Call it gangsta, call it hardcore or profane but anyone at the Snoop Dogg and Ice Cube show Saturday at the Enmax Centre had to admit it was one incredible party. With flagrant disregard for city smoking bylaws and drug laws, a couple of thousand avid fans were encouraged to light up and get high by the hip-hop acts including Canada's own Belly who gave a well-received opening performance. Lethbridge is definitely hip to the hop and dope to the dope as the Enmax centre air filled with the aroma of marijuana. [continues 320 words]
Editor: I feel compelled to answer Bal S. Boora's letter (Herald, Jan. 10) which asks Canadians to "ask the Harper government why it is so set against the Canadian Wheat Board when the majority of farmers support it. Whose interests are they representing?" Stephen Harper and his pals are serving themselves. They are not farmers. I doubt they have ever had soil under their fingernails in their lives. However, it is very easy for them to get their secretaries to look at sheets of paper and have them report back which numbers equal greatest profit for their pockets. [continues 300 words]
Editor: I applaud Gwynne Dyer and The Herald for the conviction to stand up and publish the truth in regards to prohibition! Sadly, unlike Gwynne Dyer and The Herald, a lot of media do not publish the truthful facts in regards to prohibition still to this very day in time. We know prohibition does not work for a fact; we have over 70 years of real time proof it causes a lot more harm then the prohibited drugs themselves. The big bully U.S.A. still insists on forcing their completely proven wrong, unjust and even immoral war on drugs and the harms that are associated with their war on drugs. It tends to make a lot of people see the U.S. as the most powerful terrorist in the world. The terrorists the U.S. is fighting are trying to do the exact same thing as the U.S. has done for all to many years now, to force their proven wrong, inappropriate, unjust and even immoral views on the whole world. Keith Fagin Calgary [end]
Editor: Regarding Gwynne Dyer's Jan. 7 column, there is a middle ground between drug prohibition and blanket legalization. Switzerland's heroin maintenance program has been shown to reduce disease, death and crime among chronic users. Providing addicts with standardized doses in a clinical setting eliminates many of the problems associated with heroin use. Heroin maintenance pilot projects are underway in Canada, England, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands. If expanded, prescription heroin maintenance would deprive organized crime of a core client base. This would render illegal heroin trafficking unprofitable and spare future generations addiction. [continues 123 words]
Editor: I am a legal marijuana patient in Canada due to the chronic indications of multiple sclerosis and a terrible pain in my face 24 hours a day called Tic Douloureux. I am also a retired law enforcement officer and one of Canada's busiest speakers for LEAP, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. I applaud The Herald's bravery on publishing the article To win, call a truce on the war on drugs, Jan. 7, by Gwynne Dyer. Gwynne interviewed some very powerful people. Jack Cole has been my inspiration in this movement, asking me to join LEAP over two and a half years ago. What an incredible mentor! [continues 188 words]
Barry Cooper's new DVD, Never Get Busted Again, which went on sale over the Internet late last month, will probably not sell very well outside the United States, because in most other countries the possession of marijuana for personal use is treated as a misdemeanour or simply ignored by the police. But it will sell very well in the U.S., where many thousands of casual marijuana users are hit with savage jail terms every year in a nationwide game of Russian roulette in which most people indulge their habit unharmed while a few unfortunates have their lives ruined. [continues 646 words]
Proposed Legislation Would Give Police More Power To Detect, Arrest Drivers Under The Influence Of Drugs After a concerned citizen spots a vehicle weaving from curb to curb along Scenic Drive, Lethbridge regional police are called to intervene. Const. Dave Easter stops the vehicle and, upon approaching the driver's side, recognizes the woman behind the wheel as a known drug user. Her passenger seat is littered with hypodermic syringes and pills and she demonstrates obvious signs of impairment. She's charged with drug-impaired driving and later convicted. [continues 648 words]
Editor: It is commendable to stop citizens from driving while honestly impaired (Tories unveil legislation to crack down on drug-impaired drivers, Nov. 22), as long as citizens who use cannabis responsibly are not targeted for simply having trace amounts of THC in their body. Just like responsible alcohol consumers having alcohol in their body may pass impairment tests, so too should cannabis consumers. Discriminating responsible cannabis users able to walk-the-line is unacceptable. This is important since various jurisdictions in North America, have attempted enacting laws targeting citizens with any trace amount of THC in their body as being impaired, yet is not a clear case of impairment. Dillon, Colo. [end]
Many people realize Alberta has a drug problem, with cocaine trading in downtown Lethbridge and drug dealers gunned down in Calgary. Not so many realize there are serious efforts, right here in Lethbridge, to reduce the harm caused by substance abuse of all kinds. But now a group of front-line agencies is responding to those issues and Susan Canning says the new Community Substance Abuse Response Team is part of a new, province-wide initiative. "Lethbridge is a good place to live," says Canning, manager at the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission here. "We want to work closely as agencies to make sure we don't have the same problems in Lethbridge that some communities like Fort McMurray are experiencing." [continues 458 words]
The Lethbridge area is Alberta's highest for alcohol-related deaths. Cocaine-related charges here have tripled over the last four years, police report. But on the positive side, Lethbridge is also the only community outside Calgary and Edmonton boasting a full range of alcohol-or drug-related treatment programs. More are on the way. And now more than a dozen Lethbridge-area agencies have joined forces to create a Community Substance Abuse Response Team. The initiative, announced Wednesday, will see public and non-profit agencies work together to create a community response to today's challenges and future developments. [continues 368 words]
Governing Conservatives ADD Teeth to Plan Originally Put Forward by Liberals OTTAWA (CP) - The federal Conservatives have brought in legislation to crack down on drug-impaired drivers - by resurrecting a plan first advanced by the Liberals, adding heavier fines and jail terms, and calling the result a Tory initiative. The bill, tabled Tuesday by Justice Minister Vic Toews, would also tighten laws against driving under the influence of alcohol, changing the rules of evidence to make it harder to challenge breathalyzer tests in court. [continues 513 words]
A neurologist from southern Alberta says the Premier's Task Force on Crystal Meth is bang-on when it says addicts should go into treatment rather than to jail. And Dr. Bill Tatton agrees, too, with the report's insistence that crystal meth producers and dealers face much stiffer sentences. But Tatton believes the province has its work cut out if it plans to implement the sweeping 83 recommendations outlined Tuesday by Colleen Klein, who co-chaired the task force with Dr. Robert Westbury. [continues 841 words]
Just days away from the fifth anniversary of the largest attack of terrorism on American soil, the United States has beefed up border security at the Montana-Alberta crossing. In addition to traditional measures at the international boundary, the perimeter is being observed from above by Black Hawk helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft, housed in a new security base at the Great Falls International Airport. The aircraft will conduct random patrols and investigate suspicious activities. "We have a special arrangement with the Canadian government," said Charles Albrecht, assistant chief patrol agent with the U.S. Border Patrol at Havre, Mont. "We don't just fly over. There is one Black Hawk there already and another one is on the way, or it could even be there today." [continues 689 words]
FORT MACLEOD -- Pat M. has seen firsthand the crystal meth problem in Fort Macleod. Walking down the street, he's seen people light up their pipes, oblivious anyone is watching. "It's shocking and I've been in the addictions field for a long time," he says. Now a program facilitator at the Foothills Centre, Pat once knew addiction from the other side for much of his life. "I was the last to realize that I was an addict, an alcoholic and a compulsive gambler," he says. [continues 551 words]
Picture Butte along with other provincial communities will be getting a little extra support for those dealing with drug and alcohol abuse problems. The Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission (AADAC) is adding more staff, youth treatment beds and a new program to support the Protection of Children Abusing Drugs Act (PChAD) that will be taking effect July 1. There will be 20 new beds in communities like Red Deer, Grand Prairie, Calgary, Edmonton and neighbouring Picture Butte. The program aims to help youth and their parents or guardians to better deal with drug abuse when the child is either unable or unwilling to seek help. [continues 191 words]
In the 21st Century, there still seems to be a prevailing image of drugs and youth entwined in a glamorous embrace -- all part of the ever expanding culture of drugs. James, a heroine user who asked his real name be withheld, said all it would take is a day spent in his world for drug-using teens to see is really isn't worth it in the end. "I'd like to show them what it's like to sit on a bed for half-an-hour trying to find a vein (for the needle) to get a 30-second buzz," he said Wednesday as a member of a panel discussion at the Alberta Harm Reduction Conference in Lethbridge. [continues 333 words]
Lethbridge regional police say an increasing number of organized crime groups from larger cities are moving in but their illicit activities won't be tolerated. Police laid 100 charges this week after busting a major dial-a-doper drug ring with ties to an Edmonton-based Asian gang. "There will be a definite impact on this group and others for a short term," said Sgt. Rod Klassen. "But typically either this group will re-set up or another group will move in and take over." [continues 269 words]
A conference targeted at both those who undertake risky behaviour like sex trade work, use drugs or live on the street and those who provide services to them is set to come to Lethbridge for the first time. The seventh annual Alberta Harm Reduction Conference, running Feb. 14-15 at the Lethbridge Lodge, is expected to attract some 250 people from Alberta and British Columbia and is being hosted by the Lethbridge HIV Connection and the Provincial Non-Prescription Needle Use Consortium. [continues 275 words]
Crystal meth and other drugs are making their way into southern Alberta. Communities are striking at the issue head on with community groups focused on education and prevention. Lethbridge and Taber have had groups that bring community members and service providers together for a while to tackle drugs issues in the community but in other places like Fort Macleod and Claresholm, programs are just getting underway. "I think certainly the emergence of some of these drugs, like crystal meth, different agencies have come to the decision they can't do this alone," says Susan Canning, manager of the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission Lethbridge area office. [continues 444 words]
Editor: The Conservative Party has put forth as one of their platforms, all drug traffickers to serve a mandatory sentence of two years. How do the Conservatives intend to pay the costs of this proposal? Statscan statistics for the year 2003, state, 6,944 persons were charged with trafficking of drugs, 527 of these were given conditional discharge or paid restitution; 2,520 were sentenced to prison (it doesn't say for how long). This leaves 3,897 that would be required to serve a sentence of two years. The country doesn't have the jail space. [continues 197 words]
