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My first post

As I sit here indulging in marijuana before I start my day, I consider the loss of privilages in life I would have if I were to get caught by the wrong people. I'm not hurting anyone, and I'm even really a nice person.

This is a test

How are you doing now that it is September 16th?

Support Question 7

Once again there will be another ballot issue on marijuana in Nevada. As readers know, I have consistently been an outspoken critic of the drug war and so it should come as no surprise that I support this ballot measure.

Just Say No to Meth Registries

What sort of criminal offender merits the special distinction of being placed on a public registry? Only the most dangerous, or is it the most demonized? Registries of sex offenders began appearing a few years ago as part of the hysterical response to not an increase in sex crimes, but an increase in publicity about them, driven in part by information technologies that allow the whole country to almost instantaneously watch the latest local outrage with fascinated horror.

ONDCP Publicly Debates Drug Reform Leaders for the First (and Probably Last) Time Ever

Last night I attended the D.C. premiere of Jed Riffeâs film Waiting to Inhale, which was followed by a debate that pitted Special Assistant to the Drug Czar David Murray against MPPâs Rob Kampia, and DPAâs Ethan Nadelmann (Former ONDCP staffer Andrea Barthwell didnât show).The film takes a compelling look at the history of medical cannabis and gives us a glimpse into the lives of several patients who depend on it. For those of us whoâve been following the issue, the plight of the patients depicted is all too familiar. Iâd bet that many people whoâve formed snap judgments about medical marijuana would be stunned to see the faces behind this controversy.

Retired Sheriff's Deputy Jay Fleming of LEAP Joins DRCNet Blogging Team -- Drugs, Crime and Conservation First Topic

DRCNet is pleased to welcome Jay Fleming to the Speakeasy. Fleming was for many years a deputy sheriff and narcotics officer in Washington, Montana & Idaho. He is now retired in the US southwest (Arizona) and is a speaker with the organization Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP). Fleming has graciously agreed to serve as a regular, featured guest blogger here in the Speakeasy, focusing on the impact of drug prohibition on the western United States.

Making Sense of the DEA's New Proposed Policy Statement on Pain Prescribing

There are definitely mixed feelings in the pain medicine community when it comes to the DEA's new proposed policy statement on prescribing pain medications. While everyone is pleased that the agency has loosened up its prescribing rulesâallowing doctors to write three one-month pain med prescriptions at a timeâthere is some dispute over whether the DEA's latest policy statement represents anything other than the agency doing business as usual.

Vermont politics and drug news

I created and chaired the Vt. Grassroots Party(VGP) from '92 to 2000 and was a Gubernatorial candidate against Howard Dean in '94 & '96 as well as being 1 of 14 Americans to be on the Presidential ballot in the 2000 election. The VGP received enough votes in just our 2nd election w/o benefit of any money to become the only other major political party in Vt. besides the Republicrats and Demopublicans. I've been an active anti-prohibitionist since '67. I've sponsored and organized annual cannabis awareness rallies in Burlington, Vt. since '89. I

Reformers Raid Cato Institute

Radley Balko and Norm Stamper spoke at the Cato Institute yesterday about Balkoâs new report Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids in America.

Heroin Lifers, DEA Pain Guidance, California Lowest Priority Initiatives

Those are the feature stories I think I will be doing this week. It doesn't always happen that way, though. Some readers may recall that I was going to do the Louisiana heroin lifer story last week, but I didn't manage to get ahold of any of the people critical to the story. I'm back on it again this week. Similarly, something may break during the week. This typically happens on Thursday, the day we're supposed to be wrapping up the Chronicle.

A Question for Dr. Volkow

Drug warriors donât answer phone calls or emails from the likes of us, so the only way to ask them questions is to show up when theyâre speaking publicly and hope to get called on during Q&A. Sitting in the moderatorâs line of sight helps, as does not looking like a balls-to-the-wall hippie drug-legalizer (not that thereâs anything wrong with that).

My Border Blues

I really dislike crossing international borders. I've been doing a lot of it lately in the past few years, particularly since my partner and I got a summer place outside Nelson, BC. Even when I was spending a few weeks or months in Nelson, I was often off to the USâfor a meth conference in Salt Lake, the NORML annual conference in San Francisco, to score cheap cigarettes on the Indian reservation in Washington stateâor crossing into the US to get to the nearest big time airport to fly off to more exotic locales.

Many Partisans on Both Sides Get Drug Policy Wrong, Blogosphere Shows

Last Friday the blogosphere provided a good example of how readily even political progressives can fail to see the important points in drug policy. A post in Bob Geiger's U.S. Senate Report titled "Bill to Cripple Taliban Drug Trade Passes -- After GOP Tries to Kill It" informs us that Republican senators had unsuccessfully tried to block an amendment by Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to put $700 million into the latest defense appropriations bill for suppression of Afghanistan's opium trade. Schumer explained, "The Taliban draws its strength from the drug trade and in order to prevent them from reclaiming the country, we need to crack down the drugs that fuel their regime. We need to ensure that the Department of Defense has the resources available to attack this problem before it becomes far worse."

Rest in Peace, John W. Perry

Radley Balko reminds us that John W. Perry lost his life 5 years ago today. Our John W. Perry Fund, which provides scholarships to students whoâve lost financial aid due to drug convictions, is named in his honor:

Money Laundering

This "Prohibition in the Media" post is not tied to a particular article. If you do a Google News search on "drug money laundering," you'll get a list of over 1,400 articles. These are only the ones that the news outlets still have online -- the global financial system is virtually "awash" in illicitly-generated revenues, much of it from the drug trade.

Framing the Issue

re: framing the issue: in the recent article on Ireland the term "re-legalisation" was used, and i thought that was a good term. we could frame it in the context of "restoring constitutional freedoms" or "restoring basic American freedoms to disenfranchised populations", both of which speak subconsciously to conservatives' nostalgic longing for "the good old days" as well as tapping into the Pavlovian response Bush has created to sell his agenda by repeated use of the word "freedom" in conjuction with even the most oppressive activities.

Crossing the Border

I'm off to Spokane, Washington, in a few minutes, which means I will be crossing the US-Canadian border at one of the remote ports of entry above Spokane. I'm coming from BC Bud country, which means the border crossing is always, um, interesting. You never know whether they are going to wave you through in a matter of a few seconds, or tear your vehicle apart, make you empty your pockets, and maybe even do a strip search. It always makes me feel so wanted by my homeland.