Drug WarRant

I’m so upset I missed Lou Dobbs’ attack on marijuana legalizers. I’ll just have to wait for the transcripts. We’ve had some updates in the comments on the open thread below. Add any more here.
The Quick Vote is up at Lou’s site — if you haven’t voted yet, go ahead and add to it.

QUICKVOTE
Do you believe marijuana should be legalized in this country?
___ Yes ____ No

It’s currently running at 79% yes.

I’m on the road today.
“bullet” Check out this week’s Drug War Roundup by thehim.

In recent years, I’ve been doing a lot more thinking about the concept of authoritarianism, its dangers to our society, and the kind of people who are taken in by it.
I’ve just discovered the work of Bob Altemeyer, an Associate Professor of Psychology who has researched authoritarianism pretty much his entire life, and whose work provided much of the support for John Dean’s book Conservatives Without Conscience.
Altemeyer has been writing an easy-to-read (but not dumbed-down) book on his methods and how authoritarianism manifests in its followers. And he’s providing it free on the internet — The Authoritarians — in a series of chapters released every two weeks or so (the first five chapters are already up and the last one will come out on Monday.
In chapter one, he sets up his RWA scale (Right-Wing Authoritarianism scale — a different meaning of right-wing than most people assume, which isn’t necessarily attuned to liberal or conservative in U.S. politics). He provides a test that you can take to determine your own RWA score on a scale of 20 to 180 (I scored a 28, and I’m betting that most readers here will score below 90).
Turns out this scale can fairly accurately predict a variety of specific authoritarian behaviors including the tendency to ignore facts and reason and mindlessly support what they are told by authority figures if it agrees with their world-view.
For example, he gave tests to two large groups of students:

In both studies high RWAs went down in flames
more than others did. They particularly had trouble figuring out that an inference or
deduction was wrong. To illustrate, suppose they had gotten the following syllogism:

All fish live in the sea.
Sharks live in the sea.
Therefore, sharks are fish.

The conclusion does not follow, but high RWAs would be more likely to say the
reasoning is correct than most people would. If you ask them why it seems right, they
would likely tell you, ‹Because sharks are fish.Š In other words, they thought the
reasoning was sound because they agreed with the last statement. If the conclusion is
right, they figure, then the reasoning must have been right. Or to put it another way,
they don‰t ‹get itŠ that the reasoning matters–especially on a reasoning test.

This is, of course, extremely dangerous, as Altemeyer says “because it shows that if authoritarian followers like the conclusion, the logic involved is pretty irrelevant.” He is careful to note that this is not an absolute, and that lots of people have problems with syllogisms, but it is a measurable factor. And this can go beyond the inability to accept syllogisms and continue on to complete rejection of logic, science, reason, education, and more.
[Note, for simplicity in communication, even though the psychology is different, I am using the term authoritarian for both those who are authoritarian followers, and those opportunistic leaders who often manipulate the followers in order to increase power.]
Let’s take a real-world drug policy example. Some of our good friends here at Drug WarRant have been having some excellent discussions on the Sean Hannity messageboard. One of the pro-prohibition (and clearly authoritarian) posters had brought up, in opposition to marijuana, an early study by Dr. Tashkin that showed potential for precancerous links to marijuana. Our folks countered with Tashkin’s later comprehensive study that conclusively showed no link between even heavy marijuana use and lung cancer. How did the authoritarian respond? Carefully analyze the evidence? Look for more studies? No. Here was his reaction:

This is exactly why all funding for research should be stopped immediately. The Universities and Colleges of America are the enemy in the war on drugs. They harbor druggies, they employ druggies and they are the epitome of the drug culture. […]
Marijuana should not be studied. There’s been too much study. It’s just time to condemn the Demon Weed for all eternity as well as all who partook of the Demon Weed. To HELL WITH THEM ALL. I hate them, I hate their misdeeds, I hate all they stand for and I don’t want them studied, I want them prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and made to pay for their crimes.

These are the soldiers being actively recruited and egged on by the drug warriors.
Those of us in drug policy reform have been aware of the dangers of authoritarianism for some time — probably before much of the rest of the country even realized the degree of prevalence of the trait in this country.
I think Altemeyer is really on to something, and it helps to explain why some of our opponents seem so resistant to fact and reason. It’s also good to understand the psychological connection between drug war authoritarianism and the current political authoritarianism that has manifested in the practical alliance between the neocons and the religious extremists.
What I don’t know is whether this information helps provide any kind of strategy for us. Altemeyer notes that RWA scores have a natural tendency to increase with fear and in times of crisis (which is why authoritarian leaders pull the fear card so often). Theoretically then, if we could ease people’s fears, we could reduce their RWA score and make them more open to facts and reason. But how do we do that?
I’m just thinking out loud, here. What do you think?

“bullet”

“bullet” Drug Sense Weekly

Details are slow in coming in (which is, in itself, suspicious), but it appears that 17 year-old Daniel Castillo, Jr. may be the latest victim in an over-militarized drug war here at home.
During a forced entry drug raid that, by some accounts, found no drugs, it’s looking like Daniel awoke to the sound of his sister screaming, sat up in bed and was shot to death.
Radley Balko is keeping on top of it, here and here.
Update: (from Radley)

This afternoon I spoke with Rick Dovalina, director of the Houston chapter of the Hispanic advocacy group LULAC, and who has served as spokesman for the Castillo family the last few days. According to Dovalina, police say they found what appear to be stems and seeds of marijuana, either in the Castillo home or in the yard behind it. Contrary to earlier reports, the victim’s father, Daniel Castillo, Sr. was not arrested or charged with a crime.
Police did arrest a man in a white pick-up truck outside the house. The man was apparently dating one of the victim’s sisters, and police claim they found crack cocaine in the vehicle. […]
According to his sister, Castillo was shot just below the eye as he rose up from his bed after hearing her scream. She was holding a 1-year-old child just a few feet from the shooting.

Every now and then I find some obscure blog post that is just astonishingly… odd.
L. Craig Schoonmaker, Chairman of the Expansionist Party of the United States (?) has a different idea for dealing with the poppies in Afghanistan. He suggests eradicating the poppy fields, but instead of chemicals, he recommends… nuclear weapons.

We can bomb them, strafe them, napalm them Ö even nuke them, literally, with tactical nuclear weapons that can wipe out an entire valley’s drug crops in 10 minutes. […] We have firepower the drug cartel can only dream about. The drug war must be militarized.

Update: Removed the link after a suggestion in comments. You can go find the idiot if you wish.

Keith Plocek had a rather fascinating feature on Barry Cooper, the former cop who is marketing “Never Get Busted Again” in the Dallas Observer a couple of weeks ago. It may give you some of the flavor of the circus that is Barry Cooper. [Thanks, Kaptin]
Scott Morgan at Flex Your Rights reviewed Cooper’s DVD here in a post that drew some comments from Barry himself, and Scott later followed it up with The Viability of Refusing Consent
Mark at WindyPundit has been following that exchange and providing his own analysis in On Refusing a Search of Your Vehicle and a followup: More Email From Barry Cooper.
A lot of the controversy here has been Cooper’s suggestion on his DVD that you should give consent to search your car in some situations. My stance is that you should never surrender your rights. Ever.
Scott Morgan gives An Offer For Barry Cooper, which is agreed to by all parties and Windypundit condenses it to:

1. Be aware that consenting to a search means that you’re waiving your 4th Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. If anything illegal is found after you’ve consented to a search, there will be very little your attorney can do for you.
2. If an officer asks to search and you have private items that are not well hidden, always REFUSE consent.
3. If you’ve got nothing to hide, always refuse the search. You’ve got nothing to lose.
4. If you find it necessary to refuse a search for the reasons listed above, calmly state the following: “Officer I don’t consent to any searches. Am I free to go?”…If the officer says you may leave, depart immediately regardless of anything else he says.

“bullet” Why isn’t the author of this piece locked up with the other pedophiles?
“bullet” Lou Dobbs’ most recent convoluted declamation dressed up as a poll question:

QUICKVOTE: Are you outraged that the U.S. attorney had evidence sealed regarding a second drug load that was brought into the U.S. by the Mexican drug smuggler given immunity in the case against Border Patrol agents Ramos and Compean? ___Yes___No

“bullet” Drug Czar finally tells the truth:

“The drug dealer is us,” said Walters, the national drug policy director.

“bullet” Kathryn Johnston’s real killer

Cops fired the fatal bullets on Nov. 21 in Johnston’s west Atlanta home, but the real culprit is the 36-year-old “war on drugs.”

“bullet” The Liberty Papers: The War on Drugs Helps Terrorists.
“bullet” Drug Czar pushes discredited and disproved links between marijuana and suicide/depression (in fact, studies (pdf) have shown the reverse).
“bullet” The list of things that kill more people than marijuana

In the Daily Vidette:

As proposed by state Rep. Roger Eddy, House Bill 262 states that an applicant for an instruction permit who is under the age of 18 must undergo testing for controlled substances and cannabis and must be found to be free of controlled substances and cannabis before he or she may receive an instruction permit.

Yes, another stupid bill so someone can say that they’re tough on drugs. Wonder if the media will get anybody to comment on it who doesn’t have their head up their ass. Wait a second — who’s this guy? …

“I think it is ridiculous, silly, inappropriate and ineffective. Here’s the issue. Really what you need to be dealing with when it comes to driving is impaired driving. Drug testing at the time of permit or license has absolutely nothing to do with that. What it does is simply go out of its way to target young people who have used marijuana, regardless if it has anything to do with their driving,” Guither said. […]
According to Guither, every study done has shown that alcohol is the more dangerous factor when it comes to road safety.
“It is not even a close consideration with marijuana, which is somewhat in the same area as cell phone usage and being tired,” he said. “It’s really just a way for Congress to act tough. It is just not constitutionally a good idea.”

Hey, that’s me!

From Students for Sensible Drug Policy, an opportunity to take action: Visit http://www.SchoolsNotPrisons.com/aid/ to send letters to Congress and join more than 150 prominent organizations that are calling on Congress to finally repeal the law that has stripped financial aid from nearly 200,000 college students with drug convictions.

In the next few weeks, Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) will reintroduce his Removing Impediments to Students’ Education (RISE) Act, which would overturn the penalty. Last year, the bill had more than 70 co-sponsors, including the new chairmen of the committees on Education and Labor, Judiciary, and Oversight and Government Reform. Even Speaker Nancy Pelosi herself co-sponsored an earlier version of the bill.
With the whole Higher Education Act due to be reauthorized later this year, there is very good reason to believe that these Congressional leaders will move to reinstate aid to students affected by the penalty.
The letter signed by more than 150 prominent education, substance abuse recovery, and civil rights organizations can be found at http://www.ssdp.org/campaigns/hea/letter.shtml

Check out the list of the organizations that signed the letter. Pretty impressive.