out the big guns of the numbers to support his conclusions, it all sounds scary, unless you actually look at it. Now I haven’t even looked at any of the original data he’s drawing from, but check out this one that he promotes:

Nearly one in six teens (17%) who got into serious fights at school or work in the past year report using drugs;

However, if you look at the 2007 Monitoring the Future report, you see that the percentages of any teens who used drugs in the past year are: 8th grade (14.8%), 10th grade (28.7%), and 12th grade (36.5%). So to say that 17% of teens who got into serious fights report using drugs is not a particularly alarming thing. (In fact, it appears by these numbers that teens who use drugs are actually less likely to get into serious fights.)
But this is, of course, standard operating procedure for the Czar of Lying.
For more on how stupid this all is, see Scott Morgan’s excellent posts: Pete Gets off the Couch and Joins a Gang and Marijuana Doesn’t Cause Gang Membership, but the Drug War Does.

Radley Balko’s doing some great stuff.
Today, he’s testifying “as part of House Crime Subcommittee Chairman Bobby Scott’s ‘Crime Summit.’ … topic is the militarization of domestic police departments.”
There’s nobody better to talk about that subject. And on July 19th he’s been invited to testify at hearings on the Kathryn Johnston raid.
It’s really wonderful to see the House even discussing these subjects (and that somebody had the brains to invite Radley).
Also check out his column on videotaping the policy.

“bullet” Brian Bennett challenges the drug policy reform establishment again with The Catch-22 of Drug Law Reform
“bullet” The so-called Drug Czar uses his so-called “blog” to brag Governor of Connecticut Vetoes So-Called “Medical” Marijuana Bill. He’s particularly good at being smug at taxpayer expense about the prospect of sick people suffering. It’s a talent.
“bullet” Scientists from the Pontificia Catholic University in Quito, Ecuador claim that our aerial spraying in Colombia is damaging the DNA of Ecuadorians living near the Colombian border (makes you wonder what it’s doing to the Colombians).
“bullet” William A. Collins in the East Texas Review: Some wars aren’t meant to be won

Never mind that none of this works. It‰s not meant to work. It‰s meant to promote heroic political figures, to protect wasteful prison jobs and contractors, and to keep poor people away from the dreaded voting booth. […] The ‹Drug War,Š like the ‹Terror War,Š has value in its own right. We can‰t simply end it. Jobs and votes are at stake. For many, winning the ‹warŠ would be a true calamity.

“bullet” I’m guessing Mark Kleiman has the right take on the Giuliani campaign chair being arrested for cocaine.
“bullet” Do rules hamper remedies for pain? by Kyung M. Song in the Seattle Times [from May, but worth reading]

Via Vote Hemp:

On June 18, 2007 the two North Dakota farmers granted state hemp farming licenses, Rep. David Monson and Wayne Hauge, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of North Dakota in an effort to end the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) obstruction of commercial hemp farming in the United States.

For those who haven’t been following this case — basically, the state of North Dakota, after determining that hemp would be a good viable crop in the state, passed a law allowing farmers to grow industrial hemp, if they jumped through a bunch of state hoops and got permission from the DEA. So these two farmers went through the state process and put in their application with the DEA. The DEA said “Thanks for the application. We’ll sit on it for a dozen years or so just to to be jerks, and approve it when hell freezes over.” So the state of North Dakota said, “Forget that nonsense — you don’t need to get DEA approval anymore.”
This set up the confrontation that we’re seeing now. The lawsuit is to prevent the DEA from busting the farmers for following state law.
I’ve read the complaint (pdf) and it’s quite interesting. This is going to generate some more fireworks.
Now it may seem suicidal to base their argument on limited federal government reach under the Commerce Clause (particularly given recent Supreme Court rulings — ie, Raich). However, even in Raich, the government was able to find a convoluted way to say that the marijuana used by Raich had an affect on the overall national supply and movement of marijuana (as absurd as that idea is to rational people). But in this case, the parts of the plant that will be utilized are specifically exempted from the Controlled Substances Act (and that has been confirmed by the courts).
So I don’t know — maybe the Commerce Clause has a couple of crumbs of usefulness left. We’ll see.
In the complaint, they get a few nice digs in against the DEA:

On information and belief, DEA would in fact not act on the two Plaintiff
farmers‰ applications, ever. Even in the highly unlikely event that DEA ever made a
decision on those applications, the decision would be a foregone conclusion: DEA has
clearly indicated that it would treat Plaintiffs‰ non-drug state-licensed and regulated
industrial hemp cultivation as the manufacture of a substance controlled under Schedule I
of the CSA and would never authorize such production.

Update: Nice analysis of the history of hemp and the DEA by Jamison Colburn over at Findlaw today. [Thanks, Tom]

There’s a whole lot going on in the world, so bear with me as I list a bunch of really interesting and/or important links.
“bullet” Radley Balko has a compelling video interview with Regina Kelly, one of the 27 black residents of Hearne, Texas arrested in a horrible travesty of justice. Fortunately she survived the ordeal and is talking about what happened.
“bullet” Phillip Smith covers Creepy Science — an effort to develop tests to determine whether someone used drugs up to four months previous. And he rightly calls “bulls*it” on their claim that it’s to help identify potential drug addicts earlier.
“bullet” The U.S. Supreme Court today unanimously ruled that a passenger in a car that has been pulled over is considered “seized” (as the Justices properly noted, he’s certainly not under the impression that he can walk away), so that if the original stop was potentially questionable, the passenger could challenge it under the Fourth Amendment. Yes, a Fourth Amendment drug case where the Supreme Court ruled to protect the Fourth Amendment! Wow!
“bullet” The Sixth Circuit Court ruled today that email has Constitutional privacy protection, similar to phone calls. The ruling may not stand, however, based on some of the talk around the legal blogs.
“bullet” The strange case of What Ted Stevens, Bolivian cocaine and Halliburton have in common over at Salon. This story will make you sick regarding the utterly corrupt way contracting is done in the federal government. (It also makes you realize how logic and common sense has very little impact in the political world.)
“bullet” John Ross’ The Annexation of Mexico is scary — the notion of our even attempting to turn Mexico into another Colombia is frightening. But that’s exactly what our government wants to do.
“bullet” A blast from the past: Short video of Ron Paul back in 1988 on the Morton Downey show responding to a drug war cheerleader audience member. Nails it.
“bullet” More stupidity in government. Canada telling doctors how much marijuana they can prescribe — limiting it to five grams a day. “We don’t need no stinking doctors to advise us on dosage. We’re the government.”
“bullet” The Bush administration is concerned that we don’t have enough people in jail for long enough in this country, so they’re pushing for more mandatory sentences as part of a Republican crime legislation package as a campaign issue for 2008. So expect a bunch of tough on drugs/crime rhetoric in the campaign, with the Republicans calling for more outrageous sentences and the Democrats whimpering “Me, too.”

The DEA is at it again. Tonight, they are sponsoring the Chicago Vigil for Lost Promise at Navy Pier (with information at chicagovigil.org). Naturally, I am countering with Chicago Vigil for Lost Promise (with info at chicagovigil.com).
What we have here (and with the original Vigil for Lost Promise, and with the DEA Museum exhibits, etc.) is a blatant effort on the part of the DEA to help their own image through using the tragedy of people who have died. What makes it worse is that the DEA itself is, directly or indirectly, a cause of those deaths.
It is the drug war, and the enforcement tactics used by the DEA, that increases violence and the dangers of drugs, that keeps young people from seeking help — that shortens the promise of all those lives. I understand the pain of those who have lost loved ones. But for them to turn to the agency that contributed to their deaths for some kind of macabre celebration of the lethal drug war… is a sickness born of ignorance and despair.
The fact that this vigil in Chicago tonight will be held at the obscene DEA-glorifying exhibit Target America: Opening Eyes to the Damage Drugs Cause at Navy Pier, just makes it worse.
Of course, left out of this vigil will be the true victims. There will be no discussion of the lost promise of 14-year-old Ashley Villareal, who was killed by the DEA. Or those who have committed suicide since the DEA took away the medication they needed to live. Or all the broken families brought about from imprisoning non-violent drug offenders.
The vigil is a sham. A publicity stunt for the DEA, dancing on the bodies of the dead.
And, of course, all the usual suspects will be dancing — including NBC5/Telemundo and the Chicago Sun-Times, Motorola; McDonald’s; the Cebrin Goodman Center; the Richard Driehaus Charitable Lead Trust; Bensinger & DuPont Associates, Inc.; Families Changing America; TASC (Treatment Alternatives for Safer Communites); Prevention First; and the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, each of which will receive an “award” for dancing on dead people.
“A Vigil for Lost Promise” is open to the public and will take place on Monday, June 18th at 6:30 p.m. in the Grand Ballroom at Navy Pier.
By the way, if you type “Vigil for Lost Promise” into google, the first site you get is mine. Hopefully, some will arrive there by accident and learn something.

One of the things that is the most frustrating about being a drug policy reformer is fighting through the assumption by the uneducated (drug war uneducated, I mean), that the only reason to be in favor of drug policy reform is so people can do drugs.
And, of course, if they said that, the easy response would be: “You stupid twit. People can do drugs now. They do drugs now.” But, of course, they don’t give you that option. Most times, they don’t actually say it. They just look at you with that expression that says “what a strange reason for him to invest all this time and energy.”
Of course, the reasons for supporting drug policy reform are too numerous to count, including: taking the profit out of the black market and de-funding violent criminal enterprises; reducing corruption in police and public officials; reducing overdoses and dangers from tainted drugs; doing a better job of keeping dangerous drugs from kids; restoring our constitutional rights; injecting some sanity into foreign policy; stopping the waste of billions of taxpayer dollars; increasing business productivity through reforming human resource policies; teaching children how to be responsible free citizens; restoring sanity to medical practice; and a whole lot more.
Science has long been one of the victims of the drug war — ever since Anslinger distorted science to fit his drug war fantasies.
This article at Memepunks: America’s War on Science, provides a chilling picture of the future of science education (and the encouragement of young scientists).
Whether it’s concern over homemade fireworks, methamphetamines, or homeland security, it is now almost impossible to get useful chemistry kits for kids to learn and experiment.

In an attempt to curb the production of crystal meth, more than 30 states have now outlawed or require registration for common lab equipment. In Texas, you need to register the purchase of Erlenmeyer flasks or three-necked beakers. The same state where I do not have to register a handgun, forces me to register a glass beaker.

Mr. Wizard (who died last week), is probably spinning in his grave.

For example, when a current company tried re releasing a kit based on the one marketed by Mr. Wizard himself back in the 1950s, they found that they could only include five of the original chemicals in the set. The rest of the items were replaced with inane things like super balls and balloons.

So no, drug policy reform isn’t just about letting people smoke pot legally. It’s about saving the country from a host of serious ills related to prohibition.
Some people get stupid when they do drugs, but that’s usually for only a few hours. The drug war reduces the intelligence of the entire country’s future.

“bullet” Richmond, Virginia prosecutors and police plan to start seizing houses where they find drug activity and selling them off, even if the owner wasn’t directly involved. But there’s a catch.

But officials said seizing a house under the forfeiture law, a civil proceeding, can be a time-consuming and complex process.

Oh, gee, you mean you have to go through, like, procedures and stuff before you can take someone’s home?
“bullet” Dan Gardner has a good column in the Ottawa Citizen: We Can Score One For The Naysayers. He reminds the U.N. of their specific plans for a drug free world by 2008.

In 1998, Pino Arlacchi said the naysayers were wrong. Give it 10 more years, he said.
We did. The naysayers were right. And it’s well past time those who make a living pursuing this mad policy were held to account.

“bullet” The Washington Post has a really bad OpEd by long-time drug warriors J. Michael Walsh and Robert L. DuPont (yes, that one): The Drugged Driving Epidemic. It is a hopeless piece of dreck, using bad science, anecdote, and irrelevant data to proclaim an epidemic that doesn’t exist, all to support their drug testing and related businesses. (Interestingly, Walsh’s group lists both the ONDCP and the Washington post as their clients.)
“bullet” The anti-pot pill turns out to be a pretty stupid idea. (We could have told you that.)
Apparently, blocking the natural cannabinoid receptors in your body leads to depression, nausea, vomiting, and suicidal tendencies, among others side effects (possibly including central nervous system damage). And why were they creating this pill? For weight loss.

Ultimately, in the eyes of the FDA, a healthy body needs all the “pot” it can get.

(That last line in the story is got to be stinging the FDA right now.)