Dear Editor: The writer of this letter is very naive and has not thought through the drug related problems we face. The world would be better without pollution, George Bush, and a whole lot of things. Wish logic is not going to solve any problems. The only choice we have in dealing with drugs is whether we allow the criminal black markets to supply them or we provide them in legal regulated markets where age and quality controls can be enforced. Which of these two choices do you prefer? Santa Cruz, CA. [end]
WASHINGTON -- On a website he calls ExposeObama.com, Floyd G. Brown, the producer of the Willie Horton ad that helped defeat Michael S. Dukakis in 1988, is preparing an encore. Brown is raising money for a series of ads that he says will show Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) to be out of touch on an issue of fundamental concern to voters: violent crime. One spot already making the rounds on the Internet attacks the presumptive Democratic nominee for opposing a bill while he was a state legislator that would have extended the death penalty to gang-related murders. [continues 935 words]
The Democratic Presidential frontrunner talks timber payments, Gordon Smith and of course tattoos. Sen. Barack Obama once remarked on the long odds of a "skinny guy from the South Side with a funny name" finding success in American politics. How much more improbable then that Oregon - an overwhelmingly white state 1,700 miles from his Chicago home - could finally put the Illinois senator over the top this Tuesday, May 20, in his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. The Obama campaign looks to that date as the day to finally declare victory over Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), after an anticipated Oregon win gives Obama a majority of pledged delegates nationwide. Little wonder then that Obama's third Oregon swing May 9-10 felt more like a victory lap than a campaign stop. In Beaverton, Albany, Eugene and Bend, Obama test-drove a new strategy of targeting Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and largely ignoring Clinton. [continues 766 words]
THREE REGIONAL leaders were among guests of honour at a reception hosted by United States Ambassador Mary Ourisman on Thursday night. St Lucia Prime Minister Stephenson King, Roosevelt Skerrit of Dominica and Keith Mitchell of Grenada were among dignitaries mingling at Ourisman's residence. Also in the midst was the United States Assistant Secretary of State Tom Shannon, who had a follow-up meeting to the one which Prime Minister David Thompson attended in Washington last week with United States President George Bush and Secretary of State Condeleezza Rice. [continues 204 words]
Some drug task forces in Montana and across the nation could face tough choices after a significant cut in their major source of funding. "This is the most critical issue we've faced in the last 10 years for drug enforcement funding," said Jeff Faycosh, a member of the Montana Narcotics Officers Association. There is $170.4 million set aside in the national budget in the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant in fiscal year 2008, which begins July 1. That's a decrease of about 67 percent from the FY 2007 total of $520 million. The Byrne grant is the largest source of drug enforcement funding in almost every state, according to an Associated Press report. In FY 2007, Montana got about $1.5 million in Byrne money, Faycosh said. For the 2008 budget year, Montana is projected to get about $460,000, he said. [continues 700 words]
Think of drugs, and you think of Colombia, Thailand, Afghanistan. But Canada? Nice, peaceful, dull Canada? Believe it or not, there are parts of the country where cannabis provides more jobs than logging, mining, oil and gas combined. Misha Glenny investigates, in the first of two extracts from his new book on organised crime "Open the back for me, please, Dan." Quiet yet firm - that's how they speak around Metaline Falls, in the far north of Washington State. Dan Wheeler walked around his pick-up truck and unbolted the tray. "Let's clear away all that stuff, please, Dan." Wheeler started hauling the grubby but neatly piled strips of chromium that were lying on the flatbed. The US customs officer at the border with Canada helped by shifting the snow chains, toolbox, rags, oilcans and the detritus common to an artisan's vehicle. [continues 2716 words]
Prohibition Is the Problem "The Drug War has arguably been the single most devastating, dysfunctional social policy since slavery." --Norm Stamper, Retired Chief of Police, Seattle In the long history of human folly and futility, America's War on Drugs has surely earned a special place of honor. Not satisfied that America was fighting a no-win war in Vietnam, in 1971 President Richard Nixon declared a War on Drugs, creating the Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention. Nearly 40 years and hundreds of billions of dollars later, we are still fighting that war, with no end in sight. And the casualties keep piling up. The first, of course, was truth, as Aeschylus reminded us long ago. Other casualties have been our civil liberties and our trust in our government and leaders. [continues 699 words]
It remains unclear why the U.S. Food and Drug Administration continues to classify marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug, the most dangerous classification available along with heroin, PCP (angel dust) and LSD, while in 1998 classifying Marinol, a synthetic THC (the main psychoactive ingredient in marijuana), as a Schedule 3 drug. This despite polls showing most Americans would support reclassification. Even a reclassification of marijuana to a Schedule 2 category such as cocaine and coca leaves, raw opium and poppy straw, morphine and methamphetamines, would allow physicians to prescribe it for medical patients and pharmacies to dispense it. [continues 576 words]
When Hillary Rodham Clinton announced her campaign for the Senate in 2000, she declared - emphatically, according to an interviewer - that she supported the death penalty. When Barack Obama first ran for the Illinois state Senate in 1996, he said in a campaign questionnaire that he opposed capital punishment. Their positions seemed to reflect their political roots - Clinton, the moderate "New Democrat," a term she has used to describe herself; Obama, the insurgent who got his start as a community organizer. But times change, and so do candidates, particularly on issues that loom as potential minefields for Democrats with presidential ambitions. It's a less delicate topic for Republicans, whose leading candidates - with the exception of maverick Rep. Ron Paul - espouse time-tested, nearly identical law-and-order platforms. [continues 1376 words]
Every week for the next 52 weeks, Susan Boyd will be "educating" Prime Minister Stephen Harper about harm reduction and drug regulation by sending him a letter. Vancouver-based Boyd is an associate professor in the studies in policy and practice program and a senior research fellow at the Centre for Addictions Research of B.C., both at the University of Victoria. She told the Georgia Straight she has been "interested in drug policy for almost 20 years" and is part of the Vancouver-based Beyond Prohibition Coalition. [continues 555 words]
If the Missouri River Drug Task Force loses the majority of its funding, which is on the table, the communities the unit serves will not only see a rise in drug use but also general crime, according to officials. Task force detectives were instrumental in solving the last five homicides in Helena, all of which were drug-related. They used networks of informants to gather incriminating information on the murders. Investigators say they also spend many hours a week on assaults, burglaries and other drug-related crimes. [continues 779 words]
Report Understates Role Heroin Plays In Destabilizing Afghanistan John Manley's otherwise brutally frank assessment of the dismal situation facing Canada and other countries fighting in Afghanistan curiously glosses over one of the most serious and intractable enemies of the entire effort: Opium. Last week's controversial report by a panel of experts headed by the former Liberal cabinet minister acknowledges only that "the opium trade is a complicating factor in Afghan security and it is both a result of violent instability and a contributor to it. [continues 548 words]
John Manley's otherwise brutally frank assessment of the dismal situation facing Canada and other countries fighting in Afghanistan, curiously glosses over one of the most serious and intractable enemies of the entire effort: Opium. This week's controversial report by a panel of experts headed by the former Liberal cabinet minister acknowledges only that "the opium trade is a complicating factor in Afghan security, and it is both a result of violent instability and a contributor to it. "Opium profits flow to the Taliban, to criminal elements and to corrupt government officials," the Manley report notes. "Coherent counter-narcotics strategies need to be adopted by all relevant agencies." [continues 512 words]
Many Bay area medical cannabis dispensary operators, including Marin's own lyrical Lynette Shaw, rallied in Downtown San Francisco on December 20th in protest of the Drug Enforcement Administration's recent execution of another attack on medical cannabis dispensaries. In an effort to overcome the obstacles raised in the raid tactics the DEA employed in earlier attempts to circumvent a compassionate community of medical cannabis connoisseurs, the feds have resorted to sending letters to landlords who rent commercial space to medical cannabis providers, first in Southern California back in July and more recently here in the Bay area. Landlords who own space occupied by medical cannabis dispensaries in Marin, San Francisco, and Alameda counties received letters the second week in December. [continues 1127 words]
Oroville resident and founder of the Drug Endangered Children's program, Sue Webber-Brown, was recently invited to meet with President George Bush. She is one of 12 people who received a special invitation to speak to the president about their work in drug prevention programs. President Bush hosted meetings on "Teen Drug Use" on Dec. 11, and he had a press conference in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to White House concerning the results of the "Monitoring the Future" study conducted by the University of Michigan. [continues 1921 words]
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Combating our nation's substance abuse problem requires engaged citizens in every community -- such as those involved with Operation UNITE's efforts in Eastern Kentucky, President George Bush said Tuesday during a press conference. "All Americans have a responsibility to encourage people to turn away from the losing spiral of addiction and to make good choices in life. But the great thing about our country, and the reason I'm so optimistic, is there are thousands and thousands of people willing to take the lead in their own communities -- people who have seen a problem and said, we're going to do something about it, like this good woman right here from Eastern Kentucky," said Bush, pointing to UNITE President/CEO Karen Engle. [continues 457 words]
Editor: Since the terrorist attacks of 9/11 in New York, the politics of North America have moved further and further to the right. The "Conservatives" of Stephen Harper had their origins in the Alberta Reform Party of Preston Manning-the extreme religious right-wing, which became the Canadian Alliance and then became the new Conservative Party. Harper was strongly influenced by the American system of government, and when the corrupt Liberal Party began to crumble they were replaced by the Conservatives who immediately reaffirmed Canada's commitment to George Bush's war in Afghanistan. Although some support Canada's involvement, I do not. Like Vietnam and the war in Iraq, it appears to be a war that cannot be won. [continues 667 words]
BARBADOS MAY soon be forced to absorb more criminal deportees from the United States. The criminal aliens who are soon to be released were originally sent to prison for drug dealing and it is expected that about 3 500 inmates, some of them from the Caribbean, Bajans included, could have their terms shortened within the next few months. That's going to happen because of a decision by the United States Sentencing Commission to lighten punishment retroactively for some drug crimes. It's a move that could eventually free as many as 20 000 inmates who were sent to federal prison for drug dealing. [continues 803 words]
I am dumbstruck by a recent letter writer's not-so-thoughtful letter headlined "Obama's drug use is mostly ignored." Unless you have been asleep this past decade we have had two presidents dancing around the truth of their past drug use, and their stories have been accepted by the American people. Bill Clinton didn't inhale and George Bush would never come clean about his irresponsible youth, depending solely on his father's influence to get out of drunk driving and worse. [continues 80 words]
Paul Stanford Is Oregon's "Drug Czar." Now He's Under Attack. Paul Stanford should be at the top of his game. After more than two decades growing, toking and agitating to legalize cannabis, the 47-year-old Portlander is now running the largest chain of medical-marijuana clinics in the nation. Stanford spends half his time jetting between home and Honolulu, Los Angeles, Denver and Seattle, visiting his clinics that have helped thousands gain medical-marijuana permits. His nonprofit, The Hemp & Cannabis (ahem, THC) Foundation, is on track to rake in $2 million this year. [continues 4019 words]
