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DRUGSENSE WEEKLY
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DrugSense Weekly,            April 3, 2009                       #594
Read This Publication On-line at:Â http://www.drugsense.org/current.htm
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TABLE OF CONTENTS:
* This Just In
  (1) As Mexico Battles Cartels, The Army Becomes the Law
  (2) Poverty Influences Drug Use: Survey
  (3) Marijuana Therapy May Shrink Tumours
  (4) Public Defender Calls Venues Unconstitutional
* Weekly News in Review
Drug Policy-
  (5) Column: Here's How to End the Drug Wars That Put
  (6) Editorial: It's Time to Consider Changing the Policy on War on Drugs
  (7) Column: Maybe We Should Legalize Drugs
  (8) Judge Neuters Hailey Pot Initiatives
Law Enforcement & Prisons-
  (9) Editorial: Incarceration Lobby Deserves Tough Questions
  (10) Burns, Other Sheriffs At Odds On Altering Drug Laws
  (11) Drugs Seized At Border Winding Up In Dump
  (12) Teen Drug-Smuggling Arrests Jump
  (13) Couple's Road Trip Ends On Sour Note
Cannabis & Hemp-
  (14) Panel Votes To Decriminalize Less Than Half-Ounce Of Marijuana
  (15) Michigan Readies For Medical Pot Use
  (16) Pennsylvania Ponders Legalizing Medical Marijuana
  (17) Santa Cruz Medical Pot Outfit On The Brink Of Survival
International News-
  (18) Juarez Crime Plummets After Troops Pour In
  (19) The Real Downtown Problem
  (20) The Real Cost of War On Drugs
  (21) It's Time To End The War On Drugs
* Hot Off The 'Net
  Government Grown - New Hemp Documentary
  New York Lightens Up On Some Of The Harshest Drug Laws In The Country
  Is The Media Finally Getting It On Drug Policy? / Maia Szalavitz
  Kids Do The Darndest Things: Joe Biden's Cocaine Dilemma / Tony Newman
  2007 Treatment Episode Data Set (TEDS) Marijuana Stats / Russ Belville
  Pot-For-Profit
  Drug Truth Network
  Shovelling Water: War On Drugs, War On People
  Drug Decriminalization In Portugal
* What You Can Do This Week
  Job Announcement: Executive Associate
  Stop Bill C-15!
* Letter Of The Week
  Deaths A Consequence Of Prohibition / Bruce Symington
* Feature Article
  Obama Gets Hazy On Reefer Economics / Clarence Page
* Quote of the Week
  Carlos Santana
DrugSense needs your support to continue this newsletter and many
other important projects - see how you can help at
http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
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THIS JUST IN
=======================================================================
(1) AS MEXICO BATTLES CARTELS, THE ARMY BECOMES THE LAW
Pubdate: Thu, 2 Apr 2009
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2009 The Washington Post Company
Authors: Steve Fainaru and William Booth, Washington Post Foreign Service
PETATLAN, Mexico -- President Felipe Calderon is rapidly escalating
the Mexican army's role in the war against drug traffickers,
deploying nearly 50 percent of its combat-ready troops along the
U.S.-Mexico border and throughout the country, while retired army
officers take command of local police forces and the military
supplies civilian authorities with automatic weapons and grenades.
U.S. and Mexican officials describe the drug cartels as a widening
narco-insurgency. The four major drug states average a total of 12
murders a day, characterized by ambushes, gun battles, executions
and decapitated bodies left by the side of the road. In the villages
and cities where the traffickers hold sway, daily life now takes
place against a martial backdrop of round-the-clock patrols,
pre-dawn raids and roadblocks manned by masked young soldiers.
Calderon's deployment of about 45,000 troops to fight the cartels
represents a historic change. Previous administrations relied on
Mexico's traditionally weak police agencies to combat the
traffickers, who funnel 90 percent of the cocaine that enters the
United States. The cartels corrupted local authorities and reached
tacit agreements with the national government, limiting the violence
while the drugs continued to flow.
After Calderon became president in December 2006, he told Mexicans
that the use of the military against the cartels would be limited
and brief. But it is now the centerpiece of his anti-narcotics
strategy, according to interviews with senior U.S. and Mexican
officials and dozens of people on the front lines of the war.
"It can be traumatic to have the army in control of public security,
but I am convinced that we don't have a better alternative, even
with all the risks that it implies," said Monte Alejandro Rubido, a
senior public security official who is overseeing the overhaul of
Mexico's police forces.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n377/a03.html
===
(2) POVERTY INFLUENCES DRUG USE: SURVEY
Pubdate: Thu, 02 Apr 2009
Source: StarPhoenix, The (CN SN)
Copyright: 2009 The StarPhoenix
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)
It's being poor -- not any kind of genetic or cultural tendency --
that leads more aboriginal youth to drink alcohol and smoke
marijuana, a new Saskatoon study has found.
The study, to be published today in the journal Paedeatric Child
Health, found after statistically eliminating risk factors such as
poverty, aboriginal kids were 20 per cent less likely to abuse
alcohol than their Caucasian counterparts.
"When we're dealing with government agencies, we tend to walk away
from service delivery when we know that things are associated with
aboriginal cultural status because we believe that there's some sort
of genetic trait that's pre-disposing them to addictions behaviour,"
said the study's lead author, Mark Lemstra.
Lemstra is the director of research and evaluation for the Saskatoon
Tribal Council, which represents seven First Nations in the
Saskatoon area. Public health researchers at the Saskatoon Health
Region were also involved in the study.
The data comes from surveys distributed to all Saskatoon public and
Catholic school students in grades 5 through 8 in 2007. The survey
results, which were initially published in June 2007, showed kids
who went to schools in poor neighbourhoods were more likely to be
bullied, have mental health problems, have a teen pregnancy or a
sexually transmitted infection or battle with addictions than the
average Saskatoon kid. It also found students in wealthy
neighbourhoods fared better than average.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n380/a10.html
===
(3) MARIJUANA THERAPY MAY SHRINK TUMOURS
Pubdate: Thu, 02 Apr 2009
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2009 The Ottawa Citizen
( CNS ) The active ingredient in marijuana appears to reduce tumour
growth, according to a Spanish study published on Wednesday.
The researchers showed giving THC to mice with cancer decreased
tumour growth and killed cells off in a process called autophagy.
"Our findings support that safe, therapeutically efficacious doses
of THC may be reached in cancer patients," Complutense University in
Madrid reported in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n380/a09.html
===
(4) PUBLIC DEFENDER CALLS VENUES UNCONSTITUTIONAL
Pubdate: Fri, 3 Apr 2009
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2009 The Washington Post Company
Author: Henri E. Cauvin, Washington Post Staff Writer
Defendants in So-Called Problem-Solving Courts Denied Due Process,
Official Says
Drug courts, a forum designed to give addicted offenders a second
chance, are under attack in Maryland -- and not by prosecutors.
The state's public defender says Maryland's drug courts give judges
too much power and defendants too little protection, and yesterday
she argued to the state's high court that the tribunals are not
constitutional.
Public Defender Nancy S. Forster told the Court of Appeals that
judges should not shed impartiality by sitting down with
prosecutors, social workers and defense attorneys to try to help a
defendant. She argued that judges should not be permitted to send a
defendant to jail again and again without a full hearing each time,
as she said judges in the drug courts do.
"There is no due process in drug treatment court," she said.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n379/a05.html
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WEEKLY NEWS IN REVIEW
=======================================================================
Domestic News- Policy
----------------------------------
COMMENT: (5-8)
In eight years of editing this newsletter, and following drug policy
news closely for a few years before that, I can't recall a week with
so many different media voices questioning the drug war, and even
firmly calling for its end. The calls from across the world and
across the political spectrum. A few samples are included, but there
are plenty more to chose from in the MAP archives.
And, yet, in one place where voters have actually called for reform,
most measures are being stuck down in court.
===
(5) COLUMN: HERE'S HOW TO END THE DRUG WARS THAT PUT EVERYONE AT
RISK
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: New York Daily News (NY)
Copyright: 2009 Daily News, L.P.
Author: Stanley Crouch
Blood sacrifice often precedes significant legislative change. We
saw blood sacrifice during the Prohibition years when prudish
zealots thought that outlawing the sale of liquor would bring an end
to drinking and the worst excesses connected to taking a nip or as
many as needed to release the demons within. Organized crime killed
until the bootleg liquor turf was slippery with fresh blood.
Now, the recent turmoil in Mexico is real proof that we have big
trouble on our hands.
The rooms and the places where people are murdered over the sale of
drugs continue to underline the fact that billions of dollars in
profit create a level of greed so addictive that its coldness is
incalculable.
We have seen all of this before in quite bloody detail. Hundreds
were murdered, from high government officials to people caught in
crossfire when Pablo Escobar ordered entire city blocks blown up in
order to defend his monstrous cocaine profits by declaring war on
Colombia.
Knowing that, we should now seriously consider the very simplest way
to break the back of the international drug trade. It needs to be
broken in the same way the back of the bootlegging business was
broken.
Need I say what it is? Fine. The only real solution is legalization,
which would put a permanent hole in the bucket of illegal dope
dealing.
[snip]
Continued: : http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n363/a02.html
===
(6) EDITORIAL: IT'S TIME TO CONSIDER CHANGING THE POLICY ON THE WAR
ON DRUGS
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: Free Press, The (Kinston, NC)
Copyright: 2009 Kinston Free Press
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton received a minor flurry of
criticism last week for acknowledging that the United States - or at
least some people in the United States - bears some responsibility
for the explosion of drug-law-related violence in Mexico that has
left more than 7,000 Mexicans dead since January 2008. The trouble
is that she doesn't seem to be prepared to follow her comments to
anything close to their logical implications. "Clearly what we've
been doing has not worked," Clinton told reporters on her plane at
the start of a two-day visit to Mexico. "Our insatiable demand for
illegal drugs fuels the drug trade.
Our inability to prevent weapons from being smuggled across the
border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police, of
soldiers and civilians." She added that "neither interdiction [of
drugs] nor reducing demand have been successful." Clinton is only
partially correct.
It isn't "our" insatiable demand but the demand of a small subset of
the population that fuels the drug trade, but it fuels it to the
tune of $15 billion to $25 billion a year. And while Mexican drug
gangs do smuggle weapons from U.S. gun stores along the border to
elude Mexico's strict gun laws, the current issue of Foreign Policy
magazine notes that since the beginning of Mexican President Felipe
Calderon's decision two years ago to unleash the military against
the drug gangs, the gangs' arsenals have come to include: "sea-going
submersibles, helicopters and modern transport aviation, automatic
weapons, RPG's, Anti-Tank 66 mm rockets, mines and booby traps,
heavy machine guns, .50 caliber sniper rifles, massive use of
military hand grenades, and the most modern models of 40 mm grenade
machine guns."
Clearly, these weapons are not coming from a few rogue gun shops in
Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. With the vast profits that
prohibition makes possible, the Mexican drug gangs are tapping into
the international black market in military weaponry.
Inspecting a few more vehicles crossing into Mexico won't stop that
trade.
President Obama has said the government will send a few more Border
Patrol agents to the 2,000-mile border with Mexico, step up
inspection of vehicles going both ways across the border and send
another $66 million to the Mexican government. Good luck with that.
Maybe it's time to stop the insanity. The dynamics of efforts at
prohibition of substances for which people are willing to pay
inflated prices predict precisely the outcomes we are seeing. Those
most adept at violence, concealment, bribery and skullduggery are
rewarded with enormous sums of money, respect for law declines and
civil society is ripped apart.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n363/a01.html
===
(7) COLUMN: MAYBE WE SHOULD LEGALIZE DRUGS
Pubdate: Wed, 01 Apr 2009
Source: Miami Herald (FL)
Copyright: 2009 Miami Herald Media Co.
Author: Leonard Pitts Jr.
I come neither eagerly nor easily to that maybe. Rather, I come by
way of spiraling drug violence in Mexico that recently forced
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to acknowledge the role America's
insatiable appetite for narcotics plays in the carnage. I come by
way of watching Olympian Michael Phelps do the usual public
relations song and dance after being outed smoking weed, and knowing
the whole thing was a ritualized farce. Most of all, I come by way
of personal antipathy: I don't like and have never used illegal
drugs.
But yeah, I'm thinking maybe we should legalize them.
Or at the very least, begin the discussion.
I find myself in august -- and unexpected -- company. Ronald
Reagan's secretary of state, George Schultz, former New Mexico Gov.
Gary Johnson, the late Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman
and the late conservative icon William F. Buckley Jr. have all said
much the same thing.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n374/a06.html
===
(8) JUDGE NEUTERS HAILEY POT INITIATIVES
Pubdate: Fri, 27 Mar 2009
Source: Idaho Mountain Express (ID)
Copyright: 2009 Express Publishing, Inc
Author: Terry Smith
City Still Required To Advocate For Marijuana Reform
A judge's ruling this week took the teeth out of two controversial
marijuana initiatives that were approved by Hailey voters, but left
intact a requirement that the city advocate for reform of marijuana
and industrial hemp laws.
Blaine County 5th District Court Judge Robert J. Elgee, in a
decision filed Tuesday, voided portions of the initiatives that
would have legalized medical marijuana use in the city and would
have made enforcement of marijuana laws the lowest priority for
Hailey police. The judge also voided language in the initiatives
that would have required individual city officials to advocate for
marijuana reform.
However, provisions of the initiatives that require the city as an
entity to advocate for marijuana reform were left intact, as were
provisions that require the city to establish community committees
regarding marijuana and hemp issues.
Hailey voters approved three marijuana and industrial hemp
initiatives in 2007 and again in 2008. The initiatives were titled
the Hailey Medical Marijuana Act, the Hailey Lowest Police Priority
Act and the Hailey Industrial Hemp Act.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n368/a03.html
=======================================================================
Law Enforcement & Prisons
-------------------------
COMMENT: (9-13)
Continuing on a theme from the policy section above, many are
questioning the aggressive use of law enforcement and prison as
solutions to drug problems, even a sheriff in New York. The
incompetence of the drug war was on display in Canada this week, as
a new report uncovers problems with the disposal of drugs
confiscated at the border. At the Mexican border, kids are finding
more work as drug smugglers; and in Iowa, watch out for the state's
Department of Transportation police. They don't need no stinking
badges.
===
(9) EDITORIAL: INCARCERATION LOBBY DESERVES TOUGH QUESTIONS
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: Tomah Journal, The (WI)
Copyright: 2009 The Tomah Journal
Here's a question to those who gathered in Sparta last week to
criticize Gov. Jim Doyle's public safety budget:
Why does the United States, with just 5 percent of the world's
population, house 25 percent of the world's prisoners?
Led by Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, several public officials
blasted Doyle's budget, which calls for the early release of
non-violent prisoners and cutting back on supervision and parole.
They levelled the criticism despite a huge state budget deficit and
a corrections budget already grown at a staggering pace. Consider
that:
* In 1996, Wisconsin spent $360 million corrections. It was $1
billion in 2008.
* In 1982, one out of every 437 Wisconsin residents was in jail or
prison. In 2007, it was one out of 109.
Wisconsin, of course, isn't alone in its appetite to throw people in
prison and keep them there for a long time. The United States
incarcerates more people per capita than any nation in the world,
but it's not anywhere near the safest nation in the world. America,
for example, has the world's 24th highest homicide rate. That's
higher than every country in Western Europe, which imprisons a much
smaller percentage of its people.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n365/a08.html
===
(10) BURNS, OTHER SHERIFFS AT ODDS ON ALTERING DRUG LAWS
Pubdate: Wed, 01 Apr 2009
Source: Watertown Daily Times (NY)
Copyright: 2009 Watertown Daily Times
Author: David Shampine, Staff Writer
While the sheriffs of Oswego and St. Lawrence counties are calling
upon state Sen. Darrel J. Aubertine, D-Cape Vincent, to "just say
no" to weakening the so-called Rockefeller drug laws, their
counterpart in Jefferson County says the current mood in Albany "is
a step in the right direction."
Oswego County Sheriff Reuel A. Todd and St. Lawrence County Sheriff
Kevin M. Wells released a joint statement Monday asserting that
reducing current penalties "for major drug dealers" will result only
in sending "a dangerous message to drug dealers, users and young
people."
Their comments do not accurately reflect the proposed legislation,
however. The agreement as announced in Albany would repeal mandatory
minimum prison sentences for "lower-level drug felons."
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n373/a04.html
===
(11) DRUGS SEIZED AT BORDER WINDING UP IN DUMP
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: Winnipeg Free Press (CN MB)
Copyright: 2009 Winnipeg Free Press
Author: Dean Beeby, Canadian Press
OTTAWA -- Illegal drugs seized at the border -- including hash,
methadone and steroids -- are winding up in landfills because
Canada's border guards don't know they're supposed to be destroyed.
That's among the findings of a scathing report into sloppy security
at government warehouses, where some $400 million of seized
contraband is sent each year by the Canada Border Services Agency.
"Security and access control to storage facilities were below
standard and storage requirements for drugs, firearms and ammunition
were not consistently met," says the internal audit.
"Inventory control was inadequate."
Investigators examined supposedly secure facilities -- known as
Queen's warehouses or bond rooms -- in the province of Quebec, and
in the Toronto and Windsor, Ont., regions, where many of the 30,000
border seizures each year are made. More than half of all seizures
are drugs, alcohol and tobacco. The rest includes child pornography,
firearms, ammunition and jewelry. The report notes that seized items
are rarely suitable for sale on the government's online auction
site, creating a continuing storage and disposal challenge.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n368/a01.html
===
(12) TEEN DRUG-SMUGGLING ARRESTS JUMP
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: El Paso Times (TX)
Copyright: 2009 El Paso Times
Author: Daniel Borunda
ELÂ PASOÂ --Â More juvenile drug smugglers have been arrested in March
on the El Paso border than in the last two months combined, U.S.
Customs and Border Protection officials said.
There have been 17 accused smugglers age 17 and younger arrested in
March compared with five in February and seven in January, U.S.
Customs and Border Protection officials.
"The rising number of children we are catching smuggling drugs
should serve as a wake-up call to parents in our community," said
Ana Hinojosa, Customs director of field operations in El Paso.
"Parents should have the 'drug talk' with their teens now if they
haven't done so already because the consequences of involvement in
this activity are serious," Hinojosa said in a statement.
Customs spokesman Roger Maier said the spike this year is
significant because officers were seeing only about two to four
juvenile smuggling cases per month last year.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n369/a02.html
===
(13) COUPLE'S ROAD TRIP ENDS ON SOUR NOTE
Pubdate: Wed, 01 Apr 2009
Source: Hawk Eye, The (Burlington, IA)
Copyright: 2009 The Hawk Eye
Author: John Mangalonzo
F.M. residents file complaint about IDOT stop.
FORT MADISON -- Carl and Jane Schneider thought their trip home to
Fort Madison from a two-week vacation would be pleasant. Then they
would relax in their living room and talk about the fun time they
had driving in their recreational vehicle and look at pictures they
took.
They were wrong.
Carl, 66, who operated Blue Grass Dairy for many years and whose
family has lived for four generations in town, and Jane, 59, said
instead they had to deal with an afterthought of being treated like
criminals during what they described as an unnecessary and "scary"
traffic stop.
It was 8 p.m., Friday, when the couple said the horrifying
experience unfolded. They were a few miles from home when Iowa
Department of Transportation officer Darrell D. Wiegand pulled them
over.
According to IDOT files, Wiegand had been a correctional officer in
Oakdale before becoming a motor vehicle officer in 1994. A local
phone listing for him could not be found, and all questions about
the stop have been directed to IDOT officials in Des Moines.
"The officer did not ask for Carl's license or registration or
insurance, instead he said he just wanted to know what the
odd-looking trailer we were pulling was used for," Jane Schneider
said. "Carl replied that it was for a gyrocopter and he and the
officer chatted for a couple of minutes during which Carl explained
to him we lived north of town and were returning home after a trip."
Wiegand, the couple said, asked them to stand in front of their RV
and allegedly started interrogating them, asking, "What's that I
smell? What's that smell?"
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n378/a05.html
=======================================================================
Cannabis & Hemp-
---------------------------
COMMENT: (14-17)
Some legislators in Connecticut have come to the conclusion that it
is more fiscally prudent to relieve cannabis consumers of some of
their money than deprive them of their freedom.
Michigan is set to implement medicinal cannabis regulations
overwhelmingly approved by voters last fall.
Lawmakers in Pennsylvania are looking closely at the potential costs
and benefits of legalizing cannabis for medicinal purposes.
Medicinal cannabis dispensaries are exhaling a sigh of relief
following pronouncements from the Obama administration that
they will tolerate those that comply with state laws and
regulations.
===
(14) PANEL VOTES TO DECRIMINALIZE LESS THAN HALF-OUNCE OF MARIJUANA
Pubdate: Wed, 01 Apr 2009
Source: Hartford Courant (CT)
Copyright: 2009 The Hartford Courant
Author: Christopher Keating
On a groundbreaking vote, the legislature's judiciary committee
decided Tuesday night to decriminalize marijuana possession for adults
18 and older who have less than half an ounce of the drug.
Under a compromise, the marijuana laws would not change for anyone
under 18, and the amount that would be decriminalized was reduced from
less than 1 ounce to less than half an ounce. The possession of small
amounts would no longer be a crime and would instead be an infraction
with a maximum fine of $250 that could be paid like a speeding ticket.
Some Democratic legislators, including Senate Majority Leader Martin
Looney of New Haven, have been pushing hard this year for
decriminalization, saying that doing so could save the state more than
$11 million in law enforcement costs annually because far fewer people
would be sent to state Superior Court to be overseen by prosecutors
and probation officials. If marijuana users were issued a ticket that
could be paid by mail, they would no longer need to go to court.
The bill passed 24-14 in the Democratic-dominated committee, and the
highest-ranking Republican who voted for the measure was deputy House
Republican leader William Hamzy of Plymouth.
Despite the positive vote Tuesday night, the bill still faces an
uphill battle as Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell opposes the
decriminalization. Rell vetoed a bill two years ago that would have
allowed the use of marijuana for medical purposes to relieve pain.
"Whether it's little or a lot, it is an illegal substance, and the
governor does not support the bill," Rell's spokesman, Christopher
Cooper, said Tuesday night after the vote.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n373.a14.html
===
(15) MICHIGAN READIES FOR MEDICAL POT USE
Pubdate: Wed, 1 Apr 2009
Source: Detroit News (MI)
Copyright: 2009 The Detroit News
Author: Charlie Cain, Detroit News Lansing Bureau
Cited: http://www.michiganmedicalmarijuana.org/
Up to 50,000 May Qualify for Legal Smoking
Lynn Allen is busy squirreling away marijuana seeds - at $5 a shot -
as he prepares to take advantage of a new state law that will allow
seriously or terminally ill patients to legally smoke pot to ease
their pain and suffering.
The 52-year-old married father of two from Williamston is confined to
a wheelchair and unable to work because of a lack of stamina. He is
one of an estimated 50,000 Michigan residents who may qualify for
medical marijuana use once the state begins accepting applications on
Saturday.
A hemophiliac who contracted HIV/AIDS from blood work, he lives in
pain and battles to keep from losing weight because of a lack of
appetite.
"I've decided I'm going to grow my own marijuana in my house," said
Allen, who was forced to declare bankruptcy last year. "I can't afford
to buy marijuana" - which can cost from $200 to $900 an ounce,
according to police.
"But I have bought 10 seeds and now I'm waiting for the game to
begin."
Michigan voters in November approved medical marijuana use by a 63
percent to 37 percent margin, joining a dozen other states that allow
it.
State health officials are finalizing rules and regulations for the
Michigan Medical Marijuana Program.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n370.a07.html
===
(16) PENNSYLVANIA PONDERS LEGALIZING MEDICAL MARIJUANA
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: Quad, The (West Chester U, PA Edu)
Copyright: 2009 The Quad
Author: David Baker
State Rep. Mark Cohen of Philadelphia announced this week his desire
to introduce a bill next month that would legalize medical marijuana
in Pennsylvania.
The bill, as explained by Cohen, would be of the same nature as the
New Jersey legislation introduced earlier this year, which offers
prescriptions of the drug to patients suffering from cancer, multiple
sclerosis, and other diseases. New Jersey's governor has stated that
he would sign the bill proposed in his state.
Aside from the potential benefits the bill would bring in the medical
community, from an economic standpoint, Cohen also saw the bill as a
way to increase state revenue.
"I think it can easily raise $25 million a year in taxes."
[snip]
Pennsylvania is one of three states, including Michigan and New
Jersey, that are currently considering legalizing the drug for medical
use.
In recent weeks, California legislators have begun discussing and
debating a new addition to their existing marijuana laws.
San Francisco Assemblyman Tom Ammiano proposed last month that
California legalize and tax marijuana, a major - and still technically
illegal - crop in the state, in an attempt to ease some of
California's economic strain.
"We're all jonesing now for money," Mr. Ammiano said. "And there's
this enormous industry out there."
[snip]
Lobbyists such as John Lovell, who works on behalf of several
California law enforcement officials, says the plan would open the
floodgates to a large, uncontrolled and therefore, un-taxed, black
market while also increasing substance abuse problems.
"The last thing we need is yet another legal substance that is mind-
altering," Lovell said.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n368.a07.html
===
(17) SANTA CRUZ MEDICAL POT OUTFIT ON THE BRINK OF SURVIVAL
Pubdate: Mon, 30 Mar 2009
Source: Santa Cruz Sentinel (CA)
Copyright: 2009 Santa Cruz Sentinel
Author: Howard Mintz
Cited: http://www.wamm.org/
For at least the past six years, one of the fiercest struggles in the
federal government's war with the states over medical marijuana has
been waged from a nondescript Santa Cruz warehouse, tucked between an
auto repair shop and an electrical contractor.
These days, there is unprecedented optimism inside that warehouse,
where the feisty Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana appears to be
on the brink of outlasting the feds and winning the most important
legal fight still left in the courts over California's nearly 13-year-
old voter approved medical pot law.
The Obama administration, through new Attorney General Eric Holder,
has publicly indicated in recent weeks that it will not enforce
federal drug laws against medical marijuana providers in states with
medical pot laws, as long as those providers are obeying their state
laws. For WAMM's leaders and patients, such a policy shift would not
only end their 6-year-old lawsuit, but also an era of raids,
uncertainty and near-extinction for an operation that tends to the
sick and dying.
The Santa Cruz case also could be the first in the country that forces
the new administration to lay out its exact policy on medical pot in
writing.
On a recent morning inside WAMM, Valerie and Mike Corral, who
cofounded the cooperative in the early 1990s, appeared visibly
relieved as they discussed the prospects of the feds finally leaving
them alone. As they spoke, the unmistakable, pungent smell of pot
wafted through the corridor outside their cramped office.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n366.a09.html
=======================================================================
International News
---------------------------
COMMENT: (18-21)
President Felipe Calderon increased the Mexican military presence in
Cuidad Juarez, and this week, the violence decreased somewhat. But
folks there don't see a quick end to the violence. "The government
is part of the drug dealing. Unless there is a negotiated solution,
the violence won't stop." Some predict the violence will resume once
troops are gone. "The problem is," asked one analyst, "what are we
going to do when the army leaves?"
The city of Victoria, Canada, may indeed have a drug problem, but
undercover officers were unable "to turn up any drugs or arrests at
all." On the other hand, there is one drug which does cause
"disorder -- people yelling or screaming, arguments, doors being
slammed or pushing and shoving", and that drugs is ... alcohol.
Alcohol abuse is the biggest problem Victoria police have on their
hands downtown, Victoria's new Chief of Police Jamie Graham said
last week.
And finally this week, we leave you with two columns appearing in
two Canadian papers this week, both calling for an end to drug
prohibition. The first, by Terry Field in the Calgary Herald
newspaper, has advice for the watchdog media: "news organizations
need come up with more sophisticated questions to ask of
decision-makers... what alternatives to waging this war might
exist?" The "former Mexican president Ernesto Zedillo suggested in
late February that perhaps it might be smarter to legalize the use
of marijuana," but was dismissed by prohibitionists. Legalize drugs,
says Field, and "we could save billions of dollars, countless lives,
make money taxing it, and using what we earn to educate the public
and treat addicts."
And in the National Post this week, Jonathan Kay argues prohibition
makes criminals rich and, "the problem should be treated the same
way that we treat other self-inflicted, self-destructive behavioural
pathologies" (with doctors; not with jails and coercion).
===
(18) JUAREZ CRIME PLUMMETS AFTER TROOPS POUR IN
Pubdate: Thu, 2 Apr 2009
Source: Dallas Morning News (TX)
Copyright: 2009 The Dallas Morning News, Inc.
Author: Laurence Iliff, The Dallas Morning News
CUIDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - The military surge in this Texas-Mexico
border city, now crowded with trucks carrying stone-faced young men
wielding assault rifles, does not scare Ana, a middle-aged airport
worker.
Ana, who asked not to be further identified in a city where contract
killings go for as little as $100, prefers the thousands of young
men in dark camouflage to the drug thugs, muggers and rapists who
killed 1,600 people in Juarez last year.
[snip]
A local hotel worker, 42, put it more bluntly: "The government is
part of the drug dealing. Unless there is a negotiated solution, the
violence won't stop."
President Calderon has said he will never negotiate with drug
criminals and has denied any official ties to the cartels.
[snip]
The local drug distributors - teenagers, mostly - know that they
cannot take on the military so now they are lying low, Quijano said,
and the cartel operators "are probably off on vacation in Acapulco."
Given the broad base of drug users, the gangs will probably outlast
the military over time, he suggested.
At an estimated cost of $250,000 a week to maintain the soldiers and
police, a cost shared by the federal and city governments, time and
money may be running out, he said.
"The money they are spending is money that is not being spent to
pave the streets, and that can be maintained for a while, but not
forever," said Quijano. "It's like a fire that I'm trying to put out
on my own, but it just keeps getting bigger, so I call for help. The
problem is, what are we going to do when the army leaves?"
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n377.a05.html
===
(19) THE REAL DOWNTOWN PROBLEM
Pubdate: Wed, 01 Apr 2009
Source: Victoria Times-Colonist (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Times Colonist
Many Victoria residents were likely surprised to read police Chief
Jamie Graham's comment that this city's illegal drug trade is not
nearly the problem it is perceived to be.
Alcohol abuse is far and away the largest problem city police deal
with, Graham told a meeting of downtown residents this week.
That statement not only turns popular thinking on its ear -- that
illegal drug addicts among the homeless population create a
significant amount of downtown mayhem -- but exposes a harsher
reality.
The people causing the most trouble downtown aren't necessarily the
mentally ill or addicted.
[snip]
Chances are it's young, middle-class males, fuelled by a night of
alcohol consumption.
"Many of the issues our officers are sent to, they act almost as
referees," Graham said, adding the most common calls city police
respond to are reports of alcohol-related disorder -- people yelling
or screaming, arguments, doors being slammed or pushing and shoving.
By comparison, a recently completed undercover operation in Victoria
was hard-pressed to turn up any drugs or arrests at all. Over the
course of two weeks, police made only about a dozen arrests, and
undercover officers reported surprise at how difficult it was to buy
illegal drugs.
[snip]
The next time you read about a violent incident downtown, don't fall
into the trap of assuming the problems are exclusive to "them."
Sometimes, as Walt Kelly once wrote, the enemy is us.
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n372.a04.html
===
(20) THE REAL COST OF WAR ON DRUGS
Pubdate: Tue, 31 Mar 2009
Source: Calgary Herald (CN AB)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Author: Terry Field
By now the majority of Calgarians will have heard of the daily
fighting between drug cartels and authorities in Northern Mexican
cities that dot the border with the United States. The devastating
context of this protracted 'war' has been slow to reach us here,
largely because the news media has been slow to see the story as
something other than a Mexican story.
[snip]
In truth, the drug trade causes havoc in every western nation, not
just Mexico, and our sense of Mexico as a lawless, corrupt place
where these kinds of things happen routinely, is to miss the point
entirely.
[snip]
That was 1982. Now, 27 years later, we are no closer to eradicating
drug use than we were then. In fact, by most measures the problem is
worse. The only thing this policy has succeeded in doing is wasting
untold billions in enforcement and encouraging the enemy to defend
itself.
Every war needs an enemy, and in this case the enemy has grown from a
series of modestly scaled country-specific gangs into large-scale,
wealthy, well-armed and well-connected international organizations.
Just last week, U. S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said U. S.
policy on drugs has been a failure and Mexico is paying too steep a
price for the war on drugs, especially considering that the U. S. is
the main market.
She then went on to say that the answer is to escalate and get more
money promised during the Bush years into Mexican hands to support
their battle with the cartels.
[snip]
I wouldn't presume to have the ultimate answer to this issue, but I
would suggest that news organizations need come up with more
sophisticated questions to ask of decision-makers. Starting with a
simple one: what alternatives to waging this war might exist? When
former Mexican president Ernesto Zedillo suggested in late February
that perhaps it might be smarter to legalize the use of marijuana
the idea was immediately dismissed by the current Mexican
government, and some U. S. lawmakers.
Zedillo was floating that idea as an example of alternative action
following release of a report he co-authored on the bigger problem.
"If we insist only on a strategy of the criminal pursuit of those
who traffic in drugs," Zedillo has said, "the problem will never be
resolved."
Maybe he has a point.
Arguably, if drug production and use was made legal, we could save
billions of dollars, countless lives, make money taxing it, and
using what we earn to educate the public and treat addicts.
[snip]
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n367.a04.html
===
(21) IT'S TIME TO END THE WAR ON DRUGS
Pubdate: Tue, 31 Mar 2009
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Author: Jonathan Kay
[snip]
I realize that this is a stale theme. (One of these days, someone is
going to hand me or Colby Cosh or Dan Gardner a plaque for writing the
millionth op-ed urging an end to the drug war.) But recent events may
give Western governments reason to act. American states are going
bankrupt, and one of the main reasons is a jail system bursting with
drug offenders. Meanwhile, our soldiers are fighting, and dying, in a
struggle against a Taliban force whose primary income stream derives
from OECD drug addicts.
Not for a moment do I dispute that hard drugs ruin lives, or that
eradicating their usage should be an objective of government. But the
problem should be treated the same way that we treat other self-
inflicted, self-destructive behavioural pathologies: through the
health system and social-assistance programs.
Sometimes, it takes a crisis to give common sense its moment. Thanks
to a global recession, a poppy-financed Afghan enemy and a NAFTA
partner descending into anarchy, that moment may finally be upon us.
Continues: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n368.a06.html
***********************************************************************
HOT OFF THE 'NET
-------------------------------
GOVERNMENT GROWN - NEW HEMP DOCUMENTARY
Government Grown is a new short documentary about the Hemp For
Victory program that includes interviews with participating farmers.
http://www.governmentgrown.com/
===
NEWÂ YORK LIGHTENS UP ON SOME OF THE HARSHEST DRUG LAWS IN THE COUNTRY
By Steven Wishnia
Let's hope the changes mark the beginning of the end of New York's
Rockefeller drug laws.
http://drugsense.org/url/5fwhvSUD
===
IS THE MEDIA FINALLY GETTING IT ON DRUG POLICY?
By Maia Szalavitz
http://drugsense.org/url/le3n7pLr
===
KIDS DO THE DARNDEST THINGS: JOE BIDEN'S COCAINE DILEMMA
By Tony Newman
The allegations about Ashley Biden offer her father a chance to join
the millions who challenge the irrationality of our drug laws.
http://drugsense.org/url/y56ILQyl
===
2007 TREATMENT EPISODE DATA SET (TEDS) MARIJUANA STATS
By Russ Belville, NORML Outreach Coordinator
SAMHSAÂ have released the results of their 2007 Treatment Episode Data
Set, or TEDS, showing the National Admissions to Substance Abuse
Treatment Services. Let's take a look at the statistics for marijuana,
shall we?
===
POT-FOR-PROFIT
The Brian Lehrer Radio Show
If the underground pot economy comes into the light, can it really
have an impact? Ethan Nadelmann, the founder and executive director of
the Drug Policy Alliance Network, makes the case for legalization.
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/bl/episodes/2009/03/30/segments/127421
===
DRUG TRUTH NETWORK
Century of Lies - 03/29/09 - David Duncan
Dr. David Duncan, professor emeritus at Brown University details the
contaminants contained in recreational drugs.
http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2356
Cultural Baggage Radio Show - 04/01/09 - Cliff Schaffer
Cliff Schaffer, founder of DrugLibrary.org and MarijuanaBusinessNews.com
discusses how we steer the discussion on how to end the drug war.
http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/?q=node/2358
===
SHOVELING WATER: WAR ON DRUGS, WAR ON PEOPLE
Please take a few minutes to watch this excellent short film produced
by Witness for Peace, that considers the human and environmental costs
of the disastrous ongoing efforts to eradicate coca production in
Colombia using aerial fumigation.
http://drugsense.org/url/k45whPc0
===
DRUG DECRIMINALIZATION IN PORTUGAL
Policy Forum, Friday, April 3, 2009
In 2001, Portugal began a remarkable policy experiment,
decriminalizing all drugs, including cocaine and heroin. Some
predicted disastrous results-that drug addiction rates would soar and
the country would become a haven for "drug tourists." Now that several
years have passed, policy experts can study the results.
Featuring Glenn Greenwald, Attorney and Best-selling Author; with
comments by Peter Reuter, Department of Criminology, University of
Maryland; moderated by Tim Lynch, Director, Project on Criminal
Justice, Cato Institute.
http://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=5887
The report can be downloaded for free here:
http://cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10080
***********************************************************************
WHAT YOU CAN DO THIS WEEK
--------------------------------------------------
JOB ANNOUNCEMENT: EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATE
The Drug Policy Alliance has an immediate opening for an Executive
Associate, working directly with the Executive Director.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/about/jobsfunding/jobs/execassist.cfm
===
STOP BILL C15!
C-15Â an Act to amend the Canadian Controlled Drugs and Substances Act
This enactment would amend the CDSA to provide for minimum penalties
for "serious" drug offences and increase the maximum penalty for
cannabis (marihuana) production.
http://canadiandrugpolicy.org/index.php
***********************************************************************
LETTER OF THE WEEK
------------------------------------
DEATHS A CONSEQUENCE OF PROHIBITION
By Bruce Symington
The tragedy of the two young girls in a coma or dead due to taking
unknown street drugs is yet another foreseeable, predictable
consequence of the prohibition on drugs. You doubt that statement?
Let us compare to the 'other' prohibition of last millennium:
alcohol. When alcohol was prohibited, gangsters made and sold
liquor. The physical harm alone caused by that liquor was extensive,
because it was made by amateurs in uncontrolled conditions.
Prohibition did not stop drinking, and its repeal did not entirely
stop the harm caused by alcohol. But the harm now is much less
significant and far more manageable than that caused by prohibition.
Likewise, if ecstasy was made by pharmaceutical companies with
controlled sales, these girls would not be dead. As a society, it is
time for us to grow up and admit that people will do what they want.
The only gauge of an approach is whether it leads to more harms or
fewer to legalize it. Therefore, prohibition must end.
Bruce Symington
( It's an abject reality some simply don't want to accept. )
Pubdate: Sat, 28 Mar 2009
Source: Edmonton Sun (CN AB)
Note: Parenthetical remark by the Sun editor, headline by newshawk.
***********************************************************************
FEATURE ARTICLE
-------------------------------
OBAMA GETS HAZY ON REEFER ECONOMICS
By Clarence Page
For all of the keen intellect that President Barack Obama showed in
his online town hall meeting, he didn't seem to know much about
reefer economics.
When asked whether legalizing marijuana might be a stimulus for the
economy and job creation, he played the question for laughs.
"I don't know what this says about the online audience . . .," he
quipped as his studio audience chuckled and groaned. "But . . . this
was a fairly popular question. We want to make sure that it was
answered," he said.
Sure. So you could knock it, I thought.
Obama's response: "The answer is, no, I don't think that is a good
strategy to grow our economy."
No stimulus? Hey, more than a few blinged-out, Escalade-driving pot
dealers would dispute that notion. You want a "green" industry? Free
the weed, dude.
Such is the call of pro-pot politicians like California Assemblyman
Tom Ammiano, who has proposed to legalize the weed, tax it and
regulate it like booze. He estimates the move would generate $1
billion in revenue for the state's troubled budget and save $150
million in enforcement costs.
It's hard to argue with Ammiano's logic, but it's easy to make light
of lighting up. Marijuana is, after all, funny. Few subjects inspire
more bad puns from headline writers than those that, well, step on
grass. A quick sample:
"Obama: Nope to dope." ( Russia Today )
"Obama's marijuana buzz kill." ( The Daily Beast online )
"Marijuana issue suddenly smoking hot." ( Politico )
Like sex and sobriety, marijuana is funny because it is surrounded
by so much hypocrisy. So is politics.
To listen to Obama's chortles, for example, you'd never guess that
he is our third president in a row to have admitted to using
marijuana back in his years of youthful indiscretion.
Bill Clinton says he tried it but "didn't inhale." Oh, sure. George
W. Bush admitted to early pot use in a taped interview with a
friend, but refuses to discuss it in public. Obama described his own
teen drug use in poignant detail in his first memoir, but like
countless other Baby Boomer dads he now shies shyly away from the
subject.
Yet, you would not guess from his snarky town-hall attitude that
only a week earlier his attorney general, Eric Holder, announced
that the federal Drug Enforcement Administration would stop raiding
and arresting users or dispensers of medicinal marijuana unless they
violated both state and federal laws.
That means you, California, and a dozen other states that permit
marijuana sales and possession for medicinal purposes with a
doctor's recommendation.
Holder sensibly announced that DEA resources are too valuable in the
war against dangerous drug lords to be raiding residents who
otherwise are in compliance with state and local laws and standards.
That would reverse the Bush administration's ridiculous
scorched-earth pursuit that ignored the right of states to govern
themselves in such matters.
Yet, convenient inconsistency is not limited to any one party or
administration. A week after Holder's notice-and the same day that
Obama laughed off the notion of legal reefers-DEA agents raided
Emmalyn's California Cannabis Clinic, a licensed medical marijuana
collective in San Francisco.
DEA spokesmen claimed Emmalyn's had violated local as well as
federal law, but they didn't say how. Local officials said they
didn't have a clue what the DEA was talking about.
Not laughing is Charles Lynch, a celebrated cause since his Morro
Bay, Calif., medical marijuana dispensary was raided by the DEA in
2007. Two days before Obama's town hall meeting, a federal judge
postponed Lynch's sentencing to await clarification of Team Obama's
new hands-off approach.
Lynch, who has no criminal record and was welcomed by the local
mayor and business community, should be set free. Instead he's in
legal limbo, with both sides trying to make him a test case for
their competing crusades.
Also not laughing are lawmakers in at least 10 states, including
Illinois, who currently are debating whether and how they might join
the 13 states where medical marijuana is legal.
If he really cares, Obama could end this reefer madness in much the
same way that President Franklin Roosevelt ended the disastrous run
of liquor prohibition in 1933. Prohibition had to go. It was too
costly to enforce. It demoralized a public already beaten down by
the Depression. It wasted a potential tax revenue-producing
commodity by intruding unnecessarily into the private lives of
otherwise law-abiding Americans. Sounds familiar.
Unlike Roosevelt, Obama does not have to amend the Constitution to
end our marijuana confusion. He only has to get out of the way and
allow the states to enforce their own drug laws. That's not a
laughable notion. It's only sensible.
Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune's editorial board and blogs
at http://chicagotribune.com/pagespage/
Pubdate: Wed, 01 Apr 2009
Source: Chicago Tribune (IL)
Copyright: 2009 Chicago Tribune Company
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/82
***********************************************************************
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
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"Legalize marijuana and take all that money and invest it in teachers
and in education. You will see a transformation in America."
-- Carlos Santana
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