Pubdate: Wed, 15 Mar 2006
Source: Anderson Valley Advertiser (CA)
Column: Cannabinotes
Copyright: 2006 Anderson Valley Advertiser
Contact:  http://www.theava.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2667
Author: Fred Gardner
Note: Indented sections indicated *
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v06/n229/a09.html?302097
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

SINGLE-ISSUE OPPORTUNISM

Last week C-Notes described the unmitigated gratitude with which 
pro-marijuana activists greeted an anti-prohibition op-ed by George 
Melloan in the Wall St. Journal.  I questioned Melloan's motives and 
his decency, quoting a subsequent op-ed in which he made light of the 
hundreds of thousands of deaths caused by the U.S. bombing and 
embargo of Iraq between 1991 and 2003. I did not anticipate that 
knocking George Melloan in the Anderson Valley Advertiser would annoy 
"progressive" activists back East, but it did, thanks to the 
Internet. A participant in the Alliance of Reform Organizations' 
chatroom forwarded this sigh of contempt from Doug McVay, Director of 
Research, Common Sense for Drug Policy, and Editor/Webmaster, Drug War Facts:

*"At the risk of being accused of being either pedantic or abrasive, 
I want to give my opinion on this article: So what? What's the point, Fred?"  *

The point was plainly stated: in the instant that drug-legalization 
advocates praise George Melloan for supporting their agenda, they 
- -you, Doug-confer credibility on his, which is global control by 
capital enforced by the U.S. military.

*"The movement in general also praises Milton Friedman, George 
Schultz, William Buckley, and any number of others.

We don't necessarily agree with their politics.

We may in fact completely oppose their politics other than this one 
issue... -- heck, there's not a whole lot of political agreement 
among ARO members.

But most of us still praise them for their pro-legalization stance." *

I don't pretend to speak for "the movement in general."  I'm old 
enough to recall when "the movement" meant a lot more than the single 
issue to which you implicitly refer.

In 1968 identifying with "the movement" -which millions of Americans 
did-meant being for peace, civil rights, civil liberties, women's 
liberation, defense of the environment against corporate plunder, an 
end to discrimination of all kinds, personal freedom (including the 
freedom to smoke marijuana), and some measure of economic equality 
(which Martin Luther King had begun to define as "socialism" before 
they killed him). Within a few years "the movement," instead of 
fusing into a party, had fissioned into 100 separate-interest groups 
pursuing piecemeal goals.

NORML, founded by Keith Stroup (a young lawyer who had worked for 
Ralph Nader) and funded mainly by Hugh Hefner of Playboy, typified this trend.

It makes sense that enlightened capitalists would prefer hundreds of 
separate-interest groups to a party capable of challenging the 
rich/poor system.

*"So personally, in that context, I have to ask: Fred, who cares 
about your bloody politics?

What does that have to do with helping patients, let alone 
improving/reforming drug control policies?"  *

I didn't send my AVA column to your list or ask you to care about my 
take on things.

I don't expect you to. The people I write for are, like me, 
relatively powerless; people on the ARO list have some clout, or 
think they do. Tom O'Connell, MD, once offered to "sponsor" me for 
the list, but I recalled an old editor's warning about "chronophages" 
and "group gropes," and decided to pass. Or maybe it was just fear of 
rejection.

Even if they let me in I would have reported on what they were 
chit-chatting about and been drummed out for unprofessional 
violations of intimacy.

What I do to help patients directly is none of your beeswax. (I 
assure you I have standing -my family's prohibition-related tragedy 
is endless.) On the political front, I've been a close friend and 
ally of Dennis Peron's since the 1970s, and was peripherally involved 
in the Prop 215 campaign (to which almost everybody on the ARO list 
owes their present livelihood). After 215 passed I produced 
occasional leaflets to update members of the San Francisco Cannabis 
Buyers Club on relevant developments, legal, political and 
scientific. I couldn't get the backing to do a statewide newsletter 
and I couldn't afford to leave my day job, but fortunately the job 
itself (at UC Med Center and then a job at the district attorney's 
office) enabled me to follow the medical marijuana story in detail. 
The AVA column, launched in the summer of 2002, is about 90% straight 
reportage, 10% political analysis.

I hope that even people who disagree with or have no use for the 
analysis, such as you, Doug, get something from the reporting.

Also in 2002 I helped Tod Mikuriya, MD, launch a journal, 
O'Shaughnessy's, in which the small but growing group of pro-cannabis 
California doctors publish their findings and observations. These 
15-20 doctors have done more actual political organizing -brought 
more adherents to the medical marijuana movement-than all the 
functionaries on the payrolls of MPP, DPA et al. The patients, as 
Philip A. Denney, MD, has observed, become organizers in turn as they 
explain to friends, loved ones and acquaintances that their cannabis 
use really is medicinal and proving by their own example that getting 
a doctor's approval is do-able. Denney's Law: the real movement grows 
by conversation and personal example.

A corollary: Almost anyone who has ever gotten seriously involved 
with a cause can recall who turned them on to it.

The pro-cannabis doctors, with several minor exceptions, receive no 
funding from the reform organizations that spend millions annually on 
lobbying and related efforts.

In the '60s the balance of power and prestige between funders and 
organizers in the field seemed very different. The funders didn't 
script or micromanage or impose their tactical line on Stokely 
Carmichael. They gave money to SNCC to support his work, not to 
direct or deflect it. Nowadays the tail is wagging the dog. Would-be 
organizers in California submit grant proposals aimed at and 
rewritten by self-styled political masterminds in New York and 
Washington, D.C. Or the masterminds dream up projects and pay people 
to carry them out. The power of money within "the movement" parallels 
the power of money in the unjust society at large. Wealth's in the 
saddle, we lost the battle, honey, only money matters....

*"The difficult part of building a coalition is saying: 'I disagree 
with you about absolutely everything except this one thing, and 
that's the one thing that we're going to work together on. The fact 
that we oppose each other on everything else will make our position 
on this the more convincing. If we can stop from killing or trashing 
each other, we will win.'" *

Why assume that a coalition is a good thing at all times and in all 
circumstances? Sometimes, as they say, "You lie down with dogs, you 
wake up with fleas." The desire to build a coalition with rightwing 
politicians is prevalent now among reform lobbyists on the East 
Coast. Their/your goals are finite, to be achieved via electoral 
politics, the media, the courts, and K Street techniques like direct 
mail (guaranteeing ongoing employment in those sectors, and many 
lunches for Republican staffers). In due course, getting marijuana 
moved to Schedule 2 will be hailed as the greatest victory since 
affirmative action (a "solution" to the "problem" that helps 1/10th 
of the people deserving and in need of help). "Medical marijuana" is 
similarly alliterative, and also has the potential to be a 10% 
solution, with doctors writing triplicate prescriptions according to 
DEA practice standards.

*"I personally disagree with George Melloan and for that matter the 
Wall Street Journal in general."  *

Do you complain in public about his and their "bloody politics?" I 
truly don't understand how you can separate what you call "personal 
politics" (by which you apparently mean your whole world view) from 
your work for CSDP. As if there's no connection between the war on 
drugs and other issues.

As if we mustn't apply the lessons we've learned in exposing the 
phony war on drugs while our fellow citizens get misled (by Melloan 
and his ilk) into waging a phony war on terror. As if the 
responsibility of an intellectual is to deny historical and political 
connections instead of revealing and explaining them... Did you 
complain when Keith Stroup of NORML, Steph Sherer of ASA, Ethan 
Nadelmann of DPA, Rob Kampia of MPP, and Angel Raich (on instructions 
from Fenton Communications) all endorsed the "war on 
terror?"  Weren't they introducing an extraneous issue into the 
drug-policy-reform discussion? How come you didn't protest in the 
high-level chat room?

*" But when he agrees with my position on drug policy reform I will 
trumpet that to the heavens and I will gladly use his agreement with 
me -- shamelessly -- to proselytize among those who otherwise agree 
politically with WSJ... Because I think that reforming drug policy is 
a lot more important than insisting that everyone agree with my 
personal politics." *

I'm not in a position to insist that anyone agree with me, 
politically. To repeat: I'm relatively powerless.

Are you suggesting that if I had power I'd insist on conformity? What 
makes you think that? It's way off.

I'm not in touch with anybody who's on the WSJ wavelength and would 
be impressed with quotes from Melloan. But I knew plenty of rightwing 
cops and DAs when I worked at the Hall of Justice, and I can imagine 
a conversation with a couple of them about the Melloan column.

It's a plausible scenario -I had a bulletin board outside my office 
and instead of just posting clips about SFDA (the traditional 
single-issue approach) I posted other articles relevant to the 
law-enforcement mission, and Melloan's well might have made the 
board. So there I am tacking up press clips and Murphy and Clark come 
by and read Melloan over my shoulder.

My commentary: "Why now, Murph? Why is this bloodthirsty motherfucker 
coming out for drug legalization now? Oh, here it is: Evo Morales! 
The natives are getting restless in South America! And Bush's 
approval ratings are down to 30%-the natives are getting restless 
here, too. Didn't I always tell you guys they'd reschedule pot when 
the ruling class really needed a sop to throw the masses? 'Let's take 
their jobs, take their pensions, take their medical care, and if we 
let them smoke their pot in peace, they'll say "Thank you."' Murphy 
and Clark would laugh understandingly, I'm pretty sure, and I'd make 
one more point: "They don't really need the war on drugs anymore.

They've got 'terror' and 'gangs.'"
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom