Drug WarRant

… and stuff that fell through the cracks.
“bullet” Heroin injecting room wildly popular with neighbors (Australia)

Nearly three-quarters of local residents and businesses support the heroin injecting center at Kings Cross, reporting a significant decrease in public drug use and rejecting the idea it encourages people to inject drugs.
Support was strongest among residents and businesses who were in the area before it was established, providing further evidence of the success of the center, which has dramatically reduced overdose deaths. […]
The NSW Opposition Leader, Peter Debnam, has vowed to close the injecting center if he becomes premier.

“bullet” Marijuana tax possibly in trouble in Tennessee. See discussion here and here at SayUncle.
“bullet” We Love Porn and Pot

“… in Canada the consummate professional will never admit to being a pot smoker, a porn surfer or a pig. “

“bullet” Since Rumsfeld won’t take advice from us regarding the Afghanistan opium crops, he has no clue what to do about it. So he’s trying to turn the problem over to Europe.
“bullet” Judge Says Police In Vermont Must Knock Before Searching — Despite Hudson ruling, exclusionary rule will apply under state’s constitution.
“bullet” The shot heard across both sides of the border. Finally, the full story of the death of Esequiel Hernandez Jr., tracked and killed by U.S. Marines conducting war on U.S. soil.
“bullet” Mark Fiore: The United States of Incarceration
“bullet” Justice Kennedy calls efforts to increase sentences “sick”
“bullet” Skippy the Bush Kangaroo turned four this week, and his blogiversary is always a momentous occasion in blogtopia. Congrats, Skippy. (And it reminds me that DrugWarRant’s own 3 year mark will be coming up on the 27th. I have to order the cake.)

With all the problems we’re having in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East, and with our soldiers’ lives at risk, it’s disheartening to see such a complete lack of command competence.
The issue this time?

US troops and Iraqi police seized and destroyed a bumper crop of marijuana plants last week, according to a report in Stars & Stripes. Based on a military press release, the report said soldiers from the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, which has responsibility for most of northern Iraq, discovered the field in an unnamed location.
According to the military press release, the field contained “juvenile marijuana plants grown in a series of furrows. The owner claimed he was growing sesame.” Police put the value of the field at $2 million. The crop was cut down and destroyed, and the man arrested.

First, we’re spending hundreds of billions of dollars (or is it in the trillions yet) on Iraq, and we’re trying to get them back on their feet, including developing their own internal commerce. Well, if the estimates are correct, we just destroyed $2 million of potential commerce.
Second, things are a little too tense over there. It’s hard to think of a better tension reducer than a little cannabis. In fact, we should take all the marijuana that’s seized here and help the war effort by giving it to the citizens of Iraq. Imagine the Sunnis and Shiites sitting there passing around the water pipe, and hearing one say “Wow! When you put it like that, what you say really makes sense. I never thought of it that way before.” and the response: “Yeah, you too! … Uh, what was I saying? … Hey, look at the camel spider!”
I say it’s time to replace Donald Rumsfeld with Tommy Chong (Hey, he couldn’t do any worse!)

Check out the end of this post of mine from yesterday, and compare it to this post from the Drug Czar today.
Same exact quoted material.
The difference? The readers of my blog can get a chuckle out of the story, because they are smart enough to realize that the police and reporters in it are brazenly dishonest nitwits. On the other hand, the Drug Czar thinks by posting it that he can make readers think that marijuana causes murderous psychosis. This, of course, makes the Drug Czar a brazenly dishonest nitwit. But I repeat myself.

The ACLU Freedom Files: Drug Wars will air tomorrow (Saturday, July 15) at noon (Eastern and Pacific) on Court TV.
Here’s the line-up for the program:

Racist Drug Raids: The “War on Drugs” costs taxpayers more than 50 billion dollars annually, but it costs those disproportionately targeted by the government — youth, communities of color and the sick and dying — so much more. In the “Drug Wars” episode, we’ll take you to Hearne, Texas, where nearly 15% of the town’s young African American men were incarcerated on drug charges based on the false accusations of a mentally ill police informant.
The Drug War Goes to School: And you’ll meet the students at Stratford High School in Goose Creek, South Carolina, who were held at gunpoint, forced by school officials and a police SWAT team into lockdown — all because of suspicion that a student “might” be in possession of a marijuana joint.
Excessive Prison Sentencing: We look at the family impact of cruel and excessive prison sentences for drug offenses through the eyes of three sisters from Oregon. Their mother, Hamedah Hasan, was sentenced to 27 years in prison because of her involvement with a man who was dealing drugs, though she never sold or used drugs herself.
Medical Marijuana: Valerie Corral suffered from constant, debilitating seizures until she discovered that marijuana relieved her symptoms. She helped author the country‰s first statewide law allowing the use of medical marijuana and started a hospice to help people with terminal illnesses cope with pain. Nevertheless, federal agents stormed her California home and arrested her and her husband. She talks about her fight to help seriously ill people live with dignity.

The ACLU web page for the program has some good resources (the pdf viewing guide looks pretty cool). They also have a web page for people to tell their own stories.
Nice. Just wish the program was on network TV in prime time instead of Court TV at noon, but still, it looks like they’ve done a good job with it.
If you don’t have Court TV, you may not be out of luck. The ACLU has plans to stream the video on their site next week.

Nice little video take-off on the anti-drug commercials, with an excellent message.

Every now and then, one of these quacks surfaces — usually in England, for some reason — at an inquest.
You see, 23-year-old Paul Dumville, after suffering from severe headaches for over a month, collapsed and died.
Well, the mallard utterance in question, Dr. Colin Hunter-Craig, has it all figured out, and explained it to Paul’s father and girlfriend:

“He was a fit and healthy 23-year-old with no hardening of the arteries of the brain.
“In the back of the brain he had a haemorrhage which caused swelling of the brain, but there was no sign of any defects there.
“The cause of death was a haemorrhage due to cannabis abuse.
“We don’t understand why it causes this, it just does. It takes about a month for THC (the psychoactive ingredient of cannabis) to build up in that part of the body.
“This is incredibly rare in young people, but in old people we would recognise this as a stroke.
“The fact that people say they only take cannabis every so often does not mean it should be recommended.”
West Sussex coroner Dr David Skipp asked Dr Hunter-Craig to explain why the build up would effect Mr Dumville but not other users.
“There is a lot we don’t know about this,” he said.
“It is rather like running across a deserted country road with your eyes shut. Most of the time you get away with it but I still wouldn’t recommend it.”
The coroner said: “This may not have been a natural cause but I’m not prepared to say that it was definitely due to cannabis.
“I’m going to record a narrative verdict, and the fact is that Paul Dumville died of a cerebral haemorrhage augmented by the use of cannabis.”

Dr. Hunter-Craig then returned to his practice of applying leeches to remove the demons that cause lung cancer.

Will we see another spate of alarmist headlines from this?

Marijuana tied to precancerous lung changes
Smoking marijuana can cause changes in lung tissue that may promote cancer growth, according to a review of decades of research on marijuana smoking and lung cancer.
Still, it is not possible to directly link pot use to lung cancer based on existing evidence.

No evidence of cancer. Never has been. Despite numerous studies and millions of users.
Now check out this stunning train of reasoning.

“We must conclude that no convincing evidence exists for an association between marijuana smoking and lung cancer based on existing data,” Mehra and her team write.
Nevertheless, they add, the precancerous changes seen in studies included in their analysis — as well as the fact that marijuana smokers generally inhale more deeply and hold smoke in their lungs longer than cigarette smokers, and that marijuana is smoked without a filter — do suggest that smoking pot could indeed boost lung cancer risk. It is known, they add, that marijuana smoking deposits more tar in the lungs than cigarette smoking does.
The failure to find a marijuana-lung cancer link may have been due to methodological flaws in existing research, rather than the absence of such a link, the researchers say. Doctors should advise their patients that marijuana does indeed have potential adverse effects, they conclude, including causing precancerous changes in the lungs. [emphasis added]

So, despite the fact that there is no evidence for marijuana causing cancer, the researchers have this gut feeling that it might anyway (plus all the other research might be flawed). Thus, based on the chance that their gut feeling is right and all the other scientific evidence is wrong, they want doctors to warn their patients about something they are supposed to call precancerous changes in the lungs, despite the continued and overwhelming lack of any evidence of a cancer link!
Now there are actual things that doctors could warn their patients about — such as the danger of bronchial conditions from marijuana smoke, without confusing them with this ignorant claptrap.
Update: Here’s the review article.
Further update: From daksya in comments:

The study takes into account only 4 studies which checked on “Marijuana (MJ) Use Exposure and Other Lung Cancer Outcomes” i.e. actual outcome of lung cancer, as opposed to precancerous changes. Of these 4 studies, two didn’t take tobacco use into account, and the low study quality score reflects that. Of the other 2 studies, the familiar Sidney study of nearly 65,000 participants did not find an increased risk of any cancers, and finally a case-control study of 353 male patients in Morocco (Sasco et al.) found a odds ratio of 1.99 (incorrectly reported as 1.93 in this paper) among consumers of hashish/kiff. Now there were 15 hashish/kiff users among cancer cases and 12 among controls, hardly enough to inspire confidence. More importantly, this review claims that tobacco use was controlled for in this study. Incorrect, “smoking status” was accounted for. Now, it turns out that kiff itself is a mixture of 2/3rd dried cannabis powder and 1/3rd tobacco. In other words, all smoke but no fire.

Note: The review was funded in part by NIDA.
Also: Can you believe the title of the review?

Reena Mehra, MD, MS; Brent A. Moore, PhD; Kristina Crothers, MD; Jeanette Tetrault, MD; and David A. Fiellin, MD should be ashamed.

Psilocybin can occasion mystical-type experiences having substantial and sustained personal meaning and spiritual significance (pdf) by R. R. Griffiths &W. A. Richards & U. McCann & R. Jesse

This double-blind study evaluated the acute and longer-term psychological effects of a high dose of psilocybin relative to a comparison compound administered under comfortable, supportive conditions. […]
The participants were hallucinogen-naðve adults reporting regular participation in religious or spiritual activities. Two or three sessions were conducted at 2-month intervals. […]
When administered under supportive conditions, psilocybin occasioned experiences similar to spontaneously occurring mystical experiences.

The study has elicited some glowing praise from people in the field:

The study by Griffiths et al. is noteworthy both for the rigorousness of its design and execution, as well as the clarity of its results. It demonstrates that psilocybin can be safely studied in normal human beings who do not have a history of hallucinogenic drug use. As would be expected, during the psilocybin session participants showed perceptual changes and labile mood. It is striking that majority of the participants reported 2 months later that the psilocybin-induced experience was personally very meaningful and spiritually significant. Indeed, most of them rated the psilocybin-induced experience as one of the top five most important experiences in their life. It is especially notable that participants reported that the drug produced positive changes in attitudes and behaviors well after the sessions, and these self-observations were consistent with ratings by friends and relatives.
— Charles R. Schuster, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience,
Wayne State University School of Medicine
The article by Griffiths et al. in this issue of Psychopharmacology should make all scientists interested in human psychopharmacology sit up and take notice. It is the first well-designed, placebo-controlled, clinical study in more than four decades to examine the psychological consequences of the effects of the hallucinogenic (psychedelic) agent known as psilocybin. In fact, one would be hard pressed to find a single study of psychedelics from any earlier era that was as well-done or as meaningful. Perhaps more importantly, despite the notion by many people that psychedelics are nothing more than troublesome drugs of abuse, the present study convincingly demonstrates that, when used appropriately, these compounds can produce remarkable, possibly beneficial, effects that certainly deserve further study.
— David E. Nichols, Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Purdue University School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

Sadly, current NIDA director Nora Volkow felt the need to almost apologetically explain NIDA’s involvement in the research funding.

As the nation’s preeminent drug abuse research organization, NIDA’s mission is to support research and provide information on the addictive and adverse health consequences of drugs of abuse. [emphasis added]

She went on to say that the researchers had kind of gone off on their own.
Yeah, sometimes science happens despite the government’s best efforts.
More reading on this:

• Jacob Sullum at Hit and Run
• Washington Post
• Wall Street Journal
• L.A. Times
• ABC News
• Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (see also The Good Friday Experiment)

Before you rush out and get your own mystical experience, remember a few things:

1. Psilocybin is currently illegal (unless you’re in the Netherlands).
2. A supportive, safe environment is essential for a positive experience with hallucinogenic drugs. Attempting things like driving is dangerous and stupid.
3. Psilocybin can intensify current psychological states. Taking it while undergoing emotional problems can be extremely discomfiting. Same thing is true for those with a history (or family history) of psychological problems or schizophrenia.

Other than those points, Psilocybin is not addictive, and has generally mild physical effects, while the psychoative effects can be quite intense. More at Erowid.

Malyasia

A top Malaysian anti-drug official has urged for glamorous-sounding and hip names of party drugs to be dropped and replaced with names highlighting the effects of the drugs, a news report said yesterday.
Designer drugs such as Ecstasy and Ketamine gave the impression of a “trendy and divine” experience for first-time drug users, said northern Kedah state’s anti-drug agency spokesman Ariffin Man. Suggested new names for the drugs would be “agony” and “bamboozle”, said Ariffin. “Likewise, all opiate drugs should be called organised killers, cannabis as mind destroyers and ketamine as community-paralysing agents,” Ariffin was quoted as saying by the Star daily.

Dominican Republic

The head of the National Drugs Control Agency ( DNCD ) yesterday complained that sometimes his agents have difficulties in obtaining search and seizure warrants from judges and waste time in arresting drug-traffickers.

Yeah, getting warrants really puts a cramp in your style.
Scotland

DRUG addicts will only get treatment and benefits if they agree not to have children, under a plan put forward by a Labour MSP.
Duncan McNeill wants addicts to sign a contract agreeing to stop taking drugs before having a family.

Australia (via Blog Reload) — here the idiots are a combination of the police and the reporter.

HOMICIDE squad detectives are investigating whether a mix of marijuana and mental illness was a factor in four murders in the past month.
Two young men and a couple who left behind a young child were the victims of fatal stabbings in the space of nine days.
It is suspected psychosis brought on by marijuana may have been a factor.
Drug counsellors have warned super-potent, genetically modified dope grown in suburban houses is severely affecting some users.
There are strong concerns among senior police at the links between cannabis-induced psychosis and killings and other violent crimes.

Very nice article by Marjorie Preston in the Atlantic City Weekly on the effort to legalize medical marijuana in New Jersey.
This is partly due to the way the article is crafed, but when you read the entire thing, the prohibitionist argument sounds so incredibly pathetic.
The article also indicts the pharmaceutical industry.

Don McGrath believes the biggest obstacle to medical marijuana in New Jersey and across the country is not the federal government but the pharmaceutical industry. “If you legalize marijuana, then maybe you don’t need all these heavyweight drugs,” he says. “You can grow marijuana yourself. It’s a weed!”
“The biggest thing lobbying against this is the drug companies,” agrees Dan Carroll. “And why? They don’t want drug sales to go down.” Carroll says one of Jason’s anti-nausea drugs — just three pills a day — cost $2,800 a month. One of Sean’s medications, “a Martha Stewart-type” drug manufactured by Imclone, was “$10,000 a pop,” says his father.

A very strong quote as a conclusion:

Legal or not, Deidre Carroll says she would not hesitate to get marijuana for Jason if his cancer recurred. “I would do it again. I’m not embarrassed or ashamed. Hell, no. My son is standing right in front of me.”

And that really says it all. If anybody should be embarrassed or ashamed, it’s those who would turn Deidre Carroll into a criminal.