Talking about pot makes for good politics for politicians who don't want to talk things that matter. For the left, talking about weed is much more fun than talking about say, the economy or terrorism - neither of which they understand. And so they talk about legalizing marijuana, media dutifully picks it up and it's a handy distraction from all that other stuff. I don't care about marijuana. I know people who smoke it and they don't seem to care if it's legal or not. They know where to get it if they want some. [continues 586 words]
Both Topics Are Intertwined and Must Be Addressed Together The faces of frightened young children huddling together just inside our border are heartrending. Texas Gov. Rick Perry has the right attitude. Enough talk. Let's act. Merely deploying National Guard units underscores the pressing need for a national dialogue that places immigration into a more sensible context. Too many politicians miss the real issues and exploit the topic for partisan gain. Immigration is a symptom. Immigrants have different motives for coming here, but a core problem stems from the Mexican drug war that has claimed more than 105,000 lives on our doorstep, and threatens our families and children in perhaps a thousand U.S. cities. [continues 539 words]
The only time I ever thought about where the illegal drugs I was purchasing might have come from was when I lucked up in the purchase of some particularly potent cocaine. I didn't ask about the urgency to move such product at such cheap prices, but when we got the eight ball back to our dinghy hotel room and started to break it up, we saw it: a mysterious-looking stamp pressed in the smooth side of the lump of coke, a skull and some words in Spanish prominent in the indention. The sight of it filled me with a little bit of unease, because it was further proof that we were indulging in a game that could have had potentially deadly consequences. It was obviously from someplace south of the border, and rather than contemplate the violence that had accompanied it north to the streets of Myrtle Beach, S.C., we busted it up and proceeded to get high and not think of it again. [continues 850 words]
When Bill Clinton ran for president in 1992, he admitted that he had "experimented with marijuana," but said he "didn't like it," "didn't inhale it" and "never tried it again." Whatever the accuracy of that statement, he was accused of pandering to the marijuana-wary voting public. Flash forward to the early stages of the 2008 presidential campaign. At an event in Iowa, then-candidate Barack Obama disclosed that he had not only smoked marijuana as a young man, 7but inhaled it, too. "That was the point," he said. The public responded with a shrug. [continues 886 words]
If the Obama administration is to be believed, America's infamous "War on Drugs" is over. In its most recent National Drug Control Strategy, released last week, officials promised a more humane and sympathetic approach to drug users and addiction. Out, the report suggests, are "tough on crime" policies. Rather than more police and more prisons, officials talk about public health and education. They promise to use evidence-based practices to combat drug abuse. And they want to use compassionate messaging and successful reentry programs to reduce the stigma drug offenders and addicts face. [continues 695 words]
Good governance is about good stewardship. Government executives always should consider how best to use the government's vast assets, including personnel, money and materials. In this light, continued opposition by the Drug Enforcement Administration to the legalization of cannabis - marijuana - is not only a losing battle but a waste of taxpayer money, particularly when the president, Congress and an increasing number of state legislatures are responding to the will of the people by decriminalizing nonviolent marijuana use and possession. Our federal tax dollars would be better spent by responding to the current widespread increase of heroin use in ways that will prevent continued abuse, reduce harm to users and provide for greater public safety. [continues 666 words]
There was the grandmother who hid heroin in the rails of her wheelchair. The pair of women who sewed cocaine packets into their hair extensions. And the Trinidadian man who stuffed cocaine in frozen goat meat. For years, a steady parade of drug smugglers have tried all sorts of ways to ferry contraband into the United States through Kennedy International Airport in Queens, posing a challenge not only to Customs and Border Protection officers, but also to federal prosecutors. To avoid clogging up the court, the United States attorney's office in Brooklyn has embraced a strategic approach that allows couriers to plead guilty and offer information in return for lighter sentences. The policy reflected a view among many prosecutors that the mandatory minimum sentences for drug-related offenses - which require prison terms of five years and higher in these smuggling cases - were too harsh on defendants who were typically nonviolent and disadvantaged. [continues 1384 words]
If you think local police look increasingly like soldiers armed for battle instead of civil servants responsible for protecting you, it's not your imagination. As noted in the Journal's recent three-part series analyzing "mission creep" at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the federal government funnels millions of tax dollars to local police departments in the form of grants used to purchase high-powered paramilitary style weapons and other gear. Law enforcement agencies across the country are also tapping into a military surplus program to acquire Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, or MRAPs, that were used in Iraq and Afghanistan. [continues 623 words]
Police are supposed to serve and protect, but increasingly special police units are being used to attack with military-style raids to serve search warrants or look for drugs. Sometimes these pumped-up Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) operations target the wrong house or injure children living with a suspect. Last month in Georgia, for instance, a SWAT team looking for drugs battered down the door of a home in the middle of the night and tossed in a stun grenade that landed in a playpen where a 19-month-old boy was sleeping. The toddler, whose family was visiting the home, suffered serious injury and was put in a medically-induced coma. No drugs were found. [continues 476 words]
Colorado's 40 casinos - and hundreds of others, including in the gaming mecca in Las Vegas - are bound by the same money-reporting rules that have made banks reluctant to let legal marijuana businesses open bank accounts, federal authorities now say. That means casinos can keep anyone associated with legal weed enterprises-from dispensary to grow operations - away from gaming tables anywhere in the country. And if they do allow them to play, casinos must file the same suspicious activity reports banks must file whenever they handle money derived from pot profits, according to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, a division of the U.S. Department of the Treasury. [continues 911 words]
The Ontario Election Shows the Degree to Which Voters Have Written Off Politicians As a Class With only days to go before a federal byelection in the Toronto riding formerly held by Liberal Jim Karygiannis, Conservatives have begun circulating a leaflet that portrays Justin Trudeau as a pot-happy drug dealer, eager to get kids hooked on drugs. Well, it's kind of, sort of, half true: horrifically distorted, but based on the real Liberal proposal to decriminalize marijuana, which could open the way to a legal retail trade. Except the Liberal plan would include strict controls aimed at restricting sales, both to put criminals out of business and to protect kids from easily accessible dope. [continues 568 words]
JONATHAN BROWN chews khat with immigrants in Sheffield and hears conflicting views about the drug's ban next week I like to be happy on one day, so I like to chew. It gives me energy. If I lose that day, what will I do? With trembling fingers Abdul Fatah unties the banana skin holding the red-green stalks of khat and steadily pulls away the soft new shoots, discarding the leaves before folding them into a wad and starting to chew. [continues 618 words]
Let's End Hyperbolic Warnings and Focus on Actual Threats - Like Prescription Pills. Since its inception, the war on drugs has essentially been based on fear-mongering to children. Drugs will ruin your life! Buying drugs gives money to terrorists! One puff of a joint, a lifetime of consequences! All these warnings have done little to reduce drug use, but they have instilled a deep sense of cynicism in far too many kids. With changes in drug laws across the country, perhaps it is time we started to tell children the truth: No one is going to die from overdosing on marijuana. Prescription painkillers are a different story. [continues 520 words]
The hypocrisy of America's cannabis policy finally does our writer in by J.M. Smith Dick Cheney sits on a porch step with his head in his hands. It's 3 a.m. and the street is deserted. A hint of fading spring is in the predawn desert air, but the heat of summer is poised to take hold. The temperature rises fast when the Arizona sun comes up, but Cheney will be long gone by then. J.M. Smith is dead. Cheney's work here is done. [continues 1013 words]
Judy and John Terlaje are running out of options for their son who has epilepsy. "Through the years, we've probably spent $10,000 in medical bills," Judy Terlaje said. "That's how often he was at the ER." The couple spoke during the University of Guam Medical Marijuana Forum yesterday at the Jesus and Eugenia Leon Guerrero School of Business and Public Adminstration building. Students gasped to hear of the years of hospital visits, the financial cost and the impact 11 medications had on 8-year-old Dylan Terlaje since he was 3 months old. [continues 492 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Drug Enforcement Administration on Wednesday broadened its national crackdown on synthetic drug manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers as federal agents served hundreds of search and arrest warrants in at least 25 states. Agents served warrants at homes, warehouses and smoke shops beginning early morning, DEA spokesman Rusty Payne said. The largest single operation was a statewide effort in Alabama. Agents also were active in 28 other states. The DEA said agents made more than 150 arrests and served about 200 warrants. Federal, state and local authorities seized hundreds of thousands of individual packets of synthetic drugs and hundreds of kilograms of synthetic products used to make the drugs. [continues 230 words]
Law enforcement officers arrested nine suspected members of an international drug ring that marketed a synthetic form of marijuana called Spice, a drug that has been linked to serious illnesses, hallucinations and even death. "Spice is poison and pain deceptively packaged as pleasure," said 18th Judicial District Attorney George Brauchler. It is sold in gas stations and corner shops under product names like "Sexy Monkey" and "Crazy Clown." Some packages are labeled "Not for Human Consumption." Beginning at 7 a.m., federal, state and local law enforcement officers from around the country arrested nine people on federal charges originating in Colorado's Federal District Court. Of those, five face related state charges in Denver and Arapahoe counties, authorities said [continues 526 words]
It swallowed people up. That's what it really did, if you want to know the truth. It swallowed them up whole, swallowed them up by the millions. In the process, it hollowed out communities, broke families, stranded hope. Politicians brayed that they were being "tough on crime" - as if anyone is really in favor of crime - as they imposed ever longer and more inflexible sentences for nonviolent drug offenses. But the "War on Drugs" didn't hurt drugs at all: Usage rose by 2,800 percent - that's not a typo - in the 40 years after it began in 1971. [continues 537 words]
It swallowed people up. That's what it really did, if you want to know the truth. It swallowed them up whole, swallowed them up by the millions. In the process, it hollowed out communities, broke families, stranded hope. Politicians brayed that they were being "tough on crime" as if anyone is really in favor of crime as they imposed ever longer and more inflexible sentences for nonviolent drug offenses. But the "War on Drugs" didn't hurt drugs at all: Usage rose by 2,800 percent that's not a typo - in the 40 years after it began in 1971. The War also made America the biggest jailer on Earth and drained a trillion dollars still not a typo from the treasury. [continues 398 words]
Fixing Jail Time Disparities Doesn't End at War on Drugs, Leonard Pitts Says It swallowed people up. That's what it really did, if you want to know the truth. It swallowed them up whole, swallowed them up by the millions. In the process, it hollowed out communities, broke families, stranded hope. Politicians brayed that they were being "tough on crime" - as if anyone is really in favor of crime - as they imposed ever longer and more inflexible sentences for nonviolent drug offenses. But the War on Drugs didn't hurt drugs at all: Usage rose by 2,800 percent - that's not a typo - in the 40 years after it began in 1971. The War also made America the biggest jailer on earth and drained $1 trillion - also not a typo - from the treasury. [continues 485 words]