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Weekly: Blogging @ the Speakeasy

"Flex Your Rights Protests Random Searches in DC," "Telemarketers Refuse to Make 'Soft on Crime' Attacks Against Obama," "The Drug Czar Can't Stop Panicking About Medical Marijuana," "The Perfect Argument for Medical Marijuana in Michigan," "Corruption at the Top Levels of the Mexican Drug War," "Rumors of NYPD Sexually Assaulting a Marijuana Suspect," "Random Searches in Our Nation's Capital," "$5 Million to Catch One Drug Trafficker?," "Will Mexico's Drug War Violence Come to the US?," "'Economically, our Criminal Justice Policies are Cutting Our Throats'."
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Iniciativas: Secretario antidroga y agentes penitenciarios embisten juntos contra la Propuesta 5 de tratamiento en vez de cárcel de California

A menos de dos semanas del día de las elecciones, el secretario antidroga y el sindicato de los agentes penitenciarios de California intentan derrotar la innovadora Ley de Rehabilitación del Infractor No Violento [<em>Nonviolent Offender Rehabilitation Act</em> (NORA, por su sigla en inglés)] que busca reemplazar la cárcel por el tratamiento.
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Flex Your Rights Protests Random Searches in D.C.


{Cross-posted from Flex Your Rights}

On Wednesday, Flex Your Rights brought together numerous allies, volunteers and friends to protest random searches on public transportation in the Nation’s Capital. The effort was aimed at voicing opposition to the new search policy, while educating the public about the 4th Amendment right to refuse police searches.

The event generated considerable media attention, including the Washington Post, the Washington CityPaper, and local ABC and NBC affiliates:



Thanks so much to our friends at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, StoptheDrugWar.org, Students for Sensible Drug Policy, and all the volunteers who came out and made this effort a success.

The constant emergence of new threats to our civil liberties is a difficult thing for any freedom-loving citizen to behold, but this unfortunate event also provided a unique opportunity to educate the public about 4th Amendment rights, and that’s exactly what we did.

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Telemarketers Refuse to Make "Soft on Crime" Attacks Against Obama

Further evidence that "soft on crime" attacks are becoming politically toxic:


Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents.

Nina Williams, a stay-at-home mom in Lake County, Indiana, tells us that her daughter recently called her from her job at the center, upset that she had been asked to read a script attacking Obama for being "dangerously weak on crime," "coddling criminals," and for voting against "protecting children from danger."
...
The daughter, who wanted her name withheld fearing retribution from her employer, confirmed the story to us. "It was like at least 40 people," the daughter said. "People thought the script was nasty and they didn't wanna read it." [Talking Points Memo]
TPM reports that the call script was drawn from this robocall used in other states:

Hello, I'm calling for John McCain and the RNC, because Democrats are dangerously weak on crime. Barack Obama has voted against tougher penalties for street gangs, drug-related crimes, and protecting children from danger. Barack Obama and his liberal allies have a disturbing history of coddling criminals. so we can't trust their judgment to keep our families safe. This call was paid for by the Republican National Committee and McCain-Palin 2008 at 866 558-5591. Thank you, bye

Of all the ferocious bile that gets strewn about in a presidential election, it strikes me as quite remarkable that it was a crime-themed attack which finally broke the will of these callers. Telemarketing is a notoriously unscrupulous profession (no offense) and one would assume that nothing short of a visceral discomfort with the content would produce this kind of open revolt.

When telemarketers sacrifice pay during an economic crisis rather than read an angry "soft on crime" attack script, it really speaks volumes about the rapid descent of crime-themed political posturing. No one wants to here that crap anymore. The limitations of our criminal justice system have become horribly evident and it's growing more difficult to sell the idea that politicians who advocate reform are somehow detached from the realities of the crime issue. Accusing one's opponent of protecting criminals and endangering children just won't fly. Our politics are changing in subtle, yet significant ways. Some of the greatest obstacles on the path to reform may soon be behind us.

(This article was published by StoptheDrugWar.org's lobbying arm, the Drug Reform Coordination Network, which also shares the cost of maintaining this web site. DRCNet Foundation takes no positions on candidates for public office, in compliance with section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, and does not pay for reporting that could be interpreted or misinterpreted as doing so.)
Blog

The Drug Czar Can’t Stop Panicking About Medical Marijuana

Here we go again:



Pete Guither couldn’t make it all the way through. I’m not even going to try. We’ve heard all of this before. We heard the same thing in Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. Yet no one is demanding the repeal of those laws. Medical marijuana works and so do the laws that protect patients from arrest.

If you’re in Michigan, vote Yes on Prop. 1. Pass it on.

In The Trenches

Medical marijuana patients attacked in new ad

Dear friends:

Michigan's medical marijuana initiative is under attack.

With just five days remaining until Election Day, prohibitionists are running this fear-mongering TV ad, which shows “footage” of a child trying to go in a medical marijuana dispensary and “patients” assaulting an elderly woman.

Attacking medical marijuana patients is a truly despicable tactic. Medical marijuana patients aren't thugs. They're seriously ill doctors, teachers, nurses, plumbers, and other upstanding Americans — who don't want to fear arrest and jail for using the medicine their physicians have recommended.

Here's a look at one of them:

Will you please help protect people like Dr. Wagoner and his wife from arrest and jail?

Not only is the opposition lying to voters about the face of medical marijuana, but they're lying about the initiative too. Michigan's initiative wouldn't even allow dispensaries; it simply permits private marijuana use by patients with a doctor's approval.

If this turns your stomach like it does mine, please turn your anger into action: Help the campaign win here.

Time is running short. Even a donation of $10 to the campaign committee will help ensure that sick and dying patients no longer must fear arrest.

Thank you,
Kampia signature (e-mail sized)

Rob Kampia
Executive Director
Marijuana Policy Project
Washington, D.C.

P.S. As I've mentioned in previous alerts, a major philanthropist has committed to match the first $3.0 million that MPP can raise from the rest of the planet in 2008. This means that your donation today will be doubled.

In The Trenches

Pants on Fire

Election 2008

Dear friends,

The prison guards' union is spending millions to defeat California's Proposition 5 and to make sure the number of people behind bars just keeps growing.

And they're lying to make that happen.

Here's your chance to fight back by helping us get this ad on the air. Donate now.

Every union has a mission to fight for better pay and working conditions.

But it's despicable when anyone sees their interests best served by locking up as many of their fellow citizens as possible.

The prison guards' union is lying to beat Prop. 5 -- the ballot initiative we drafted that would reduce prison overcrowding, expand treatment and rehabilitation for nonviolent drug offenders and cut billions of dollars in state spending.

Prop. 5 is in serious danger on Election Day because the prison guards' union has mounted an insidious campaign on TV that tells voters anything but the truth.

Help us make sure every voter in California sees the truth.

And please keep in mind: This is not just about California.  If Prop. 5 wins, it will provide a new model for the nation.

Please give whatever you can now to ensure that millions of people see this ad before Election Day.

Thank you,

Ethan Nadelmann
Executive Director
Drug Policy Alliance Network 

P.S. Don't miss this last chance to be a part of the biggest prison and sentencing reform in U.S. history. Give now.

In The Trenches

Press Release: Prison Guards Blasted on New 'Yes on 5' TV Spot: Union Has Spent $2 Million to Fight Prop. 5

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: October 29, 2008 CONTACT: Margaret Dooley-Sammuli at (213) 291-4190, Tommy McDonald at (510) 229-5215 Prison Guards Blasted in New 'Yes on 5' TV Spot CCPOA Has Spent Almost $2 million to Fight Prop. 5 Why? Overcrowded Prisons = Overtime Pay LOS ANGELES - California's prison guards union has provided most of the money lined up against Proposition 5, a drug treatment measure that would reduce prison overcrowding and forestall $2.5 billion worth of new prison construction. Today the Yes on 5 campaign struck back with a new TV spot that highlights the prison guards' contributions and their financial interest in defeating Prop. 5. Titled "Party's Over," the new Yes on 5 spot begins, "Our prisons are overcrowded. And prison guards are overjoyed!" The ad then explains that, for prison guards, overcrowding means more overtime pay. "That's why the prison guards want to stop Proposition 5, and are spending millions against it," says the ad. "Tell the prison guards the party's over. Vote Yes on 5." Margaret Dooley-Sammuli, deputy campaign manager for Yes on 5, said, "We know that California voters will be outraged to learn that the people paying for those No on 5 ads are the people who benefit the most from overcrowded prisons. Let's not forget, it is California taxpayers who shell out $10 billion a year for a broken prison system and enormous overtime pay for guards." The prison guards union, formally the California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA), contributed $1 million to the official No on 5 campaign on Oct. 14, then last Friday made another $825,000 "independent expenditure" contribution of TV airtime to oppose Prop. 5. This means the prison guards have provided 75% of the money behind the $2.4 million in airtime purchased so far to oppose Prop. 5 Dooley-Sammuli added, "If you want to know why our prison system is dysfunctional, look no further than the checkbook of the CCPOA. The prison guards will fight any reform that might threaten their bottom line. It's time for the voters to stand up to the 800-pound gorilla of state politics. We can do that by voting Yes on Prop. 5." ### To view the ad: http://www.prop5yes.com/partys-over Broadcast-quality copies of the new Yes on 5 ad are available on request.
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