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Ketamine Is 'magic drug' for Depression

Scientists claim that a single dose of the drug Ketamine, nicknamed Special K, acts like "magic" lifting people out of depression in hours and lasting more than a week. Studies have found it can treat depression within hours, even when years of alternative treatments have failed, and the effects of just one dose can last up to 10 days. The drug was even shown to restore brain-connections damaged by stress.

National Black Police Association Endorses Marijuana Legalization (Press Release)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: August 19, 2010

CONTACT: Tom Angell - (202) 557-4979 or [email protected]

National Black Police Association Endorses Marijuana Legalization

African American Cops Say California's Prop. 19 Will Protect Civil Rights & Public Safety

SACRAMENTO, CA -- A national organization of African American law enforcement officers has announced its endorsement of Proposition 19, California's initiative to legalize marijuana.

The National Black Police Association (NBPA), which was founded in 1972 and is currently holding its 38th national conference in Sacramento, is urging a yes vote on legalization this November 2.

"When I was a cop in Baltimore, and even before that when I was growing up there, I saw with my own eyes the devastating impact these misguided marijuana laws have on our communities and neighborhoods. But it's not just in Baltimore, or in Los Angeles; prohibition takes a toll on people of color across the country," said Neill Franklin, a 33-year veteran police officer and executive director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), an international group of pro-legalization cops, judges, prosecutors and corrections officials who have been organizing to support Prop. 19. "This November, with the National Black Police Association's help, Californians finally have an opportunity to do something about it by approving the initiative to control and tax marijuana."

On Thursday, Franklin spoke alongside California NAACP president Alice Huffman at the NBPA conference on a panel about criminal justice issues like marijuana legalization.

Many cops and civil rights leaders are now speaking out against marijuana prohibition because it is not only ineffective at reducing marijuana use and results in the arrest and incarceration of people of color at a highly disproportionate rate, but also because making marijuana illegal has created a lucrative black market controlled by violent gangs and cartels. LEAP has organized a group of more than 30 California police officers, judges, prosecutors and other criminal justice professionals who support Prop. 19.

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) and its 30,000 supporters represent police, prosecutors, judges, FBI/DEA agents and others who want to legalize and regulate drugs after fighting on the front lines of the "war on drugs" and learning firsthand that prohibition only serves to worsen addiction and violence.

According to NBPA, there are 80,000 black law enforcement officials in the U.S.

For more information, visit http://www.CopsSayLegalizeDrugs.com or http://www.BlackPolice.org

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Texas Counties $4.2 Million Drug Search and Seizures Fund Trips to Vegas

In a classic example of drug prohibition money corrupting, Frank Garza, the former District Attorney of Jim Wells and Brooks Counties in Texas, has been charged with going on a $4.2 million dollar drug search and seizure forfeiture spending spree in seven years. This story draws attention to the practice of authorities and officials and the very lucrative search, seizure and forfeiture drug laws, in particular, the state of Texas. According to the Institute of Justice, due to Texas’s search and seizure forfeiture laws, Texas law enforcement agencies seized in property and currency, “nearly a quarter of a billion dollars” between 2001 and 2008.

With 28,000 Killed Since 2006, Movement for Drug Legalization in Mexico Takes Hold (Video)

A growing movement in Mexico to legalize drugs, particularly marijuana, is taking shape. Four proposals that aim for varying degrees of decriminalization or legalization of drugs are on the docket in Mexico’s House of Deputies, and another is circulating in the Senate. Meanwhile, former Mexican President Vicente Fox, who was a key U.S. ally in the war on drugs, has backed the legalization of drugs, saying prohibition has failed to reduce violence and corruption.
Santiago Papasquiaro, site of Saturday's firefight
Santiago Papasquiaro, site of Saturday's firefight

Mexico Drug War Update

The death toll in Ciudad Juarez this year is over 1,800 so far, meaning 2010 is on pace to be another record year for murder there. And that's just Juarez.

Just Say Now

In 1996, California became the first state in the nation to legalize marijuana for medical use. Now, with a ballot initiative up for a vote in November, it could become the first to ratify an even more striking landmark: the legalization of pot for recreational use. Proposition 19 — the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 — treats pot much like alcohol after the repeal of Prohibition, allowing each city and county to decide whether it wants to approve and tax commercial sales of the drug.
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