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(renamed "Drug War Chronicle" effective issue #300, August 2003) Issue #168, 1/12/01
"Raising Awareness of the Consequences of Drug Prohibition" Phillip S. Smith, Editor
subscribe for FREE now! ---- make a donation ---- search BREAKING: Drug warrior Ashcroft's nephew got leniency on marijuana charges while uncle was governor and others went to prison for growing less -- visit http://www.Salon.com -- politics section to learn more. Contact: Drug Reform Coordination Network, 2000 P St., NW, Suite 210, Washington, DC 20036, (202) 293-8340 (voice), (202) 293-8344 (fax), e-mail [email protected]. Thank you. otherwise noted. DRCNet needs your support to offer this and other valuable services. Please visit http://www.drcnet.org/drcreg.html to donate online, or send checks or money orders to P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036. Contributions to the Drug Reform Coordination Network are not tax-deductible. Tax-deductible contributions supporting our educational work can be made to the DRCNet Foundation, same address. TABLE OF CONTENTS
(visit
the Week Online archives)
1. New Mexico Governor Proposes Sweeping Drug Reform Package, Tough Battle Awaits in Legislature As the US drug czar unveiled another business-as-usual drug war budget last week, a Drug Policy Advisory Group convened by New Mexico's Republican governor released a report calling for sweeping reforms that would place the border state on the frontier of drug policy reform. The political skirmishing has already begun, after Gary Johnson swiftly announced he would offer eight pieces of legislation to implement the group's recommendations. Johnson's package would, if passed, be the most comprehensive revamping of state-level drug policy reform in the land. Gov. Johnson himself rang the bell for the opening round with a January 4th press conference in Santa Fe to announce the group's report and the legislative package. Coming out swinging, the governor told assembled reporters, "I am calling for a big change in strategy in New Mexico. Are we really out to save lives, or are we out to continue to arrest and incarcerate this country? We need to work harder to save people's lives rather than locking them up." Noting more than once that, "At one point in this country, it was illegal to have a drink," the governor said violent drug users or those who sell drugs to children should be punished. "But if you're smoking marijuana in your own home and you aren't harming anyone but arguably yourself, should that be criminal?" he asked. If passed, the eight bills Johnson staffers are drafting will:
"The reason I am here is because this does have a lot of support," Johnson said. "It has a whole bunch of support that I wouldn't have dreamed that it would have had. So I am optimistic that this might get accomplished." If initial reaction from the state's political class and law enforcement honchos is any indication, however, he has a lot more convincing to do. In remarks representative of sentiments at the state capitol, House Minority Leader Ted Hobbs (R-Albuquerque) told the Albuquerque Tribune that while he could support drug treatment and education programs, decriminalizing drugs had no support among Republican legislators. "There are two or three points that made sense in those recommendations," said Hobbs, "but harm reduction policies and giving sterile needles to people who are violating the law, I just can't sign on to that. I also don't want to see the criminal justice sentencing reforms that he wants. That really stands out to me as a problem." Rep. Tom Taylor's (R-Farmington) opposition was less nuanced. "If you legalize, we'll have to have the same type of programs for drugs that we have for DWI," he told the Farmington Daily Times. "We'll need a whole cadre of bureaucrats to make sure people are destroying their brains properly. It's insane." Taylor vowed that the legislation would not pass. "How many people have jumped on the bandwagon? Only those people who are drug users," he told the local paper. Despite Taylor's ironic fears of big government, Johnson's proposals gained the support of New Mexico Libertarians. State Libertarian chairman Joseph Knight told the Farmington Daily Times that Johnson deserved support. "It's about time," Knight said. "It's a step in the right direction. Not only is the war on drugs a failure, it's morally wrong. Individuals should have dominion over their own bodies. Prohibition causes more societal problems than the drugs themselves." New Mexico law enforcement and prosecutors disagree. Leaders of the state District Attorneys Association and the Santa Fe Police Department came out in opposition to "any effort to decriminalize drugs in New Mexico," the Santa Fe New Mexican reported. Johnson also faces problems with state Democrats, who control the legislature, although at least part of the Democrats' posture derives not from opposition to Johnson's drug reform proposals but eagerness to advance their own broader political agenda. Senate President Pro-Tem Manny Aragon (D-Albuquerque) told the New Mexican that Johnson would have to address Democratic concerns before the legislature would consider changes in drug policy. "Our priorities are education, health care, public safety and economic development. I hope we look at these issues early on in the legislative session," said Aragon. Until those issues have been dealt with, said Aragon, drug policy reform is "on the back burner." But there are signs of support for the measures as well, along with demands that Johnson put his money where his mouth is, especially when it comes to paying for drug treatment. Johnson has in the past refused to pay for treatment and has not yet said how much money he will request for treatment this year. "I can support his program with one provision," Rep. Max Coll (D-Santa Fe) told the New Mexican, "if he puts a lot of money into rehabilitation programs. He's vetoed money for treatment programs right and left. That's his history. I hope he changes his mind." Rep. Rick Miera (D-Albuquerque), a licensed drug and alcohol-abuse counselor, told the Albuquerque Tribune Johnson's record on treatment gives him pause. "I just don't want to go near any of this drug reform until we have in place well-funded treatment programs that will be sorely needed." "Right now, I have this morning a 16-year-old heroin user, and I can't find a treatment program for him anywhere," said Miera. "Nobody wants a 16-year-old." Even as Johnson and his allies gird themselves for a bruising battle in the legislature, the governor is already moving to bring the state's executive branch into line behind drug reform. At the January 4th press conference, Johnson announced that he has named his chief of staff, Lou Gallegos, to coordinate all state government drug policies and programs. He also said he will direct the Department of Finance and Administration to set a "global" drug budget and monitor the effectiveness of programs. In addition, Johnson announced that he has directed Health Secretary Alex Valdez to speed up the state's naloxone distribution program, and that he will meet with the president of the State Board of Education to discuss instituting scientifically-based drug education programs in the public schools. New Mexico's legislative session begins January 16th. The Advisory Group's report can be read online at http://www.governor.state.nm.us/drug_policy/Gov_Drug_Policy_Ad_Group_Report.pdf. See our coverage from last week at http://www.drcnet.org/wol/167.html#johnson.
2. 2001 National Drug Control Strategy: It Isn't Working, Can I Have Some More, Please? As DRCNet reported (http://www.drcnet.org/wol/167.html#swansong), the drug czar's office late last week released its last Clinton-era drug policy overview. Though it doesn't say so -- in fact, it claims quite the opposite -- the latest National Drug Control Strategy report documents a set of policies that have failed even by their own criteria while neglecting to mention the role that criminalization of drug use and the drug trade has in exacerbating the social harms it decries. (Visit http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/policy/ndcs01/strategy2001.pdf to read the "strategy" online.) What's worse, NDCS 2001 promises only more of the same. And although, as the report notes on its first page, a revised strategy can be submitted at any time, there are no indications at this point that President-elect Bush has even chosen a new drug czar, let alone contemplated the rewriting of a strategy with which he seems to be in substantial agreement. As the Strategy documents with a veritable plethora of numbers, US drug policy is a failure of tragic proportions. Since 1990, ever-increasing federal government anti-drug spending has totaled more than $120 billion dollars, and that is not counting state and local expenditures. The strategy identifies prevention (based on abstinence education) as a major goal, and enumerates an array of educational and media campaigns to prevent drug use, as well as the law enforcement apparatus that has arrested more than one million people per year for drug offenses throughout the 1990s, a million and a half last year. So, is America getting its money's worth? Let's start with marijuana use. After declining from historic highs in the late 1970s, in 1990 10.9 million people were current smokers. After a decade of effort, the number had increased to 11.2 million. Among high school seniors, the number of current users increased from 13.8% in 1991 to 21.6% last year. The retail price of marijuana has stayed steady since declining in the early 1990s. How about cocaine? Between 1992 and 1999, the number of cocaine users hovered between 1.4 and 1.5 million. Cocaine use did decline markedly from 1985 to 1992, in the wake of crack hysteria, the repressive new laws it engendered, and increasing popular awareness of the drug's nasty downside. But in the last decade, use was stable, with prices dropping as supply continued to enter the country despite interdiction and crop eradication efforts in source countries. Heroin, maybe? Sorry, although the Strategy's spin is that heroin use is "stabilized," a chart on the very same page shows the number of current heroin users increasing from 694,000 to more than 980,000 over the course of the decade. Among high school seniors, past-year use increased dramatically, from 0.4% in 1990 to 1.5% last year. And although the feds seized at least a ton of heroin every year throughout the decade, they seemed to have no impact on price, which declined, or purity, which has been stable since the early 1990s. Not to put too fine a point on it, but if this drug policy were subjected to the sort of cost-benefit analysis applied to just about any other major federal budget programs, its architects would be looking for new careers. Instead, they promise more of the same and Congress laps it up. Locked into an abstinence-worshipping, prohibitionist policy stubbornly opposed by millions of American drug-using citizens who persist in their "undesirable behavior" despite all the prison cells built to accommodate them, the architects of this drug strategy are singularly devoid of any new ideas. Harm reduction? Legalization? Decriminalization? The Strategy acknowledges that such approaches exist, but only in an effort to defend its flanks. It does not seriously engage these perspectives; instead it makes only the bald assertion that if they were adopted, "the costs to the individual and society would grow astronomically." And here we come to the great blind spot: The Strategy's inability or refusal to acknowledge the costs to the individual and society imposed by prohibition. It regales the reader with links between drugs and crime, but neglects to mention the role of the black market in inflating retail drug prices. It bemoans the rise of the drug cartels, but neglects to say precisely which Dr. Frankenstein created them. It clamors about the cost of law enforcement, but neglects to mention that if we quit arresting drug users, we would eliminate one-third of all arrests. It demands public security, yet fails to explain how increasing vulnerability to traffic stops, drug searches, urine tests, and rampaging drug squads makes citizens more secure. In one scene in the current hit movie "Traffic," the new drug czar asks his assembled advisors for new ideas as their jet skims over a bleak Mexican landscape. The ensuing silence is deafening. If only life didn't imitate art imitating life.
3. Pain Wars: New Pain Management Standards Go Into Effect, But Will They Protect Doctors from the Drug Warriors? The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO), the organization that sets standards for hospitals, health maintenance organizations, and other health care providers, elaborated tough new standards for pain management last summer. Those new standards went into effect nationwide on January 1st. Advocates of pain treatment are cautiously optimistic, but continue to fear the drug war. Under the new standards, upon admission to hospital or other health care provider, patients must be screened for the presence of pain (http://www.jcaho.org/standard/stds2001_mpfrm.html). If pain is present, health care providers are required to assess its intensity, location, onset, alleviating and aggravating factors, present pain management regime, and pain management history -- all with an eye toward more effective pain control. According to broadcast news reports, hospitals are now typically using a "pain management scale" to meet JCAHO standards. The scale asks patients to rate their pain on a scale from one to ten, with ten representing intolerable pain and one representing no pain at all. A JCAHO press release estimated the number of Americans who suffer from pain at 120 million and said its new "evidence-based pain management standards require nearly 18,000 accredited health care facilities to make pain management an integral part of all treatment plans." A major, if not the only, impediment to effective pain treatment has been the status of opiates as controlled substances. Doctors both fear possible prosecution for "over-prescribing" opiates and carry with them attitudes about addiction and abuse that militate against effective pain management. The American Pain Society and the American Academy of Pain Management have called for dialogue with government and law enforcement officials to reach a new consensus of pain management since 1996 (http://www.ampainsoc.org/advocacy/opioids.htm). The two pain relief organizations wrote: "The purpose of laws that govern controlled substances and professional conduct is to protect the public. Our objective is for state policies to recognize but not interfere with the medical use of opioids for pain relief, while continuing to address the issue of prescribing that may contribute to drug abuse and diversion." Skip Baker, a pain patient and founder of the American Society for Action on Pain, or ASAP (http://www.actiononpain.org), told DRCNet the new standards will provide some breathing room for doctors hesitant to prescribe because of fears of persecution by government drug agents. "This will be a tremendous defense against the DEA when doctors are charged with over-prescribing," said Baker. "The DEA and state medical boards have for years been going after doctors for supposedly over-treating pain." For Baker, this is not just a public policy issue. A sufferer of ankylosing spondylitis, a painful arthritic condition, he takes ten four-milligram Dilaudid tablets every four hours. "It's the only way I can function," explained Baker, "and I can function -- I don't feel high or euphoric, but I can go about my daily life." "When the dosage is adjusted and titrated," Baker elaborated, "then the person can feel normal." This is something that law enforcement has trouble grasping. According to Baker, the "drug cops" at the Virginia state medical board are harassing his physician, Dr. Robert Solomon of Williamsburg, Virginia. "In my case, they're going after my doctor for prescribing too much," Baker told DRCNet, "but they don't understand the medicine. That's the problem with having police decide for doctors what a proper dosage is." But what about the potential for addiction or abuse? "Look," snorted Baker, "I'm Dilaudid dependent, just like someone with diabetes is insulin dependent. This isn't about abuse." "The people who keep talking about addiction don't know what they're talking about," said Baker. "True pain patients almost never become addicted," he asserted. The American Pain Society backs him up. "Studies indicate that the de novo development of addiction when opioids are used for the relief of pain is low. Furthermore, experience has shown that known addicts can benefit from the carefully supervised, judicious use of opioids for the treatment of pain," the professional society concluded. Baker is angry about the misapprehension. "It's amazing that the public has been so misled by an unending stream of propaganda that everything they believe about drugs is wrong," he growled. "The drug war is fueled by this kind of misinformation." "The public thinks it knows that pain patients risk becoming addicts, but what the public is not aware of is that, according to our research, the suicide rate is for pain patients is nine times the average," added Baker. "The problem is that doctors are afraid to prescribe adequate pain medication for fear of the DEA," said Baker. "It hasn't happened often, but when it does it scares all the others so badly they refuse to treat pain with opioids, period." Dr. Frank Fisher, a Shasta County, California, pain care specialist is one doctor who has had problems with law enforcement -- very serious problems. He and the married couple who ran the mom-and-pop pharmacy where Fisher's patients filled their pain prescriptions were arrested in February 1999 and charged with a variety of felonies, including several murder counts. (The murder counts included one patient who died as a passenger in a car accident, a person who stole prescribed drugs from a patient and overdosed on them, and, most egregiously, a patient who committed suicide weeks after Dr. Fisher was jailed and her access to pain medication cut off.) Prosecutors described Fisher as "a drug dealing mass murderer" in the press and in court. Fisher and the pharmacists spent five months in jail -- Fisher's bail was set at $15 million -- before the murder charges were dropped and they were released. But drug dealing charges remain, and Fisher and his pain clinic remain shut down. (Visit http://www.drfisher.org for more information and http://www.drcnet.org/wol/150.html#fishercase to read our August 2000 interview with Dr. Fisher and the pharmacists.) Dr. Fisher told DRCNet the new pain standards were necessary, but he doubted their impact would be immediate. "The fact that we needed new standards shows that the job of pain treatment isn't getting done," the Harvard-educated general practitioner said. "If there were adequate pain treatment, we wouldn't need these new regulations." "But I don't think the standards will have an immediate impact on pain management in this country," Fisher said. "Now, when a person goes in for care, the nurse who makes the initial contact will record pain levels, so we will see much new information gathered, but that won't cause doctors to immediately change their prescribing behavior." "What will happen," predicted Fisher, "is that all this information and documentation will form the basis for lawsuits when patients decide to take action for under-treatment. When doctors fear under-treatment as much as they fear regulators, then we will see a more balanced approach to pain treatment." "It's a shame that fear has to drive the whole process," he added. Fisher added that that fear manifests itself in different ways. "It's not always conscious," he told DRCNet, "it tends to get sublimated in the belief system that opioids are uniformly addictive. That's just not true." For Fisher, the problem is reckless and malicious law enforcement. "The DEA and state drug agents are mandated to check out allegations of over-prescribing, and if that's all they did, that would be fine," Fisher said. "But they go in with the attitude of 'we've got to make a big drug bust here.' By the time they send in an agent, they've already decided to bring charges." "That's what happened with me," Fisher pointed out. "They sent in agents posing as pain patients. None of them got anything because their concocted stories didn't ring true, but by then they were committed to charging me anyway." "This raises serious questions about how prosecutors decide who to charge." (Visit http://www.drcnet.org/guide10-96/pain.html to read about a previous chapter in the pain wars.)
4. Needle Exchange Program Rebuilding from Arson Attack, No Suspects Yet, Help Needed A New Year's Eve arson attack heavily damaged the building that houses Casa Segura (Safe House), a multi-service harm reduction program based in Oakland's Fruitvale District. At last report, no arrests had been made and police had no suspects in the blaze. The center employs 13 people and exchanges 17,000 needles per week. It also offers HIV and Hepatitis C counseling, treats abscesses and other minor injuries, and provides a daily meal for its clients. Oakland fire department officials put the damage at $250,000, according to a report in the Alameda Times-Star. The night of the fire, Casa Segura executive director Chris Catchpool told the paper he was "just devastated. This has been a labor of love for us to make this a reality. We've worked very hard for this and to see it go literally up in smoke is devastating." The program has faced opposition from citizen groups and some local politicians and has been prosecuted three times on drug paraphernalia charges by Oakland authorities, but for Catchpool, the attack came out of the blue. "For an action of this magnitude to take place is shocking. We did not expect this. It feels like what has happened to abortion clinics -- fire bombing to shut them down. If it is arson, then this is an act of political terrorism, I feel," he told the Oakland Tribune after investigators had determined that it was. Harm reduction advocates shared Catchpool's concerns, but were loathe to speculate on the identity of the arsonist. "I've never heard of anything like this," the Harm Reduction Coalition's Donald Grove told DRCNet. "I did a survey of needle exchange programs in 1998, and there were incidents where the cops came along and shut things down, there were incidents of community hostility, but no one ever tried to torch a place." Still, Grove added, "This is the kind of violent hostility that drug users themselves face all the time. This wasn't just an attack on the program, it was an attack on the program's users." "I don't know who did it," Grove said, "that's up to the police, and I won't speculate, but I will say that community hostility has never taken this shape." Hostility to Casa Segura is not new, and even the arson attack has not stopped opponents from continuing their fight to run it out of town. At a January 9th press conference, Casa Segura board members were waylaid by angry parents organized by Oakland City Councilmember Ignacio De La Fuente, an intractable foe of the program. De La Fuente told the Times-Star the program should move. "It is not an appropriate place for this facility, but this [issue] is not new," said De La Fuente. "Their clients [consist of] a small number of people from my district and I cannot let them impact the people who live in the district." De La Fuente and the parents used the press conference to complain that children on their way to school had encountered discarded syringes and had witnessed people engaging in drug use and sexual activity. "It was a deliberate attempt to sabotage our press conference," Gerald Lenoir, Casa Segura's board secretary told the Times-Star. "He's trying to run us out of the community." "We've been to the City Council numerous times over eight years," Lenoir said. "We've never gotten $1 from the city for this [HIV] epidemic, yet we've had harassment from Ignacio De La Fuente and from the police. Luckily, we have the support of the county and the Board of Supervisors." It was Alameda County Public Health Director Arnold Perkins who called the contested press conference. Perkins and county health officials did so to emphasize the essential services provided by Casa Segura in spreading HIV and other diseases, they said. Meanwhile, Casa Segura's work continues. Under the light of a rented electric generator in the parking lot in front of the burned-out shell of their building, staff members continue to run needle exchange and HIV and Hepatitis C testing programs. They continue to treat wounds and care for abscesses. They continue to counsel clients. They serve raw fruits, vegetables, and bread, however, instead of the daily meal they usually serve their needle exchange clients. And there was no warm shelter, no acupuncture detox, no herbal medications and vitamins, none of the other services that made Casa Segura a nationally recognized model. Those await resupplying, rebuilding, or relocating. Which will happen, Casa Segura personnel vow. "We've operated on the streets before and will continue to do so if necessary. These are vital HIV prevention services and need to be in this community," Catchpool told the Bay Area Reporter. They will need some help. According to Casa Segura's Lenoir, "We are insured, but the settlement will take a long time. Insurance investigators are coming tomorrow to view the arson site. We are in need of money to pay for the electric generator and we need office equipment, computers, supplies, furniture, and kitchen equipment. Ironically our syringes were under lock and key at another location at Tuesday's exchange." There are ways to help. The Harm Reduction Coalition and the North American Syringe Exchange Network (NASEN) have taken the lead in organizing solidarity. Please visit http://harmreduction.org/issues/hrnews/hrcalerts.html for information on how to help get Casa Segura back on its feet.
5. Farm States Signal Renewed Interest in Industrial Hemp With state legislatures across the country now coming back into session, unfinished legislative business regarding industrial hemp is back on the agenda. So far, legislators in two states, Illinois and Nebraska, have taken steps toward allowing hemp production. If the bills pass, they would join Hawaii, Minnesota, and North Dakota as states which allow either research in hemp or actual cultivation of hemp crops. This week, the Illinois House of Representatives passed a bill 67-47 that calls on the University of Illinois and Southern Illinois University to study hemp's suitability in Illinois growing conditions and its market potential. The measure passes the Illinois Senate last year, but was stalled in the House. It now goes to Republican Gov. George Ryan for his approval. Ryan has taken no position on the bill. If he signs the measure, the legislature would have to come up with funding for the studies, which are estimated to cost between $800,000 and $1 million. Most of those costs are for fences and other security measures mandated by restrictive federal regulations. The bill's sponsors, led by Sen. Evelyn Bowles (D-Edwardsville), overcame opposition from state and federal law enforcement officials and the Illinois Drug Education Alliance, an anti-drug citizens' group. Priss Parmenter, the alliance's director, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch the bill "would send the wrong message on drugs." "Drug prevention dollars have been cut over the last several years," Parmenter said. "We're scrounging all the time for dollars to do prevention. It's a little irksome when we're fighting an agricultural hemp bill when I'm at home working with kids on substance abuse issues." Opponents repeated their standard canards that hemp and smokeable marijuana are indistinguishable. Illinois State Police spokesman Capt. Dave Sanders told the Post-Dispatch that if hemp were legal, police would be unable to tell hemp fields from marijuana fields and that people arrested for marijuana possession could claim it was hemp. "The only way you're going to discern that is through the lab test," Sanders claimed. But, as Dale Gieringer of California NORML told DRCNet, "They already have to do lab tests to verify that a substance is marijuana." As for the threat of marijuana being hidden in hemp fields, Gieringer scoffed. "Sure, someone who wasn't too smart could plant smokeable marijuana in a hemp field," he said, "but all he would get is a huge cross-pollination problem. You'd end up with pot that doesn't get you high and hemp that isn't very good for fiber." And, Gieringer pointed out, "This hasn't been a problem in Europe, where several countries with strict cannabis laws allow legal hemp production." The concerns raised by anti-drug activists and police were enough, however, to sway some votes. "Agriculture is important in my district," Rep. Bill Mitchell (R-Forsyth) told the Quad-City Times, "however, I don't think this is the right direction to go. "It's opening the door." In Nebraska, meanwhile, Sen. Ed Schrock of Elm Creek has reintroduced a bill to legalize the growing of industrial hemp. The bill last year was passed by the Agriculture Committee but failed to win approval by the unicameral, non-partisan legislature. Schrock told the Omaha World-Herald that all members of the Agriculture Committee except one who was sick had cosponsored the bill. Still, he said, he expects opposition to emerge. "I personally think most of that opposition will come from people who are not well informed," he said.
6. Canadian Medical Marijuana in Cameroon? Strange Report from the British Broadcasting Corporation According to a BBC report filed on January 8th, the government of the West African nation of Cameroon will allow HIV/AIDS and cancer sufferers to use marijuana for pain relief. But in a strange twist, and citing no source, the story went on to say that Cameroon would import medical marijuana from Canada. That was news to the Canadians. "There is no foundation for that report," Canadian Health Ministry spokeswoman Roslyn Tremblay said flatly. "We don't have any to export," Tremblay told DRCNet. "We don't know where this is coming from, other than perhaps they saw the recent announcement that we had awarded a contract." Health Canada announced in late December it had awarded a contract to supply it with medical marijuana to Prairie Plant Systems of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. The company will supply the Canadian government with 400 pounds of rolled joints and bulk marijuana next year and about a thousand pounds per year for the remainder of the five-year, $7 million contract. The weed will be made available to the roughly 140 people who have been granted federal medical exemptions so far, with more to follow. For the past eighteen months, the Canadian federal government okayed the cultivation and use of medical marijuana for a small number of people for such diseases as multiple sclerosis. Some of the contract marijuana, which will be grown in a mineshaft, will be used in research, and Prairie Plant Systems will also grow placebo pot for clinical trials. No surplus is expected. And if there were? "If there is a surplus," said Tremblay, "we don't know how we would dispose of it. If it could serve a practical purpose elsewhere... well, we hadn't considered that," she pondered. Coming back to earth, Tremblay reiterated the ministry's somewhat bemused position. "As we stand at this moment, there is no consideration of any export of the contract marijuana." Be that as it may, the BBC report, filed from northwest Cameroon, says local marijuana farmers and activists are upset, and this time it cites sources. The story quotes Dzeka Edwin Fon, the head of a group calling for the legalization of cannabis cultivation in the northwest, as saying the crop could provide a bulwark against high unemployment. "Cannabis is already being grown in Cameroon -- though illegally -- so it is unwise for the government to import it," he told the BBC. Better to cultivate it locally under Health Ministry supervision, he added. The story also cites an unidentified doctor arguing that Canadian marijuana has no ingredient that makes it superior to the local variety for medical purposes, and that local crops could supply all the public hospitals and clinics in the land. Cameroon, along with other West African countries, produces significant, if unknown, amounts of marijuana for domestic consumption and export to the region and to Europe. According to the BBC report, cannabis is widely used and accepted in the northwest region, even being used "in the production of a hair lotion popular with Cameroonian women." According to the US State Department's latest country report, "Cannabis is widely available in Cameroon; some of it grown domestically, more imported from Nigeria. According to the local press it is the drug most widely used among Cameroonians (next to alcohol). The average price of 2-3 grams of cannabis is 50-100 CFA (USD .08-.16)." The UN's International Narcotics Control Board, in its most recent annual report (http://www.incb.org/e/ind_ar.htm), complained "that cannabis cultivation has increased and that important seizures of cannabis originating in Cameroon have been made in Europe." Cameroonian police have sporadically attacked cultivation and trafficking in the northwest, seizing roughly 8,000 pounds of cannabis annually in the late 1990s. The national Gendarmarie have also burned fields in the northwest and in 1999 arrested hundreds of young people during their sweeps. For Cameroonian cannabis growers, it seems the immediate threat is not a Canadian competitor, but a repressive government, with the international drug war bureaucracy glowering in the background.
7. Media Scan: Arianna Huffington, Judy Mann, USA Today and Another Dan Forbes Scoop Dan Forbes has done it again -- this time he uncovered a past marijuana bust in Missouri of John Ashcroft's nephew -- while Ashcroft was the governor of that state -- in which the nephew received leniency multiple times while others went to prison for growing less. Also by Forbes, a report on the New Mexico Drug Policy Advisory Group's recommendations, both in Salon.com: http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/01/12/ashcroft_nephew/ http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/01/05/johnson/ Salon has produced a stream of drug war-related articles over the past year or so, by Forbes and others, that are impressive in both quality and quantity. Take a stroll to http://www.salon.com and search the site to read much more such reporting. USA Today gave the Higher Education Act Reform Campaign a boost with a nice article by Mary Beth Marklein -- visit http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20010110/2976697s.htm to check it out. Arianna Huffington has a suggestion to the incoming president for drug czar -- neighboring Republican governor Gary Johnson -- visit http://www.ariannaonline.com/columns/files/010801.html to read the column online. Washington Post columnist
Judy Mann intones on sensible drug policy and its diverse advocates --
read the column online at:
8. Calling All Activists I: Leaflet Outside Traffic Showings Senator Orrin Hatch played himself in the movie Traffic, but now wishes he hadn't, according to a statement on his web site (http://hatch.senate.gov/press251.html). It's not surprising that an advocate of an indefensible policy (the drug war) would find a reason not to like a movie that makes that policy look foolhardy. Traffic represents an opportunity for activists to build the movement. Thousands of people are leaving theaters every day, thinking about how the drug war doesn't work, but not knowing that there is a movement afoot to end the drug war. DRCNet is looking for volunteers who are willing to print out some flyers, spend a little money and time to run off some photocopies, and hand them out and/or gather e-mail addresses and contact information in front of your local movie theaters as people file out of Traffic. We have four flyers available through our web site; take your pick based on whichever you think will work best for you or with which you are most comfortable:
http://www.drcnet.org/outreach/drcnet-signup.pdf http://www.drcnet.org/outreach/drcnet-brochure1.pdf http://www.drcnet.org/outreach/hea-signup.pdf http://www.drcnet.org/outreach/ssdp-brochure1.pdf
9. Calling All Activists II: Gullible Meth Lab Article in Sierra Magazine The latest issue of Sierra, magazine of the Sierra Club, contains an article, "Welcome to Meth Country," that could have been written by the DEA's propaganda office. The article, by writer/ editor Marilyn Berlin Snell, contained copious quoting from DEA agents and other drug enforcers, but made no attempt to verify the DEA's claims about environmental damaged caused by meth labs, nor to present other perspectives. Meth labs certainly can be harmful to the environment, but no DEA agent is willing to state what should be obvious, that illegal meth labs are a consequence of prohibition, and that they could be put out of business by ending prohibition and regulating meth's manufacture and distribution. Nor is the DEA at all a reliable source regarding the extent or precise nature of the problem. DEA is the agency that has championed such environmentally reckless tactics as spraying of tebuthiuron and other pesticides to eradicate marijuana, opium and coca crops and dangerous fungicides to kill the crops. The Sierra Club of all organizations should show some healthy skepticism about the information put out by such an agency. We don't have anything against the Sierra Club, but in the absence of balancing information and perspectives, an article like this one tend to fuel the drive for more arrests and harsher punishments. Please read "Welcome to Meth Country" online at http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/200101/Meth.asp and then write a letter to the editor criticizing its lack of balance and willingness to uncritically toe the DEA's line. YOUR LETTER IS ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT IF YOU ARE A MEMBER OF THE SIERRA CLUB. Mail to: 85 Second St., 2nd Floor, San Francisco, CA 94105-3441, fax to (415) 977-5794 or e-mail [email protected].
10. Calling All Activists III: Ashcroft, Clemencies, Hemp As we noted last week, drug reformers are faced with not one, or even two, but three urgent action items as we begin 2001. Please take a few moments to call Congress and the President this week -- it could make all the difference for the coming year! URGENT ACTION ITEM #1: John Ashcroft At the time of this writing, more than 1,100 people have visited our StopJohnAshcroft.org web site since its launching yesterday afternoon. We believe that the appointment of John Ashcroft as Attorney General would spell trouble for sentencing/prison policies, medical marijuana, needle exchange, racial profiling, you name it. See our article from two weeks ago for further information about Ashcroft's drug war record (http://www.drcnet.org/wol/166.html#ashcroft). Please visit http://www.StopJohnAshcroft.org to send e-mail or faxes to your two US Senators and to get their phone numbers and local contact information -- or just call the Congressional Switchboard at (202) 224-3121. You can also visit http://www.senate.gov to look up their web sites and find out their direct numbers in Washington and their local phone numbers and locations in your state. Make an in-person visit if you can! Note that our opposition to the Ashcroft appointment is nonpartisan -- we opposed Clinton's drug czar appointee, Barry McCaffrey, five years ago -- and is based solely on the Senator's drug war record. The fact that Ashcroft is positioned in the rightward end of the political spectrum has not played a role in our decision to oppose him, and in fact our supporters span the full range of the political spectrum -- liberals, conservatives, libertarians and others -- a few who even support Ashcroft for other reasons, despite their disagreement with his pro-drug war stances. We respect their opinions, and want to make clear that we oppose drug warriors regardless of their political party or stands on other issues. URGENT ACTION ITEM #2: Save Industrial Hemp Drug warriors at the DEA and ONDCP are trying to ban a whole range of products made with industrial, non-drug hemp. Their motivation, ostensibly, is that hemp interferes with drug testing and creates false positives, causing problems with federal drug testing programs more complicated. Really, they are simply committed to a bizarre ideology that considers hemp a drug, even though you can't get high with it. But in doing so, they are attempting to administratively rewrite 63 years of US law that clearly makes an exception for low-THC hemp in the marijuana laws. Their actions threaten to make a perfectly legal, fledgling industry and its patrons all victims of the drug war. What is happening is that DEA is planning to publish three "interim rules," which would immediately become effective while they go through the longer process. First, the DEA proposes to change its interpretation of existing law to bring hemp products within the purview of the Controlled Substances Act; second, to change DEA regulations to agree with the new interpretation; and third, to exempt traditional hemp products not designed for human consumption, such as paper and clothing, from being subject to the Controlled Substances Act. (See http://www.drcnet.org/wol/165.html#hempembargo for further information on the looming Hemp Embargo.) For the rules to become effective, several federal agencies have to sign off on them. The so-called Dept. of Justice has already done so, but they still have to go through Customs, Treasury, Commerce, and the Office of Management and Budget. Please call your US Representative and your two US Senators; ask them to oppose the DEA's illegal hemp regulations and to put pressure on these agencies to reject the regulations. Again, you can reach all three of them via the Congressional Switchboard at (202) 224-3121, or look up their DC and local contact info and locations via http://www.senate.gov and http://www.house.gov on the web. URGENT ACTION ITEM #3: Appeal to Clinton for More Clemencies Days before the holiday season, the news came out that President Bill Clinton had granted clemencies to two prisoners whose names are well known to drug reformers: Dorothy Gaines and Kemba Smith, now home with their families. That's the good news; read more about it at http://www.drcnet.org/wol/166.html#clemency and http://www.drcnet.org/wol/166.html#dorothygaines as well as our editorial, "Awakening from Kemba's Nightmare," http://www.drcnet.org/wol/166.html#editorial from last week. The action item is to urge Clinton to release more such prisoners. There are hundreds of thousands of nonviolent drug offenders in the nation's penal institutions, tens of thousands of them in the federal system over which Clinton has jurisdiction. It is wonderful that Dorothy and Kemba have gotten to go home, but two is not enough! In particular, the 400+ "safety-valve" prisoners should be released. These are people who would likely be free today if they had been sentenced after the passage of the 1994 Crime Bill, which allowed judges to reduce the sentences of certain drug offenders who would otherwise get five or ten year mandatory minimums. The law was almost passed with retroactivity, but that fell victim to a frenzied election-year intersection of drug and gun politics. Many similar people's sentences have begun and ended since then. There is no reason not to release them. A few other federal prisoners or defendants who deserve our support:
11. Washington, DC Job Opportunity The Research and Policy Reform Center has an immediate opening for a Media Officer in Washington, DC. The Center is a newly established Washington-based congressional affairs and public policy office that engages in education and advocacy on issues concerning human rights and civil rights, including criminal justice, indigent counsel, drug policy, and Burma. The Media Officer will develop a communications strategy for the Criminal Justice Advocacy Alliance (CJAA), a coalition of civil rights, criminal justice, religious and human rights organizations with a broad vision of the reforms necessary to change the over-reliance on incarceration in the United States. RPR will also be working on drug policy reform issues, including the Higher Education Act drug provision. Visit http://execsearches.com/exec/detail.asp?job_id=1810 for further information.
12. The Reformer's Calendar: LA, Philly, Portland, New York, DC, SF, Minneapolis, St. Petersburg, Fort Bragg, Miami, Amsterdam, New Delhi (Please submit listings of events related to drug policy and related areas to [email protected].) January 11-13, Los Angeles, CA, "Agents and Assets," performance and symposium about the Fallout from the War on Drugs, and the CIA's alleged drug connections, by the Los Angeles Poverty Department (LAPD), in conjunction with Old Stories: New Lives. Showings include Thursday, 1/11, 7:30pm, followed by discussion with Prop. 36's Dave Fratello; Friday, 1/12, with Sandra Alvarez of Global Exchange's Colombia Human Rights Program and Alfred McCoy, historian and scholar of the CIA's involvement in the heroin trade; Saturday, 1/13, 1:00pm and 7:30pm, with 2:30pm forum on arts and social change. At Side Street Live, 425 South Main Street, 2nd Floor (between 4th and 5th), $10 general admission, $8 for Side Street Projects members, seniors or students, call (213) 620-8895 for info or reservations. January 13, St. Petersburg, FL, Families Against Mandatory Minimums Regional Workshop, location to be determined. Call (202) 822-6700 for information or to register. January 20, 6:30pm, Portland, OR, Voter Power Inaugural Banquet, celebrating two years of the Oregon Medical Marijuana Act. At the Doubletree Hotel, Lloyd Center,$50/plate with dinner, $25 not including dinner, or $40 for Voter Power members and sliding scale for patients. Call (503) 786-1905 for reservations. January 27, 1:00-5:00pm, Portland, OR, Teach-In on "Colombia, America's Next Military Nightmare." At the First Unitarian Church, 1011 SW 12th Ave. For further information, contact Kim Alphandary, (503) 537-9014 or [email protected], or Chris Falazo, Portland Central America Solidarity Committee, (503) 236-7916 or [email protected]. January 29, 6:00pm, Philadelphia, PA, "America's Failing War on Drugs Continues." Table Talk with Ethan Nadelmann, at the White Dog Cafe, 3420 Sansom St., $30 includes three course dinner and discussion, $25 for full-time students registering in advance. For further information visit http://www.whitedog.com or call (215) 386-9224; students may call between for 4:00 and 5:30pm on event days for standby registration, $15 (dinner) or free (discussion only, 7:30). February 2, 8:30am-5:30pm, San Francisco, CA, "The State of Ecstasy: The Medicine, Science and Culture of MDMA." One day conference, sponsored by The Lindesmith Center-Drug Policy Foundation, at the Golden Gate Club, Presidio of San Francisco. For further information, call (415) 921-4987 or visit http://www.drugpolicy.org/ecstasy/ on the web. February 10-11, Fort Bragg, NC, Demonstration for Peaceful Solutions in Colombia. Organized by Peace Plan Colombia, call (919) 928-9828, e-mail [email protected] or visit http://www.peaceplancolombia.org for further information. February 13, 5:30-8:30pm, New York, NY, "Yes in My Backyard." Premiere screening of the first documentary portrait of a rural prison town. At the Open Society Institute, 400 W. 59th St., RSVP by 2/2 to Jennifer Page, (212) 547-6997. February 18, 7:30pm, Philadelphia, PA, "Emperor of Hemp," the story of activist Jack Herer. Movie Night at the White Dog Cafe, 3420 Sansom St., free, seating limited. RSVP to (215) 386-9224 or visit http://www.whitedog.com for further info; restaurant service available before, during and after movie. February 22-24, New York, NY, "Altered States of Consciousness" conference. At the New School, e-mail [email protected] for further information. March 5, 6:00pm, Philadelphia, PA, "The Quagmire in Colombia: Addressing the Drug War Habit." Table Talk with Prof. Ken Sharpe of Swarthmore College, at the White Dog Cafe, 3420 Sansom St., $30 includes three-course dinner and discussion, $25 for full-time students registering in advance. For further information visit http://www.whitedog.com or call (215) 386-9224; students may call between for 4:00 and 5:30pm on event days for standby registration, $15 (dinner) or free (discussion only, 7:30). March 7, 10:00am, Philadelphia, PA, Philadelphia Prison System Tour and Lunch. At the Philadelphia Industrial Correctional Center, 8301 State Road, will include discussion with inmates and drug treatment staff. Lunch provided by the Hard Time Cafe, a culinary arts training program for prisoners. Reservations required, call (215) 386-9224, $6/person for lunch and tour, carpooling available. March 9-11, New York, NY, Critical Resistance: Beyond the Prison Industrial Complex. Northeast regional conference, following on the large national gathering in 1998, to focus on the impacts of the prison industrial complex in Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Washington, DC. Visit http://www.criticalresistance.org for further information, or call (212) 561-0912 or e-mail [email protected]. March 11, 7:30pm, Philadelphia, PA, "The Drug Dilemma: War or Peace," with Walter Cronkite, and "War Zone," film examining police state tactics in the drug war. Movie Night at the White Dog Cafe, 3420 Sansom St., free, seating limited. RSVP to (215) 386-9224 or visit http://www.whitedog.com for further info; restaurant service available before, during and after movie. March 15-18, Miami, FL, "Reason Weekend," sponsored by the Reason Foundation. For information, call Amber Trudgeon at (310) 391-2245 or e-mail [email protected]. March 26, 6:00pm, Philadelphia, PA, Hemp Dinner with Richard Rose, of Hempnut, Inc. and author of "The HempNut Health and Cookbook." Book and the Cook night at the White Dog Cafe, 3420 Sansom St., $45, includes three-course dinner and discussion. Reservations required, RSVP to (215) 386-9224, visit http://www.whitedog.com for further information. April 1-5, New Delhi, India, 12th International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harm. Sponsored by the International Harm Reduction Coalition, for information visit http://www.ihrc-india2001.org on the web, e-mail [email protected], call 91-11-6237417-18, fax 91-11-6217493 or write to Showtime Events Pvt. Ltd., S-567, Greater Kailash - II, New Delhi 110 048, India. April 9, 7:30pm, Philadelphia, PA, Storytelling Night with Families Against Mandatory Minimums Communications Director Monica Pratt and members of families affected by mandatory minimum sentencing. At the White Dog Cafe, 3420 Sansom St., optional a la carte dinner at 6:00pm. Call (215) 386-9224 or visit http://www.whitedog.com for further information. April 19-21, Washington, DC, 2001 NORML Conference. Visit http://www.norml.org/calendar/conf2001intro.shtml to register or for further information, or call (202) 483-5500. April 25-28, Minneapolis, MN, North American Syringe Exchange Convention. Sponsored by the North American Syringe Exchange Network, for further information call (253) 272-4857, e-mail [email protected] or visit http://www.nasen.org on the web. At the Marriott City Center Hotel, 30 South Seventh Street. May 20-27, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Study Tour of Dutch Drug Policy, organized by the White Dog Cafe. Particularly for persons with a background in health and social services, legislation, activism, drug law or policy. Call (215) 386-9224 or visit http://www.whitedog.com for further information.
David Borden, Executive Director, [email protected] One of the John Ashcroft quotes that came across the wire during drug reformers' recent discussions, interestingly, was on the topic of "love." The Senator wrote for World magazine that the following criticism of US drug policy: "[The government says] to a person on dope, 'Here's a clean needle and a treatment program, so in case you have a bad trip, we'll be there for you.' That's not real love... Real love says to a person, 'We're not going to provide a clean needle because we don't know of a way in which helping you have a drug-addicted life is in your best interest.'" Set aside the issue of government funding -- some libertarians are opposed both to the drug war and to most government spending -- and focus on the whether needle exchange and drug treatment programs, however they may be funded, embody "real love" or not. I've visited a few needle exchange sites, to see these programs that we advocate in action, and I've seen the care that the staff and volunteers brought to their life-saving work. Their interpretation of love: Whether or not a human being chooses to use drugs today, that person's life is important, has value, and AIDS, hepatitis or the other diseases and afflictions that are risks in injection drug use are unacceptable and must be stopped. When a person injects drugs, harmful as that behavior may be, to compound that risk with the deadly threat of AIDS is not "true love" and threatens everyone. As for how the Senator could see drug treatment -- whose goal is to help people get off of drugs -- as not meeting the standards of "true love," I'm not even going to try to figure out that one. The Senator also seemed to be in love with mandatory minimum drug sentences, which he strove throughout his term to make harsher. Among the bills he supported, for example, was one which would have created a mandatory five years in federal prison for offenses involving a mere five grams of powder cocaine -- critics of current law instead wanted the five-year threshold for crack cocaine to be raised to powder's level of 500 grams. Ironically, John Ashcroft's nephew seems to have received remarkable lenience on a drug charge in Missouri, when Mr. Ashcroft was the Governor of that state. Instead of getting jail time for growing 60 plants, he received probation, according to an expose published this morning in Salon.com. Salon found no evidence that Ashcroft had intervened to gain leniency for his nephew. A Bush spokesperson quoted seemed confident that if Ashcroft had intervened, he would have sought harsher punishment. Suppose that had happened, would that have qualified as "true love" toward his nephew and others of Missouri's young adults? Regardless, the younger Ashcroft, who was well known as such, did get probation. Another Missourian, quoted by Salon, spent two years in Leavenworth after being convicted for 51 plants. Will Foster is serving 20 years in Oklahoma for growing a similar number of plants in his basement. When the parole board voted to release him early, Gov. Frank Keating -- another name that came up as possible Bush Attorney General nominee -- overruled them, and he sits in prison to this day. The younger Ashcroft was allowed to remain free on probation after failing a drug test. Senator Ashcroft supported legislation to drug test all federal prisoners at release time, and if they fail, to put them back in. I received a note this morning from a grieving parent: "I am a mother that has a son that received a fifteen year sentence because of the sentencing disparity. No, we do not need the John Ashcrofts of the world in office! We need our children to have a second chance at life. Help me, as a mother, to have her son released from prison and to be given another chance with living!" This sounds like true love, the love of a parent for her son. Does John Ashcroft have true love for them? Or does he simply not think about it? A love that puts young people away for 10-life once they've turned 18, if they don't do as we say, a love that subjects them to AIDS and denounces treatment for their addictions, that's no true love. That's a sin. If you like what you see here and want to get these bulletins by e-mail, please fill out our quick signup form at https://stopthedrugwar.org/WOLSignup.shtml. PERMISSION to reprint or redistribute any or all of the contents of Drug War Chronicle is hereby granted. We ask that any use of these materials include proper credit and, where appropriate, a link to one or more of our web sites. If your publication customarily pays for publication, DRCNet requests checks payable to the organization. If your publication does not pay for materials, you are free to use the materials gratis. In all cases, we request notification for our records, including physical copies where material has appeared in print. Contact: StoptheDrugWar.org: the Drug Reform Coordination Network, P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036, (202) 293-8340 (voice), (202) 293-8344 (fax), e-mail [email protected]. Thank you. Articles of a purely educational nature in Drug War Chronicle appear courtesy of the DRCNet Foundation, unless otherwise noted.
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