Drug WarRant

They just can’t talk about anything without distorting it.
Once again, the Drug Czar’s “blog” in its 2006 in Review: The Drug Problem Gets Smaller post uses traffic figures that no self-respecting blog would use.

ONDCP would like to thank all of the loyal readers of Pushing Back for helping make this blog a success. Thanks in part to you, we are now averaging over 300,000 hits per month!

Note the use of the word “hits.” It may be technically true that Pushing Back is getting 300,000 hits per month, if you use server terminology. In that case, every call of the server counts as a hit, so as a single page is loading it could call upon the server dozens or hundreds of times to load images, run scripts, etc. “Hits” may be useful for analyzing the way you organize your site to reduce server overload, but means very little in terms of the number of people who come to read your site.
Most blogs will talk in terms of “page views” or “visits” and those, of course are always rough counts, but at least get a better handle on number of people actually visiting your site. Drug WarRant gets about 1,000 to 2000 page views per day under the Salon tracking. Here are the page views and visits by month for the past year for Drug WarRant through SiteMeter (both systems include a slightly different set of pages and uses different methodology, so there are minor differences in results).

Would PushingBack.com care to share that kind of information? After all, our tax dollars are paying for it. It would also be interesting to see PushingBack’s referral logs. For instance, I’m betting that the traffic it gets as a result of this post doubles its usual traffic. If it wasn’t for drug policy reformers checking it to see what new lies the Drug Czar is pushing back at us, I doubt that it would have much of a readership at all.
The rest of that particular Drug Czar post about the year in review is just… sad.
If you’ve followed drug policy news of the past year and then read that post, it’s hard not to come away wondering how the staff of the Drug Czar’s office can survive such low self-esteem. The extremely odd mix of things they included (and excluded) from their list is a sign of unhinged desperation and a degree of vindictiveness.

It’s available for pre-order now, and I’m definitely looking forward to it:

Lies, Damned Lies, and Drug War Statistics
A Critical Analysis of Claims Made by the Office of National Drug Control Policy
by Matthew B. Robinson and Renee G. Scherlen

This book critically analyzes claims made by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), the White House agency of accountability in the nation‰s drug war. Specifically, the book examines six editions of the annual National Drug Control Strategy between 2000 and 2005 to determine if ONDCP accurately and honestly presents information or intentionally distorts evidence to justify continuing the war on drugs.
Matthew B. Robinson and Renee G. Scherlen uncover the many ways in which ONDCP manipulates statistics and visually presents that information to the public. […]
‹The authors have performed a valuable service to our democracy with their meticulous analysis of the White House ONDCP public statements and reports. They have pulled the sheet off what appears to be an official policy of deception using clever and sometimes clumsy attempts at statistical manipulation. This document, at last, gives us a map of the truth.Š Ö Mike Gray, author of Drug Crazy: How We Got into This Mess and How We Can Get Out

If that wasn’t enough to convince me, there’s this quote from a regular reader here:

‹[I]n a word it is magnificent. While the book is quite thorough, it is also amazingly concise and easy to read … an excellent job of completely deconstructing and debunking everything the ONDCP claims.Š — Brian Bennett, Former US Intelligence Analyst and author of truth: the Anti-Drugwar (http://www.briancbennett.com/)

You can pre-order the paperback copy for $27.95 through SUNY Press or you can pre-order it through my bookstore for the same price.

Dahlia Lithwick at Slate has The Bill of Wrongs — The 10 most outrageous civil liberties violations of 2006. While it’s a good read and certainly contains some outrageous violations, it’s a bit disconcerting to see such a list with the drug war completely omitted.
It’s not that Dahlia or Slate are in favor of the drug war — Lithwick has written some outstanding pieces and Slate has long been a critic of prohibition.
It’s just that there is this constant danger of being sucked into the numbingly incessant nature of the drug war. After all, what outrageous drug-war-related violation of civil liberties happened this year that hasn’t been happening just about every year?
We must continue to remind people that every day the drug war is an outrageous, surprising, and unacceptable violation of our civil liberties.

Senator son of slain Colombian cartel fighter proposes drug legalization

BOGOTA, Colombia: A Colombian senator and son of a presidential candidate assassinated by deceased drug kingpin Pablo Escobar has called for a congressional debate on the taboo subject of drug legalization.
“The current repressive approach against drug trafficking hasn’t worked despite the huge amounts of blood we Colombians have shed,” Sen. Juan Manuel Galan, of the opposition Liberal Party, told The Associated Press on Thursday. “It’s time to look at different options, together with other drug-production nations, as a way to break the back of the drug traffickers.” […]
“Two decades into the drug war we continue having illegal mafias that spread violence across the country, we continue having guerrillas, we continue having paramilitaries,” said Galan, who has yet to receive his party’s backing for the proposed debate. “And despite it all there’s no real solution in sight to the problem.”

From Resolutions for Sacramento in 2007:

New Year’s resolution: California’s law enforcement should stop letting the “drug war” skew the criminals it targets, and redirect resources to capturing violent felons. Tax-funded police resources should be used in protecting law-abiding citizens from violent felons, not busting someone for personal possession of marijuana. Nor should medically approved marijuana users who grow pot plants for personal prescribed use be arrested or hassled.

What are your resolutions for the New Year for the drug war? What do you think we can/should accomplish in 2007?

What’s going on in your world? How are your holidays? Have you talked to your friends and family about the drug war?

Still on the road and I haven’t had time to read it all yet, but this seems interesting.
This LA Times article gives Mark Kleiman an orgasm, but fails to impress Alex.
Read them and tell me what you think.
And of course, there is yet another question: why are we wasting resources on criminal justice solutions for non-violent drug offenders at all?

I’m going out of town to visit relatives over the next week or so, and I’ll be blogging sporadically as I have time and an internet connection. One of the things I’m looking forward to is filling in my mom on what I’ve been doing in the drug war (along with playing the piano and eating and other holiday traditions). She’s 85 and opposed to both drugs and prohibition.
And I’ll be thinking about all the non-violent drug offenders currently in jail and unable to spend the holidays with their families. Give them a moment of your thoughts. Or take it a step further as Grits for Breakfast suggests:

If you happen to know a child with an incarcerated parent this Christmas, please consider stopping by over the weekend to give them a hug and maybe dropping off a last-minute gift.
Family holidays are a troubling time for a kid whose Mom or Dad is in prison. Let them know they’re not alone. Even small gestures can make a difference. After all, we’re supposed to be celebrating Christ’s birthday … you remember, the guy who taught that “Even as ye have done unto the least of these, my brethren, you have done it unto me.” If there were ever a category of youngsters one could regard as the “least of these,” it would be the … kids who’ll wake up Christmas morning with a parent incarcerated.

If you’ve got some free time and want to discuss drug policy and I don’t have a new post up, go to the messageboard and join in a discussion there. Or get a good book or video.
If you’ve got some excess cash that you’re trying to unload before the end of the year, consider supporting one of the drug policy reform groups listed in the sidebar. Or if you must, you could always check out my wish list or my laptop fund (I’m only about $600 away thanks to your incredible support — I’ll be making a last push in January with the goal of buying it in February.)
Have a wonderful holiday and may it be filled with peace.

thehim has a special Drug War Roundup — Remembering Mr. X at Daily Kos. A must read.

There have been all sorts of interesting things going on and flying around the blogosphere. Here’s a few to keep you busy.
“bullet” Let’s start with something light at Unconfirmed Sources: Mexican Troops Killed Fighting Hybrid Marijuana Plant [Thanks, Jay].
“bullet” Over at Catallarchy we have Drug War, same old same old — a man is arrested because both he and his son have allergies and when he bought some Claritin-D to send with his son to church camp, he exceeded the maximum allowed purchase by law.
“bullet” Ex-cop plans ‘Never Get Busted Again’ video [Thanks rachelrachel]

A one-time Texas drug agent described by his former boss as perhaps the best narcotics officer in the country plans to market a how-to video on concealing drugs and fooling police.

This made the drug warriors very upset.

“…for him to go to the dark side and do this is infuriating.Š

“bullet” John Markley has written a very good OpEd at LewRockwell: What They Think of Us — In it, he talks about how drug laws and others are really based on the fact that politicians don’t think very highly of the people — that we can’t be trusted to do the right thing.

In short, the American people are subjected to a nearly continuous stream of insults and calumny from their own elected officials, as well as from many pundits and intellectuals.

Fascinating article, although in my mind it was made slightly weaker by his attempt to include social security in the mix (I think the dynamics of that discussion are different enough to throw people off the case he’s making.)
“bullet” A man put up a billboard opposing snitching and it outraged the local community and mayor. They asked him why he would promote such an offensive notion as not cooperating with the police

Gonzales said the message really means to stop snitching wrongly. He says the catch phrase is being interpreted wrongly. “There’s a lot of people incarcerated for people snitching, so people can reduce their time.”
Gonzales‰ son is in federal prison for 15 years. He says his son was wrongly convicted on a drug charge after an informant falsely snitched in exchange for a reduced prison sentence.

“bullet” Ben Fulton has a well-written OpEd in the Salt Lake City Weekly: Speed Limit. I don’t agree with him fully on his conclusions about meth, but he does a very nice job of demonstrating the absurdity of the federal government’s war on marijuana, and puts the priorities in the right place — recovery services rather than prohibition
“bullet” Speaking of Meth, Maia Szalavitz had a good article (doesn’t she always) at the Huffington Post: Barack Obama’s Meth Menace

Unfortunately, in terms of drug policy, despite his candid and refreshing discussion of his own use, he apparently remains part of our on-going national nightmare.

“bullet” Libby at Last One Speaks notes that Tyrone Brown (the man who was sentenced to life in prison for smoking a joint while on probation), may be getting a reprieve.

Keith Dean, the Dallas judge who issued the unusually harsh sentence, has written a formal letter to the Texas parole board asking them to free Brown.
Dean, who was voted out of office just days after “20/20” ran the story, wrote that he supported the district attorney’s recommendation of release and agreed that “Mr. Brown has been rehabilitated and no longer poses a risk to others or himself.”

“bullet” Via TalkLeft, Bush issued 16 pardons. And some of them were drug offenses. But. Is it just me, or is the list of those pardons missing some of the more outrageous miscarriages of justice out there? I mean, really:

Thomas R. Reece of Cumming, Ga., violating the Internal Revenue Code pertaining to alcohol. Sentenced May 2, 1969, to one year of imprisonment.

We have people rotting in jail, and dying in jail, right now.
“bullet” The Drug War Chronicles brings us the best of times, and the worst of times.