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Cannabis Strategy: Stop funding Democrats until they listen and act on drug reform!
It was all over the news: on January 22, the DEA raided a California Medical Cannabis Clinic in Lake Tahoe, and two medical cannabis grow houses in Colorado.
How Not to Legalize Marijuana
Via reason, Iâd like to introduce you to Antoine Blalock, who may be the worst activist in the history of drug policy reform:Blalock drove to the Seventh District Police Station on Alabama Avenue S.E. in Washington, D.C., in May 2007. He pulled a handgun from the trunk and started firing, shooting in the air outside the station. Five shots. He shouted, according to court records, "The police should leave us alone and let us sell our weed!"Blalock complied with demands to drop his gun -- and he did not stop there. He dropped his pants, standing naked before officers wrapped him up in a towel. [Law.com]Dude, youâre not helping. Although I suppose if Antoine Blalock starts a blog, I might check it out.
The truth about "addiction"
I have limited time, but will expound on this later, and clean it up.
Obama Appoints Temporary Drug Czar
Amidst the inauguration fanfare, we failed to notice that Obama immediately appointed ONDCPâs general counsel Ed Jurith to serve as acting director, i.e. drug czar. You can read Jurithâs bio here and my thoughts on him here.This is interesting because itâs a definite improvement over Bushâs last minute appointment of Patrick Ward, another ONDCP insider, to run the office upon John Waltersâs departure. Jurith is hardly a friend of reform on any issue Iâm aware of, but his background is in law, while Ward has been directly and heavily involved in interdiction programs.With Jurith being the preferable choice, Iâm wondering if Obama actually did this for the right reasons as he looks for a permanent candidate to fill the position. Thatâs impossible to say, but itâs a small step in the right direction. Letâs hope for a bigger one soon.
Mexican Drug Cartels Dissolve Corpses in Vats of Acid
Lately, the drug war is sounding less and less like an actual government policy and more like a distopian future from a science fiction movie:As the nation's drug war rages on, with its weekly tallies of headless torsos, it is getting harder to produce a shock wave in the Mexican media. But the gruesome recipes of "The Stewmaker" have gripped public attention here, as authorities describe how a "disposal expert" working for a Tijuana drug cartel boss allegedly got rid of hundreds of bodies by dissolving the corpses in vats of caustic liquid. [Washington Post]They call him "The Stewmaker" and his henchmen attacked the police station with machine guns after he was captured. Does any of this sound like the story of a drug policy that works? How much more of this unfathomable gory mayhem do we feel like putting up with? Weâve crossed the line into some seriously dark territory here and itâs way past time something is done about it, something completely different from everything weâve tried before.
Letter to Barack Obama
This is the letter I've just mailed to our new president. As I've said before, I'm just one little voice, and each person reading this is just one little voice.
The World's Smallest Marijuana Joint
Police donât just get the facts wrong about the dangers of marijuana and the impact of commonsense reforms like decriminalization. Frequently, theyâre wrong about marijuana itself, making wild claims about the street value of the latest bust or exaggerating plant yields to make small growers sound like major traffickers. If you think youâve heard it all, hereâs a cop from Massachusetts who says an ounce equals 200-300 joints:According to Lt. Danny Maguire of the Weston Police Department, "The biggest challenge we have is to convince people that, just because the law has changed, marijuana has not become 'legal,' and that the problem of drug addiction is still just as severe as always. There is also the danger that people will think itâs actually OK, under the new law, to smoke a joint or two and get behind the wheel of a car."â¦One ounce of marijuana is the equivalent of 200 to 300 joints, according to Maguire.This is just shockingly crazy and wrong. Researchers have estimated the average size of a joint between 0.4 and 0.9 grams, which would equal 30-70 joints per ounce. If you roll more than 70 joints from an ounce, theyâll be empty toothpick-sized joints with more paper than pot. They wonât even work and no matter who you are, Iâm sure you know someone who can assure that this is true.Claiming that you can roll up to 300 joints from an ounce is a total lie. Itâs hilarious to anyone whoâs ever smoked or even seen a joint. Itâs like claiming a bag of skittles will serve 300 people, when thereâs actually only 70 Skittles in the bag and most people donât find an individual Skittle very satisfying anyhow.So what the hell is this guy talking about? Heâs angry that voters in Massachusetts decriminalized possession of up to an ounce of marijuana, and heâs trying to pretend thatâs a huge amount of pot. It isnât. His lie, on the other hand, is enormous.
Norm Stamper is Awesome
Here's another old LEAP video that's been making the rounds this week:
Matt Fogg is Awesome
Back in April, the Metropolitan Police Dept. here in D.C. announced plans to go door-to-door asking to search homes in high-crime neighborhoods. Flex Your Rights joined with several local groups to oppose the measure and we shot this great video of Matt Fogg from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition speaking at a community meeting.I post it now because it randomly popped up at The Agitator and DrugWarRant last week and I realized Iâd never shared this here. Matt Fogg is wildly entertaining and gets me riled up every time I run into him.MPD cancelled the home-search program due to public opposition, proving that events like this can really make a difference.
Ryan Frederick Trial
Radley Balko has been covering the trial of Ryan Frederick, the Virginia man who was charged with murder for killing a police officer who he mistook for a burglar during a questionable drug raid. Iâve been doing my best to report new developments, but itâs an insanely complicated situation and I just donât have time to cover it adequately. I recommend Radleyâs excellent blog The Agitator to those of you who are following the case closely.
Save 440,000 lives each year â with Cannabis. It's high time.
How? We can do it through the use of some innovative social technology: Mandate a compulsory substitution of cannabis for tobacco in all manufactured tobacco products.
Video: Drug Tourism in the Netherlands -- Is It Really Only the Problem of the Dutch?
The latest video from our friends at the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union
Video: SSDP and LEAP Talk Drug Legalization at El Paso City Council
Nubia Legarda is a Students for Sensible Drug Policy activist from El Paso. Legarda hasn't visited her family in neighboring Ciudad Juárez for months because of the drug trade violence ravaging many of Mexico's cities -- her reason for joining SSDP last year. Texan Terry Nelson is a 30-year law enforcement veteran who worked for the US Border Patrol, the US Customs Service, and the Department of Homeland Security. He is now a leading spokesperson for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.
CNBCâs Marijuana, Inc: Propaganda, Pot Porn, or Both?
They might as well have displayed a link to ONDCP.gov across the screen for an hour. CNBC's Marijuana, Inc. couldnât have been more sensationalist if John Walters wrote the screenplay and Bill OâReilly did the interviews. Iâm serious, it was that bad. Of course, itâs impossible to know how the casual observer may interpret a propaganda trainwreck such as this, but for me it crossed the threshold of absurdity to the point of almost becoming useful. If one factual concept emerged unscathed from this, it is that there is simply nothing you can do to stop the marijuana economy. Marijuana, Inc. painted California as a veritable narco-state, thrown into anarchy by liberal values and unscrupulous profiteers. If thereâs a lesson in there other than the fact that our marijuana laws are a disaster, I must have missed it.The great irony of this is that, whether they like it or not, CNBC is selling their product to the same exact market. Who do they think watches this stuff? Just turn off the sound and youâve got sixty minutes of first-rate pot porno to accompany the musical selection of your choice. They used blatant pot porn to promote it, so they know exactly what theyâre doing. Something is seriously out of balance when CNBC puts out an obnoxious propaganda program, while simultaneously hosting an online poll that favors decriminalization at 97%. They even felt compelled to put this disclaimer on their comment section:**As of this posting, CNBC has only received comments favoring decriminalization of marijuana.Marijuana sells in the media for the same exact reason it sells in the street. The only difference is the media still feels the need to cut their marijuana merchandise with some nasty shit. If the mainstream media wants to sell us pot, thatâs fine. But give it to us straight.
DEAâs Medical Marijuana Raids Continue Under Obama Administration
Uh-oh. Looks like Obama has yet to deliver on his promise to end the medical marijuana raids:Oakland, CA -- The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) raided a medical marijuana dispensary today in South Lake Tahoe, California, in the first days of the new Obama Administration. Even though President Barack Obama had made repeated promises during his election campaign to end federal raids in medical marijuana states, many high-ranking Bush Administration officials have yet to leave office. For example, still at the helm of the DEA is acting Administrator Michele Leonhart, who has been responsible for numerous federal raids in California, following in the footsteps of her predecessor Karen Tandy. Neither Eric Holder, President Obama's pick for U.S. Attorney General, nor a new DEA Administrator, have taken office yet. [Americans for Safe Access]Itâs too early to accuse Obama of turning his back on the patients he pledged to defend, but itâs a clear sign that the new president will have to take concrete steps towards ending the DEAâs controversial crusade in California. It wonât stop just because he said it would. He has to actually do something to stop this. Weâll soon have new leadership at the Dept. of Justice and it will become perfectly clear to everyone what Obamaâs priorities really are. Until then, weâre stuck with George Bushâs drug war under Barack Obamaâs watch. The new administration has done its best to avoid publicly discussing marijuana policy, so letâs hope they understand that ending these raids promptly is the best way to avoid ugly headlines.
Drug Smuggling Robots are the Future
I told you weâd be seeing more of this kind of thing:A toy helicopter is believed to have been used in an attempt to smuggle drugs into a prison.Guards at Elmley Prison in Sheerness, Kent, spotted the remote control miniature aircraft flying over the walls of the jail and heading for the accommodation blocks one night after it was picked up by CCTV cameras.It had a small load beneath the fuselage, thought to contain drugs.The toy or its cargo was not found. [Daily Mail]Face it, thereâs nothing anyone can do to stop drug smuggling robots. Theyâre just gonna get cheaper and more sophisticated. You canât chase them because theyâre faster than you. You canât shoot them down because youâll miss and your bullets will land in a school yard miles away. And you canât fingerprint them because theyâll kick your ass.Pretty much the only way to stop drug smuggling robots from wreaking major havoc is to legalize drugs.
Marijuana, Inc. Tonight on CNBC
This looks interesting. Tonight at 9 ET on CNBC.Update: I hated it. My comments here.
Drug Policy at WhiteHouse.gov
President Obamaâs new WhiteHouse.gov site has several drug policy related items worth noting:* End Racial Profiling: President Obama and Vice President Biden will ban racial profiling by federal law enforcement agencies and provide federal incentives to state and local police departments to prohibit the practice.* Reduce Crime Recidivism by Providing Ex-Offender Support: President Obama and Vice President Biden will provide job training, substance abuse and mental health counseling to ex-offenders, so that they are successfully re-integrated into society. Obama and Biden will also create a prison-to-work incentive program to improve ex-offender employment and job retention rates.* Eliminate Sentencing Disparities: President Obama and Vice President Biden believe the disparity between sentencing crack and powder-based cocaine is wrong and should be completely eliminated.* Expand Use of Drug Courts: President Obama and Vice President Biden will give first-time, non-violent offenders a chance to serve their sentence, where appropriate, in the type of drug rehabilitation programs that have proven to work better than a prison term in changing bad behavior....The President also supports lifting the federal ban on needle exchange, which could dramatically reduce rates of infection among drug users. President Obama has also been willing to confront the stigma -- too often tied to homophobia -- that continues to surround HIV/AIDS. Seeing racial profiling, sentencing reform and needle exchange on the White House website ainât bad at all. If these are the issues the new administration is prepared to address immediately, thatâs a respectable forward step for criminal justice reform. Heck, its decent enough that I wonder why his transition team didnât mash this together into a response to that tricky drug war question they so blatantly dodged over at Change.gov. Regardless, itâs interesting to consider these policy statements in light of the unresolved drug czar selection process. Any candidate who embraces this stuff would be a major improvement to be sure.Unfortunately, the site isnât completely devoid of tough-guy drug war talk:Obama and Biden will demand the Afghan government do more, including cracking down on corruption and the illicit opium trade.Thus, despite the positive steps outlined above, Obama still suffers from the notion that drug prohibition can be a stabilizing force in international politics. This will prove to be our greatest obstacle under the new administration, as weâve heard nothing encouraging from Obama with regards to international drug policy and things are getting damn ugly out there.
Wsted Resources to Protect the Present Status
Our money coud be better spent supporting companies that provide equipment and training to help upgrade our security and infrastructure.
Barack Obama is the President
Weâve talked a lot here about Obamaâs reluctance to openly discuss drug policy. Weâve been disappointed if not surprised that our domination of his Change.gov website failed to provoke an intelligent response. As activists, thatâs just what we do and we wonât stop anytime soon. But weâd be foolish to let our frustration obscure the magnitude of what just happened. The American people just put a person of color in the White House. How many of you thought youâd see this in your lifetime? I didnât. Itâs so incredible to me, I still struggle to process it as the reality of all this periodically penetrates my entrenched political cynicism and I summon for a moment a hope-like sensation that must be what everyoneâs been talking about.Itâs not about Obama or his policies, itâs about the American people. It shows that weâre capable of transcending centuries of prejudice and idiocy, provided that circumstances are properly aligned. Itâs purely symbolic, of course, but powerfully so. I guess what Iâm trying to say is that I thought weâd end the drug war long before electing an African-American president. Iâm amazed to learn that legalizing drugs is actually the more difficult undertaking. But so be it. To anyone who says overcoming drug prohibition is just an impossible fantasy, I say "Barack Obama is the president."