More than 50,000 people were arrested last year in New York City for low-level marijuana offenses, according to the New York Division of Criminal Justice Services. Those 50,383 arrests represented 15 percent of all arrests by the New York Police Department. The 50,000-oplus figure is more marijuana arrests in one year than the number of similar arrests made by the New York Police Department over the entire period from 1978 to 1996, according to an analysis for the alliance done by Harry Levine, a sociology professor at Queens College.

This June will mark forty years since President Nixon declared a "war on drugs," identifying drug abuse as "public enemy No. 1." Ethan Nadelmann, the executive director of Drug Policy Alliance, opines that what's needed, indeed essential, are reflection -- and action.

A Mexican drug trafficking organization kidnapped the 12-year-old daughter of a ranch foreman in New Mexico, holding the girl for ransom until her family and neighbors came up with $80,000 for her release. They didn’t dare call law enforcement for help because of very real fears their calls would be monitored by the kidnappers using sophisticated communications relay stations erected on U.S. public lands. "The drug smugglers use scanners, cell phones, GPS systems and other equipment that is better than anything Border Patrol or the local deputy sheriffs have. We could actually see them watching our Border Patrol agents from points on high ground," said Rep. Ed Royce, a Republican from California while visiting hot spots along the New Mexico, Arizona and Texas border. This is yet another example of violence from Mexico's drug prohibition war crossing the border into the United States, and is interesting as Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano’s keeps claiming there has been no "spillover violence".

State-sanctioned medical marijuana dispensaries now outnumber Starbucks in Colorado. But outside Denver and Boulder, few doctors are comfortable dealing with medical marijuana. Now, residents in rural Colorado towns like Salida can see a doctor who are willing to recommend medical marijuana aboard two shiny aluminum vintage airstream trailers, which have been converted into mobile doctors' offices. The trailers criss-cross the state, providing exams for new patients and access to medical marijuana for those deemed eligible.

The Canadian government bill that would impose mandatory jail time for offenders caught growing a handful of marijuana plants appears doomed. The Liberals announced they will not support Bill S-10, which has already been passed by the Senate.

South Africans are still mulling over comments by the editor of the South African Medical Journal, who has called for government to look at legalizing certain drugs, such as dagga (marijuana) and cocaine. Editor JP van Niekerk says the high number of drug offenses that the country sees is proof that the country's prohibitionist war on drugs is ineffective, and authorities therefore should look at legalizing and regulating certain drugs.

Jennifer Abel opines on policing priorities given that the state of the economy is forcing cutbacks in law enforcement.

The once-fearsome Guatemalan army has returned to the jungles where it battled Marxist guerrillas a generation ago, this time to hunt shadowy Mexican drug traffickers fighting for control of strategic smuggling routes to the United States. The military operations are the clearest sign yet that as Mexico's wealthy drug trafficking organizations spread into Central America, wary but weak governments here are preparing to follow Mexican President Felipe Calderon's U.S.-backed decision to turn the armed forces against the traffickers. That prohibitionist strategy has failed to slow the violence in Mexico, which has left more than 34,000 dead in four years.

US Undersecretary of the Army Joseph Westphal likened Mexico's drug war to an "insurgency" and suggested the US might need to send troops to Mexico and to prevent prohibition-created drug trafficking organizations from taking over the country. Mexico has condemned the remarks, which Westphal has retracted and apologized for, but they echo September comments from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who also compared Mexico's drug prohibition threat to an "insurgency." President Obama immediately backed away from Mrs. Clinton's comparison then, just as Westphal immediately labeled his own words "inaccurate."