The Dayton Daily News is calling for gun-rationing schemes like the one-gun-per-month limit Virginia has. I lived in Virginia when that limit was adopted, and it didn't work. Some drug dealers started requiring their customers to pay for drugs with legally acquired guns instead of with cash. Others merely smuggled in guns from farther away. Criminals can always buy guns somewhere farther away. Drug dealers can buy guns in Mexico, where corrupt government officials have imposed super-strict gun laws on honest people but deliberately allow the wealthy drug lords to ignore those laws. Sound familiar? [continues 54 words]
WASHINGTON--Teen-age drug use held steady in 2000, the fourth straight year it has either fallen or stayed the same, the federal government reported Thursday. Smoking dropped significantly but use of the club drug ecstasy climbed for the second year in a row. The annual survey, a study of teen drug, alcohol and tobacco use, had mostly good news, with drops among eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders. But it also found the number of high school seniors using heroin hit its highest point since the survey began in 1975, and more 10th-graders are using steroids. [continues 668 words]
DAYTON--Sure, there are the flashy and expensive cars, multiple homes, exciting businesses and lots of girlfriends, but dealing drugs carries all the trials and tribulations of any business. And often more. There's the frequent surveillance by lawmen, the loss of privacy, worry over associates snitching you out, having to hide your assets, inflation, enormous expenses, narrow profit margins and stress spilling over into your domestic life. Not to mention being victimized by other criminals or suffering huge losses because of government anti-drug business policies. [continues 1371 words]
Re the Higher Education Act's impact on student loans: It's interesting that a drug offense is the only conviction that would disqualify a student from receiving federal aid for college. Apparently, past convictions for murder, rape or assault are of no concern to Congress. What kind of anti-drug message does this send to students? The only message I'm getting is that drug hysteria has gotten completely out of hand. Denying an education to students who need it most will have a decidedly negative impact on society. This punitive measure will disproportionately affect poor and minority students. [continues 92 words]
WASHINGTON--Nearly 7,000 college students who applied for financial aid this fall are finding past drug convictions returning to haunt them. The students are being told they are ineligible for some or all federal financial aid because of a new law. Under the law, which took effect with the 2000-01 academic year, students with drug-related convictions can be ruled ineligible for federal grants or loans. Of the 8.6 million applications processed through Oct. 15, 1,311 applicants have been ruled ineligible, and an additional 5,617 must complete a waiting period before they become eligible. [continues 206 words]
I found the Aug. 31 Knight Ridder News Service article "Youthful health mistakes that will come back to haunt you" quite offensive. As a youth minister, I deal with teen-agers on a regular basis, and to read such an irresponsible article geared toward young people was appalling! A physician suggested that drinking your way through college is no big deal because "All those brain cells you supposedly destroyed? `At that age, you probably had enough' to succeed without them," and, "The biggest problems with having smoked marijuana are the law-enforcement repercussions ..." and--and this one takes the cake--"If you snorted cocaine once or twice, it's no big deal." [continues 73 words]
SANTA FE, N.M.--Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader on Friday advocated the legalization of marijuana as part of an overhaul of the nation's "self-defeating and antiquated drug laws." Nader joined with New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson, a Republican, in criticizing the "war on drugs" as a failed policy for fighting drug use. "Addiction should never be treated as a crime. It has to be treated as a health problem," Nader said. "We do not send alcoholics to jail in this country. We do not send nicotine users to jail in this country. Over 500,000 people are in our jails who are nonviolent drug users." [continues 58 words]
The Sept. 3 editorial "Despite risks, Colombia aid makes sense" surprised me. It listed numerous reasons that this specific element in the current war against drugs might fail--there are really many others also. Why support a losing cause? Why not suggest some alternatives? The Dayton Daily News is backing the same type of attack that was made on liquor during Prohibition. Did we not learn anything from that? If Prohibition were in effect today, would the Daily News favor supplying Canada with funds to stop production of liquor that was coming into the United States? [continues 161 words]
WASHINGTON--The Supreme Court just said "no" Thursday to a state's plan to require its elected officials to take random drug tests. The justices refused without comment to revive a Louisiana law that allowed such random testing. Louisiana officials said the tests, though required of people not suspected of any crime, did not constitute unreasonable searches because the state has "special needs" to deter drug use. The nation's highest court in 1977 ruled in a Georgia case that states cannot force political candidates to take drug tests merely to demonstrate the government's commitment to the war on drugs. [continues 209 words]
First-time offenders primary beneficiaries WASHINGTON--Average sentences for federal drug offenders declined during the 1990s, a private research study reported Sunday, as Congress, judges and prosecutors took opportunities to soften the nation's tough drug sentences for certain types of defendants. The findings by Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (Trac) are somewhat surprising. The 1990s saw tougher drug laws passed throughout the nation, federal drug-control spending rose by nearly two-thirds to $16 billion a year in 1998, and federal drug convictions climbed to an annual record of 21,571 in 1998. [continues 609 words]
Over 50,000 Women Enter The U.s. As Sex Slaves Each Year WASHINGTON--With as many as 2 million women worldwide forced into sexual slavery, the sex trade seems to have replaced narcotics as the favored illegal trade activity, White House officials told at a Senate hearing Tuesday. Harold Koh, assistant Secretary of State for democracy, human rights and labor, said international criminals are moving away from "guns and drugs" to marketing women. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., who chaired the hearing, spoke of meeting some women victims during recent travels to Asia and called the trade "the greatest manifestation of slavery in the world today." [continues 300 words]
We All Lose Far More Than We Gain From Dayton Traffic Checkpoints It probably seemed like a good idea at the time. On June 8 and June 20, 1988, the Dayton Police Department set up checkpoints in every police district but downtown to inspect the licenses and other papers of every driver who passed through. Among more than 2,100 cars stopped, police arrested 159 people for driving without a license, issued 224 traffic citations, served 48 warrants, recovered three stolen cars and made six felony arrests. [continues 805 words]
DRUGS AREN'T JUST A BIG-CITY OR national problem any more, U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey said Wednesday. He said the national drug problem has mutated into local epidemics throughout the nation, including Ohio. The state borders on Kentucky, which with Tennessee and West Virginia produces more than 40 percent of the marijuana grown in this country. Ohio also is within easy driving distance from New York- New Jersey, a drug-trafficking hub. Ohio was among 31 drug locales Mr. McCaffrey identified as high-intensity drug-trafficking areas due to receive concerted attention from federal, state and local law-enforcement and prosecution agencies. [continues 53 words]
* The Court Says Privacy Concerns Shield Information About Family And Health. The Ohio Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that a criminal defendant may inspect a police officer's personnel files, but cannot obtain personal information such as the officer's home address or names of children. The ruling came in the case of Carl J. Faehl, who was indicted last April in U.S. District Court in Dayton on charges of conspiracy to distribute large amounts of cocaine and marijuana. Faehl's attorney, assistant federal Public Defender Beth Goldstein Lewis, requested the right to inspect and copy all personnel and internal affairs records relating to Miami County Sheriff's Detective Paul Reece. [continues 304 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House's anti-drug office announced Wednesday two new Internet sites where children and their parents can get information about fighting drugs. The first site, on ABC's www.Freevibe.com, will contain drug prevention messages for youngsters 10 to 13 years old. The site contains graphics, games and interactivity to help viewer understand the consequences of drug use. The second site, on America Online's Parents' Drug Resource Center, gives advice to parents and adult caregivers of children in that age group. The AOL keyword for the site is "Drug Help." "Unlike advertising and traditional media outreach, the Internet transcends geographic and economic boundaries and allows new communities to come together in an interactive substantive way," said Gen. Barry McCaffrey of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. [end]
WASHINGTON - The active ingredients in marijuana can help fight pain and nausea and thus deserve to be tested in scientific trials, an advisory panel to the federal government said Wednesday in a report sure to reignite the debate over whether marijuana is a helpful or harmful drug. The Institute of Medicine also said there was no conclusive evidence that marijuana use leads to harder drugs. In the past few years, voters in Alaska, Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon and Washington have approved measures in support of medical marijuana, even though critics say such measures send the wrong message to kids. [continues 421 words]
Increased enforcement of drug laws and stiffer penalties do not deter the use of marijuana and other drugs, research by the American Bar Association has found. The ABA found an 18 percent increase from 1992 to '97 in people who used drugs within the last month even though federal funding, arrests and incarceration rates were at all-time highs. The report, The State of Criminal Justice, also showed nearly 80 percent of the increase in drug arrests for those five years were for possession rather than dealing. [end]
* The goal is to reduce the size of the nation's drug problem in half by 2007. WASHINGTON - Hammering home the need for a drug-control strategy that measures success and failure, the Clinton administration is announcing a five-part plan designed to cut the size of the nation's drug problem in half by 2007. In a three-volume report to Congress, White House drug policy director Barry McCaffrey said drugs cost the country more than 14,000 lives annually, despite a nationwide effort that includes close to $18 billion spent this year by the federal government. [continues 514 words]
Volunteers weren't told the hallucinogen they were taking was meant to mimic schizophrenia BOSTON (AP) - Researchers trying to find ways to treat schizophrenia gave more than 100 healthy people a powerful hallucinogen without fully informing them that the drug could potentially produce psychotic episodes, The Boston Globe reported today. The studies involved the drug ketamine, also known as "Special K" and considered a "date-rape" drug because of the stupor-like condition it can cause. The Globe said the studies, which began in 1994, involved both mentally ill and healthy people, and participants often were not told they were being given ketamine to induce conditions similar to schizophrenia. [continues 312 words]
Justices interpret 4th Amendment very narrowly The U.S. Supreme Court justices in a recent ruling seemed shocked - shocked! - that Iowa police had got it into their heads that they could search any drivers and cars they pulled over for routine traffic violations. But the court needed only to look at its own rulings in recent years to see where the idea came from that privacy claims have little standing against the claims of law-enforcement convenience. The court's record of indifference to privacy issues is not perfect, but it leans heavily against any but the most narrow and literal readings of the Constitution's Fourth Amendment guarantees. The court has been winking for years at supposedly forbidden `unreasonable searches and seizures' that violate the `right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects.' [continues 400 words]
OREGON - Pain or prison. Dan Asbury, a quadriplegic, had that choice nearly a year ago. He didn't choose pain. The choice was simple for the 41-year-old man who smokes marijuana to ease aches and pains. "My doctors have given me all these legal drugs over the years, but nothing worked," he said last week as he lay in his bed in his home in this Toledo suburb. A plastic bag filled with marijuana was on a bedside table. [continues 392 words]
