War On Drugs Archives
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April 27, 2006
Loretta Nall is a party gal with the party party, the United States Marijuana Party and she's running for governor of Alabama. Her BlogAd says, "the media covers her boobs and activist history, but what she really needs is your support to get on the ballot." I don't know if other articles rip holes in her stories at the first link, but it's an interesting scan nonetheless.
Posted at 08:29 PM
| Comments (1)
June 27, 2005
Dude! This Ron Paul guy from congress wants to make hemp farming legal! Send out a 420 to all your buds and buddettes, dude! It's called the H.R. 3037, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2005, and it would like make hemp farming like legal. Think of all the products that can be made, like natural clothing, and baskets, and stuff. Details in "Industrial Hemp Farming Act Introduced at Packed Capitol Hill Hemp Food Lunch; HR 3037 Would Give States the Right to Regulate Farming of Versatile Hemp Plant". Harshing my buzz, Common Dreams says "You can smoke a bushel of industrial hemp and not get high." Dude!
Posted at 12:24 PM
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August 02, 2004
Drudge doesn't have this story yet, so:
LaFAYETTE, Ga. - A Walker County man was charged with manufacturing methamphetamine after his pants exploded while he was talking to social services workers outside his home...
"Finally, while he was sitting in the back seat, the front of his pants exploded," [the commander of the Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit Drug Task Force] said Friday...
If you read further, recall that second and third-degree burns aren't as bad as first-degree burns.
Given the name of the "task force," this counts as a WackyHumor and WarOnDrugs two-fer.
UPDATE: The first (and probably only) comment correctly informs me that I have the severity of burns reversed. Third-degree are the worst kind.
Oh.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Racked with guilt, I moved this from the WackyHumor category to the WarOnDrugs category.
Posted at 12:22 PM
| Comments (2)
July 08, 2003
From this:
Still licking their wounds, federal prosecutors have fired another shot at freed grass guru Ed Rosenthal, appealing the light sentence that let the convicted medical pot grower walk away a free man last month.
The motion, filed late Thursday in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, does not go into any detail about the grounds of appeal, according to Assistant United States Attorney Matthew Jacobs, who would not comment on why the Department of Justice decided to appeal the sentence...
"I think the Ninth Circuit is going to knock that appeal down quicker that you can knock down a stack of cards on your desk," said [Golden Gate University law school dean Peter Keane]...
"The U.S. Attorney got its marching orders from Washington, as a matter of course," he said. "(Attorney General John) Ashcroft is very idealistic on the subject of marijuana and medical marijuana and wants the U.S. Attorney to emphasize the fact that they don't like it..."
"They should be happy with what they got," [Rosenthal] said. "Right now, I'm a felon and by the time I'm done with this, not only will I be exonerated, the courts will find that these laws should be thrown out."
(Via TalkLeft)
Posted at 01:52 PM
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June 04, 2003
From this:
Amid cheers from supporters, marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal was sentenced on Wednesday to a single day in jail for growing the drug in violation of federal law even though California allows its cultivation for medical use.
U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer said he handed down the light sentence because of the "extraordinary circumstances" of the case -- referring to the fact that growing marijuana for medical purposes was legal under a voter-approved California law...
Breyer sentenced Rosenthal to a single day in prison but gave him credit for time served so he walked out of court a free man. He also fined Rosenthal $1,300.
Posted at 11:38 AM
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April 23, 2003
Here I thought the Nick & Norm anti-drug TV commercials were no more. Yet, I've seen them twice recently.
The latest one attempts to, er, discuss legalization. The smart older guy says something like "make them available everywhere like Cheezios... crack on the schoolyard, heroin in vending machines, etc. etc."
While I'm sure some extreme libertarians think that all drugs should not just be legalized but that they should be available everywhere, I don't think that represents a majority opinion. Personally, I have problems with legalizing things like crack and PCP.
But, I find Nick's (or maybe the smart one's Norm) misrepresentation - deliberately only addressing the most extreme opposition points of view - quite disturbing. Why is our government spending our money to lie to us?
I realize you can only stick so many arguments into a 30-second commercial. So, I think we should take Nick and Norm out to lunch and discuss this issue with them. Now that'd be a good commercial.
Posted at 11:06 PM
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April 01, 2003
"Also Stops Study That Found Campaign Wasn't Working"
From this, via Drudge.
Oh, in case you aren't laughing yet:
"Also Stops Study That Found Campaign Wasn't Working"
Posted at 11:52 PM
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January 07, 2003
This Reason article has interviews with three former drug warriors. As I discussed below, there are problems not just with the WOD, but with legalization as well. From the article:
What do you do when you legalize it? You are the government crack dealer and a 14-year-old kid comes up to you. Do you sell it to him? If you say no, then you’re already talking about another prohibition, another market. So what do you do when you sell legal crack to a guy who’s 30 and he turns around and sells it to 15-year-old kids? That’s illegal! It doesn’t work. And, then you get into other drugs like Angel Dust, methamphetamines, LSD. What do you do with that stuff? Is it legal? You are talking about stuff that directly affects the public safety.
Posted at 03:44 PM
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January 04, 2003
I posted below about the new "Nick and Norm" anti-drug TV commercials. Here's another blogger's comments, many of which I find persuasive.
Posted at 04:57 PM
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December 29, 2002
A recent government TV commercial for the War on Drugs features two guys discussing how drug money funds terrorism. Something about, "if there were no drug buyers, there would be no drug cartels, and if there were no drug cartels, money wouldn't go to terrorist orgs."
I have to wonder, are these commercials designed to show how foolish and morally bankrupt the WOD is?
I'll just comment on the first phrase in this recipe; others have discussed the remainder of the WOD's current mantra. Under what set of circumstances do these people actually think there could ever be "no drug buyers?" Is that the same world in which there are no buyers of chocolate, liquor, lottery tickets, cigarettes, or whatever other form of self-medication you can come up with?
There will always be drug buyers. Even if we locked up every single recreational pot smoker to slammin' junkie we could find, there'd be millions left.
While I certainly have big qualms about legalizing crack or heroin, and even larger qualms about the government being involved in their production, sale, or distribution in the same way that states are involved in lotteries, something has to be done that's not based on an extraordinary fantasy.
(Something worrisome about making hard drugs available in the same way as prescription drugs is that there would probably still be a black market for drugs. It would be a lot smaller than the current black market, but there would still be people who could sell drugs to those who couldn't get prescriptions, such as teenagers. And, harder forms of heroin or other drugs might be available only on the black market. Or, would the legal drugs have to get stronger to compete with the black market versions. The government brand White Horse might lose out to the street brand Black Ice.)
Posted at 10:47 PM
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