DRUG WAR

More Prohibition Fatalities

Kirk Tousaw — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:56:53 -0800

CN BC: ‘Magic’ Mushrooms Suspected In Fatality

RCMP here have issued a warning against consuming magic mushrooms, after the death of a B.C. man.

Cpl. Bryson Hill said preliminary results from an autopsy performed on a 23-year-old man who died while in the Halfway Hot Springs Nov. 8, indicate his death could be linked to him taking what he thought were hallucination-causing magic mushrooms or psilocybin mushrooms.

News reports identified the man as Dieter Eggers of Taylor, near Fort St. John.

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STOP BILL C-15!: New Drug Law Will Drive Up Prison Costs

jeremiah — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:25:06 -0800

A federal bill that would impose mandatory jail time for serious drug crimes would increase the workload of the parole system, and the government intends to inject more than $100 million over five years to ease the burden, according to the commissioner of the Correctional Service of Canada.

Commissioner Don Head said at a Senate committee hearing Thursday that if the bill is passed, CSC will receive an additional $116.5 million over the next five years to support an expected increase in cases for the National Parole Board.

Sacked Adviser Urges Cannabis Probe

jeremiah — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:46:33 -0800

Sacked government drugs adviser Prof David Nutt has called for a Royal Commission to investigate whether cannabis should be decriminalised.

Editors note: Read more about the David Nutt affair here on Cannabis Culture.

Prof Nutt told the BBC the possibility of allowing Dutch-style cannabis cafes should be "explored".

Women Bring Fresh Blood to Drug War

jeremiah — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:45:31 -0800

Guillermina Castro Lopez, a mother of three, is serving 15 years in a Mexican prison for helping a trafficker smuggle 2 pounds of heroin. (Photo by Don Bartlett)In the story making the rounds here in Mexico's drug capital, the setting is a beauty parlor. A woman with wealth obtained legally criticizes a younger patron who is married to a trafficker. The "narco-wife" orders the hairdresser to shave the first woman's head. Terrified, the hairdresser complies.

Boomers See Views Relaxing on Marijuana

jeremiah — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 00:41:19 -0800

Joe Lee, 62, a regular pot smoker, runs a vintage-record shop in Rockville. He says he has noticed more public acceptance of the drug than when he used it while an art student in Baltimore in the 1960s. (Photo by Bill O'leary)Smoking pot isn't what it used to be for Joe Lee, a 62-year-old vintage-record dealer in Rockville.

Back in the late 1960s, as an art student in Baltimore, he kept his landlord in a constant state of suspicion, with clouds of marijuana smoke poorly masked by clouds of incense.

Marc Emery's Prison Potcast - Episode #7

jeremiah — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 16:44:29 -0800

CANNABIS CULTURE - Marc discusses the history of his continuing conflict with Canadian and US authorities in Episode #7 of the Prison Potcast.

Marc outlines the unrelenting crusade of Vancouver police and American Drug Czar John Walters to see him put behind bars for selling marijuana seeds and using the profits to fund anti-prohibition activists and marijuana legalization groups.

Accept The Facts – and End This Futile 'War on Drugs'

jeremiah — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:51:03 -0800

Illustration by Eva Tatcheva

The proponents of the "war on drugs" are well-intentioned people who believe they are saving people from the nightmare of drug addiction and making the world safer. But this self-image has turned into a faith – and like all faiths, it can only be maintained by cultivating a deliberate blindness to the evidence.

Drug War Remembrance

jeremiah — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:13:14 -0800

Editors Note: This article was written last Remembrance Day by Steve Rolles of the UK's Transform Drug Policy Foundation. Besides a steady growth in US Troop levels, political strife, and death tolls, little has changed in Afghanistan - and this post is as poignant today as it was a year ago.

Should Pot Be Legal?

jeremiah — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 09:28:36 -0800

At left, Dave Evans of the Drug Free America Foundation. At right, Judge James Gray, a pro-marijuana advocate.Editor's Note: This is the first installment of a two-part debate CBS News.com is hosting between James P. Gray, a retired Orange County, Calif. judge who nowadays is a speaker for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, and David Evans, an author and advisor to the Drug Free America Foundation. Part 2 will be published on Tuesday.

Baldwin Co. to Use Stimulus Money for Drug Task Force

Loretta Nall — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:38:50 -0800

This is the definition of insanity. Take money that was intended to help create jobs and use it to drive the prison population higher so tax payers will be forced to pay for housing more non-violent drug offenders.

Montgomery Advertiser

BAY MINETTE -- The Baldwin County Drug Task Force will use $465,705 in economic stimulus funds to help the unit investigate, arrest and prosecute drug offenders.

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Lies About Marijuana Drive People to a Much More Harmful Drug - Booze

jeremiah — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:43:42 -0800

Professor David Nutt didn’t play the game. As the chief drug policy advisor in the British Government, an unspoken part of his job description was to help maintain a public fiction about marijuana – or cannabis, as it is known in the U.K. and other parts of the world. Specifically, he was expected to further the misperception of cannabis as a substance worthy of being classified and prohibited in a manner similar to more dangerous drugs like heroin and cocaine.

Mexican Mayor Announces Death of Drug Boss Hours Before Body Found

jeremiah — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 09:51:42 -0800

Mauricio Fernandez, the mayor of San Pedro Garza GarciaMauricio Fernandez could have been forgiven for sounding triumphant when he announced that the drug boss who had threatened to assassinate him had been shot dead by police in Mexico City.

Fernandez, the mayor of San Pedro Garza Garcia, the country's wealthiest municipality, was applauded when he revealed that Hector 'Black' Saldaña, a cartel chief turned kidnapper, had been killed.

What Sentence for Marijuana Seed Dealer?

jeremiah — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:42:56 -0700

Is he a hardened on-line marijuana dealer or an enterprising entrepreneur?

A Montreal judge will decide and sentence him in the way he sees fit.

The Crown says Richard Hratch Bagdadlian knew exactly what he was doing when he broke the law and wants him to serve five years behind bars.

The RCMP arrested him for exporting and importing marijuana seeds on the Web.

Investigators say the company got 30 orders a day, at 100 dollars per order, buying and selling seeds all over the world.

DEA Agents Forced into Afghan War

Kirk Tousaw — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 08:37:57 -0700

Digby has a disturbing post on how several DEA helicopter pilots have apparently been pressured into service in Afghanistan.

Read "Hullabaloo"

It seems that our two abstract, endless Orwellian wars — the War on Drugs and the War on Terror — have officially merged. And the complications stemming from that decision are going to be immense. What are we fighting for again?

What Two Super-Jocks Can Tell Us About the Disastrous War on Pot

jeremiah — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:59:08 -0700

For better or worse, our American Idiocracy has come to rely on athletes as national pedagogues. Michael Jordan educated the country about commitment and just doing it. A.C. Green lectured us about sexual caution. Serena Williams and John McEnroe taught us what sportsmanship is -- and is not. And Charles Barkley outlined how society should define role models.

Minnesota Court Rules Bong Water Illegal

jeremiah — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:44:03 -0700

Bong water can count as a controlled substance, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a decision that raises the threat of longer sentences for drug smokers who fail to dump the water out of their pipes.

In a 4-3 decision Thursday, the state's highest court said a person can be prosecuted for a first-degree drug crime for 25 grams or more of bong water that tests positive for a controlled substance.

Obama's Statement on Federal Medical Marijuana Busts

Ed Rosenthal — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:11:45 -0700

I was so overjoyed when I first heard about Obama’s statement regarding the prosecution of medical marijuana patients and caregivers that I started singing “Happy Days Are Here Again”. I was overjoyed that our Joints for Obama campaign had finally shown some results. As I understand it, the White House received over 10,000 joints.

Brutal Drug War Erupts in Rio

jeremiah — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:07:45 -0700

Many residents of some of Rio de Janeiro's worst slums are fleeing their homes to escape a drug war that has left part of the Brazilian city in ruins, and killed a dozen people.

Smoke rose from the smoldering wreckage of a police helicopter shot down by drug gangs Saturday, while eight buses burned and gunfire filled the air in the slum of Morro dos Macacos.

Police say the fighting broke out early Saturday when one of the city's three main drug gangs invaded the area in an attempt to expand its territory.

President Reagan's Sec. of State Against the Drug War

Loretta Nall — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 08:43:19 -0700

This is a great piece from a very respectable and influential person.

Wall Street Journal
George Shultz on the Drug War
The former secretary of state has long doubted the wisdom of interdiction.

Ottawa
By MARY ANASTASIA O'GRADY

When George P. Shultz took office as Ronald Reagan's secretary of state in 1982, his first trip out of the country was to Canada. His second was to Mexico.

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Noam Chomsky deconstructs the drug war

David Malmo-Levine — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 19:13:50 -0700

For those of you who have never heard of him, Noam Chomsky is the most quoted living human being:

According to the Arts and Humanities Citation Index in 1992, Chomsky was cited as a source more often than any other living scholar during the 1980–92 period, and was the eighth most-cited source.[13][14][15]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky

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He has opposed the U.S. global "war on drugs" numerous times. For example:

War on Drugs Conference: Legalize Marijuana, Participants Say

jeremiah — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 10:08:02 -0700

David Courtwright spoke about the history of drug abuse Tuesday at the Plaza Theatre. (Victor Calzada / El Paso Times)Legalizing marijuana in the United States would weaken Mexico's powerful drug cartels, panelists at a War on Drugs conference said Tuesday.

"If you take away half of their money, it will hurt them," said William Martin, a sociology professor at Rice University who studies drug abuse and government policy. "You are not going to break them, but you will hurt them."

Rahim Jaffer, Latest Example of Conservative Hypocrisy

jeremiah — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 11:35:30 -0700

Rahim Jaffer, the former Conservative caucus chair, was recently arrested for drunk driving and cocaine possession.

After 12 years as a Member of Parliament, Jaffer lost the last election in part for his attacks on the NDP Leader Jack Layton for his progressive stance on marijuana. Jaffer implied that Mr. Layton's comments were a threat to children and communities.

Marijuana Arrests Drop For First Time Since 2002

jeremiah — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 10:02:01 -0700

Drug War protester at Huntington Beach, Calif. (Photo by The November Coalition)Marijuana arrests in the United States declined in 2008 -- the first such drop since 2002 -- according to figures released by the FBI today.

One Drug Arrest Every 18 Seconds in The US

jeremiah — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 08:01:52 -0700

A group of police and judges who want to legalize drugs pointed to new FBI numbers released today as evidence that the "war on drugs" is a failure that can never be won. The data, from the FBI's "Crime in the United States" report, shows that in 2008 there were 1,702,537 arrests for drug law violations, or one drug arrest every 18 seconds.

The Racism of Marijuana Prohibition

jeremiah — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 09:58:51 -0700

Illustration by Larmee, indymedia.orgThe Times' Aug. 30 article, "Marijuana’s new high life," does a great job describing the cultural mainstreaming of marijuana. Pot is indeed flourishing in "civilized society" as never before, and the movement to end decades of failed prohibition has picked up unprecedented momentum. But that debate has largely ignored the people most impacted by our current policies -- the rising number of people, particularly young people of color, arrested on marijuana charges each year.