The ACLU reports the story quite well
This week, a college in Missouri broke the law and violated the Fourth Amendment rights of its students. Linn State Technical College became the first public institution of higher learning to implement mandatory drug testing of all new students, as well as those returning from extended leaves of absence.
What a way to welcome back the student body.
Keep in mind that we are talking about college students who have done nothing to arouse suspicion of drug use. In fact, the only thing they are guilty of is enrolling at Linn State. The ironic part is that the school has stated that they don’t believe they have a higher rate of drug use than students at any other college.
This is a very clear violation of the 4th Amendment, and it’s so incredibly wrong.
Here’s where it gets surreal and, in some ways, quite scary…
Linn State argues that their drug screening program serves as a way to prepare students for the real world of employee drug testing.
We’ve talked before about the fact that one of the dangers of extra-curricular drug testing in public schools is that it builds in young people the sense that providing pee to the government (proving your innocence) is a normal part of being a citizen in this free society.
Now, Linn State takes that a bizarre step further by educating its students that employee drug testing is so natural, that you should… practice it.
Sexual harassment is, unfortunately, also quite common in the workplace. Will Linn State next require all its students to pay to be sexually harassed?
Is there an Ssdp chapter there?
Are you sure it is a 4th amendment violation? The university isn’t law enforcement, and you don’t HAVE to take the test because you could always just leave the university. And it is not public school, where you are required by law to attend.
The test is voluntary, just like employee drug tests are. Voluntary doesn’t equal nice, but voluntary nonetheless. The part I like, though:
“Linn State argues that their drug screening program serves as a way to prepare students for the real world of employee drug testing.”
Now THAT’s pretty awesome. They’re doing it for your own good. Their mission is education, and this fascist drug test is preparation for a lifetime of fascist drug tests! It is a teachable moment!
Yes, it is, based on current case law. The fourth amendment doesn’t apply just to law enforcement. It applies to the government. And through the 14th Amendment, it applies to state governments and their agencies (including public education). Linn State has been part of the State of Missouri since 1996 and prior to that was part of a public local school district. It doesn’t matter that attending is voluntary. The government simply can’t search anyone without cause as a condition of participation, without a showing that there is a compelling interest (such as safety issues (bus drivers or extra-curricular activities)).
The Supreme Court has allowed the interests above, but has not yet agreed to any situation where suspicionless testing is used without a “compelling” reason.
Businesses, on the other hand, can require suspicionless testing because they’re not the government.
yeah, i dunno, maybe u forgot we don’t have any rights….detained, tortured, etc. yea, that can happen to anyone—no rights involved.
[i]The government simply can’t search anyone without cause as a condition of participation, without a showing that there is a compelling interest (such as safety issues (bus drivers or extra-curricular activities)).[/i]
The Supreme Court (Board of Education vs Earls) did not state any compelling interest needed beyond deterring drug use among students. Anybody student from the chess club to the cheerleading squad can be drug tested across the country.
“Vernonia did not require the school to test the group of students most likely to use drugs, but rather considered the constitutionality of the program in the context of the public school’s custodial responsibilities. Evaluating the Policy in this context, we conclude that the drug testing of Tecumseh students who participate in extracurricular activities effectively serves the School District’s interest in protecting the safety and health of its students. ”
http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/earls.html
If we consider that colleges receiving federal funding are required to set up comprehensive drug education and prevention programs to create “drug-free” campuses, then it’s not a strong leap in thinking that they also have the right to piss test their students. However, maybe some small conservative rural community college could get away with it, but it would be a huge effort at some liberal university with 50,000 students.
In Earls, the Supreme Court ruled specifically for extra-curricular activities. The Justices have not yet allowed suspicionless testing to be used for all students. Additionally, the Supreme Court has always allowed a somewhat lessened Constitutional scrutiny for High School students compared to others.
I’m not saying that the Supreme Court might not expand the scope of allowable drug testing, but based on current case law, the Linn State activity is clearly unconstitutional.
the whole drug war is clearly unconstitutional — and everyone will be routinely drug tested several times a day in the very near future.
Education is key to sensible drug policies. This is part of the reason why I am running for school board trustee in my hometown of Victoria.
If you don’t get involved, you can’t make a difference.
yes, i agree. but in both countries, education is not a priority—war is. there is no way out—-i don’t see one…..unless…
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Oh well shit, we may as well just commit suicide.
u are
nice reply pete. ya betta get used to it, however. soon, most will be considered a terror threat—including cannabis consumers (already are, duh), all part of the game. can someone, anyone, see this getting better? please enlighten me!
Yes, it WILL get better if everyone who wants real changes in these policies actually votes for Ron Paul in the primaries and caucuses (crossing party lines to do so, if necessary). If you are not willing to do this, then you are contributing to the problem, helping keep this sorry situation ongoing into the future. Ron Paul is the ONLY candidate who WILL change things; all the rest, including Obama, will only produce more of the same shit we’ve been dealing with for decades.
Yea, that could be a problem. Before I heard his debate answers I even considered voting for him. Now he’s a big a wingnut as his rugrat, baulkman and boosh lackey perry. I can already grow pot legally. I don’t need to flush the remainder of workers rights down the toilet saveding the rich under the false guise of protecting the Constitution. Nothing written about corporate rights or money in any of the Bill of Rights. Why do so many blame the government? The forefathers were very meticulous in establishing checks and balances because they knew all to well humans are corruptible. Corporate CEO’s like Rumsfeld and Cheney become corporate legislators and Libertards just go ape shit believing their stories and fairy-tales. Neocons say what they must to get elected. PERIOD! Ron Paul has gone from an alley against the drug war to the same boring Wallmart Street Moneysluts selling out the country for the world banksters with no allegiance. Kucinich and Nader are the only Americans worth giving a vote too. The only Americans period. The really big problem Americans have is their blind following of political parties and politicians, even when they stand against Americans rights. I agree with Thomas Jefferson.,,
Neocon Teabogs Really Are “Bloodlusting Terrorists”
How Neo-Cons, Neo-Nazis And Neo-McVeighs
Crashed Ron Paul’s Tea Party
The Tea Party, which started off as a Libertarian protest against taxes and government, has turned into a right wing, corporate sponsored, racist hate-fest. Three groups have joined the Libertarian founders of the Tea Party movement to add money, racism, hatred and conspiracy theory based paranoia to the Tea Pot.
Ron Paul does not favor corporations and does not take money from them, he’s had a consistent Constitutional voting record and has been totally consistent in his principles. He returns the unused portion (a rather large portion) of his congressional office’s funding each year to the Treasury and has refused to participate in the congressional pension plan. He ALWAYS obeys the Constitution in everything he does in government. He has a plan to turn the economy around and it will work, he will end all the military adventures (read “wars”) in other nations, call home all the troops who are overseas, and close all those overseas bases, leaving only those military who are guarding our embassies in place.
He will end the domestic wars as well (on drugs, on terror, and phase out the war on poverty (since all it has done is create greater numbers of people in poverty.
He will end the income tax and IRS, and those other meddling federal agencies, and end the Fed so as to return us to a sound money system (and no, not by going back to the gold standard, his proposal is more complex than that).
Since his personal positions on evolution and abortion would never affect any Americans, I could not care less about those, and I completely agree with him on the changing climate and and individual freedom. He is exactly the kind of man I want in the presidency.
The Tea Party may have been “crashed” by neocons and theocrats, but he is not to blame for that, they saw a good thing and twisted it to their purposes, tho there is not one Tea Party, each community has its own and they are all different, the ones on the west coast are more libertarian, the ones on the east cost are the ones that have been infiltrated and co-opted.
Bogus claims about climate dangers should not be used as a justification to further limit the American people’s freedom? How many American “people” do you know with oil wells in Saudi Arabia? Exxon are not “people” Monsanto is not a person. People don’t spew dioxins from smoke stacks that he is so generously giving the status of human too. Ron Paul is very idealistic, likable and truly believes in the Constitution. Too bad he wasn’t in vogue when the world banks and industrialists created poverty, slave labor, opposed the disabilities act, child labor laws and minimum wage, You think Cerebral Palsy patients really stay in their conditions because of the government intervening? Putting in ramps for wheel chairs in public buildings is against your rights to steps I suppose. If the schools were delivered books anonymously. Then the cities would receive the same as the suburbs. Stealing school funding with private vouchers only profit private schools and take away from the total populations education. More dumbing down, the better for cheap wages. Outsourcing or Ganjawars, its alls profits. Until the Libertarians remove themselves from the Wall St Fascists controlling the Legislature. They are a problem more than a solution. Aiding and abetting the enemies of the people. Those choosing to profit on treatment by shelving and prohibiting cures and preventions. Waging war for the sake of waging war to sell war toys and wound kits. Same with the prison industrial complex. Koch’s $72k per head is all the incentive they need to perpetuate the Ganjawar. Paul has nice words. His kid is a heartless bore. Spoiled on daddy’s generousity.
Many who have excess donate. Ted Turner, Gates, Buffett. That is their business. But their integrity is still like the preacher taking a vow of poverty holding on to his credit card just in case. The widows mite story comes to mind. If you’re comparing Ron Pauls donations to a poor mother on afdc then you’re out of touch with reality. Until the mother on afdc has a living income and housing and food then as Americans she has a higher priority to the tax money than Exxon with their $47 bil profit. Removing the Band Aids while the rich are cutting up the middle class leaves us paying taxes worse off down the road. Not only in paying more for jails and emergency care. But with lowering our standards as a country to the level of carnival barkers. Until you see that EVERY American has the same Bill of Rights that is there for we the people, not them the international tax sheltered corporations. Then nothing will change. Until we dump the exporting of jobs and importing chinese sweatshop OPEC crude oil plastic crap. We will see more suffering than need be. Same as seeing Americans die from prohibition knowing it is what’s killing people, not the drugs. I won’t intentionally have anything to do with Americans suffering by perpetuating or worsening what was orchestrated on them. Too many people on non renewable resources and the church and social conservatives want a ban on education and safe work practices. The Constitution can’t protect us as long as Corporations are included as citizens. I choose people over bricks. Paul chooses bricks.
Yes his record is almost as good as Kucinich. Only he doesn’t choose bricks.
Yea, so does Mack Crazyman by Nuking the planet and putting 300 million in underground cities until the fall out threat subsides. Anyone can fix the frickin budget, but at what expense to human lives, especially Americans? That isn’t the point. No more than those waiting for legal cannabis before they toke. The welfare of the citizenry is the only concern. Not two trillion to bail out Wall St Banks. Not two trillion to pay for fabricated fairy tale wars or another for the Ganjawar. All paid by taxes the teabags stay mum on while taking from the special needs.
Are you having trouble contemplating life as it is? He’s running for president, not Emperor of Earth. He believes the Parchment locked in the Smithsonian will magically make the World Banks and G-20 Corporations just stop doing what they are doing for a century, and poof, no more no bid contracts. Poof no more interventions. Period. Including Hitler if it was 1939. He wants 1776 to become 2011. We have to put people back to work. As long as Wall St has a vote, that won’t happen. Trickle down only works with foreign labor. So as I’ve repeated several times. Paul plays the game as a Libertarian knowing he can’t win unless he runs republican. He has a lot of individual support wearing the same blinders, blaming the poor and rewarding the rich. The rich cause the poor. In the 50’s Art Linkletter paid over 90% in taxes and still became a multi millionaire. Today those using tax paid roads and services shelter their share in offshore accounts or propaganda groups. So the workers are hit from both ends. Paul sides with the same Wall St., including the AMA as a Physician. Same as ole Harry Browne or Bob Barr. Can’t withdraw from the money junk.
Again he’s only the would be president and has no authority to over ride Congress and just stop police actions here or abroad. Not counting the money involved if he even attempts it. If he isn’t assassinated he would not get corporate press anymore than anyone else trying to stop profits. As far as the obvious insanity that the poor are just lazy and make themselves poor just to collect welfare. Only from the mouths of the spoiled. Typical to take random isolated incidents, making them the rule. No one wants to be poor. No one wants to be unemployed if they have a family, car payments and a mortgage. The hardest job in the world is being unemployed and the closest thing to an owned person is someone on SSI. Due to birth defects or disabilities. More strings attached than a marionette. Quadriplegics selling their souls for HUD rent subsidies. This is what Paul thinks is waste. Best they live under bridges.
Someday somewhere over the rainbow skies are blue and food stamps are unnecessary and jobs are plentiful and the rich are taxed until there are enough jobs to remove the poor. Then we all can lower taxes. Until then. Freedom isn’t Free.jpg
Like I said, he’s moved in with the wingnuts and it really doesn’t matter what else he says or if it’s legislated. This is how he thinks and if it’s just appeasing the base or old fashioned bassawkwards reality, he isn’t presidential material. As far as climate change. The same deniers in not so far distant pasts, said we couldn’t hurt the rivers and lakes until Erie caught on fire. Never harm the oceans until state size islands of partially decomposed plastic was discovered. Mercury levels past toxic from the Gold mines in Cali. Now the fish omega 2 oil has to be filtered. Same omega 3 as the illicit to grow hemp oil. Now you think the finite amount of air is beyond changing by human emissions? Just like Paul and Gil, you deny your nose to spite your face. Physical realities are non debatable. CO2 retains solar heat, period. A measurable amount of air is heated and you think it won’t make any difference? Heat increases volume so the oceans flooding islands isn’t real either? Just the common sense that says if something repeats itself as global warming does naturally. It has to be in a contained environment. So if you have a measured pot of water and add heat no amount of denial will prevent it from eventually expanding and over flowing it it is full enough. Same as Ganja and Hemp. It is or it isn’t. The debate is a red herring to avoid that simple reality. You believe the same wingnut that argues for Intelligent design and I’m supposed to take you or paul seriously? Sorry, I don’t believe in reefer madness, religionists myth’s or flat earths.
Agreed, they all suck. Any group that puts themselves over other Americans are not Americans. Tea Parties have no more Patriotism or right to change the laws of physics than anyone else. Any Libertarian who would interject their own mythology into law is not representing me. Like I said and Jefferson said and anyone looking outside of their TV sets says. You can’t leave a huge pile of corporate shit in the street and then cut subsidies for the tax paid shovels in the name of the Constitution. Where was the fucking Constitution when Monsanto and Cliarence Thomas were dumping dioxins in the Mississippi River? Or when Rockefeller and Hearse fabricated the booze prohibition the same as Nexxon did the Ganja Hemp inclusion as schedule#1 narcotics? You can’t just wave a magic Libertarian wand and undo the harm and then start from scratch. Take care of we the people by demanding living wages to spend locally. We will fix the economy. By shutting out Wallmart Street lobbyists and subsidies for multi national corporations. Many things Paul could do when the priorities of the people are met. But not in the order he has planned, or worse what his teabog kid has. Compassion isn’t what I’m talking about. Liberty for all including the poor is. Not charity, just the simple American way of helping your neighbors. Speaking out and getting informed. Paul has a place at a cabinet level for sure. But until he shows me he is human and not just an economist with a machete. I’ll vote Nader.
Al Capone and Watergate were red herrings to divert the countries attention from the Fascist acts of eliminating competition. Booze/Ethanol or Ganja//Hemp.
Hottest Summer in USA in 75 Years
You Are Part Neanderthal!
no, it won’t. ron paul? u must be really fuking high! u don’t have a vote that counts for anything until money is taken outta the system. case closed.
I happen to agree. Our vote doent count for shit till the money is taken out of washington/government. If your there to make money and a name for your self you dont belong in government. I say so what if Ron Paul is voted in…as long as big money is there , he wont be able to do shit ! Nor will any other candidate.
“It may be just as possible to produce a breed of men who do not wish for liberty as to produce a breed of hornless cows. The Inquisition failed, but then the Inquisition did not have the resources of the modern state.â€â€”George Orwell, Coming Up for Air, 1946.
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But the modern state doesn’t even have the resources of the modern state. Unless I’m grossly mistaken the people lending the resources to the modern state have realized that their borrowers are profligate and those resources are drying up at a startlingly quick rates, and by election day 2012 Uncle Sam will be holding up a cardboard “will pass laws for money or food” sign in an attempt to simply survive. He won’t be looking anything like the evil son of a bitch shaking all the money out of a citizen’s pockets pictured on the cover of the “Legalize Freedom” album by the Inhalers:
http://images.cdbaby.name/i/n/inhalers3.jpg
http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=101900516507329
“Legalize Freedom” ~ The Inhalers
“Linn State argues that their drug screening program serves as a way to prepare students for the real world of employee drug testing.”
Um… do Linn State students really need to practice peeing in a cup? (I know it’s not a super elite school and all, but good Lord!) Maybe they just want to give their students the chance to practice beating a drug test. And in their defense, a few trial runs with the Urinator is probably not a bad idea.
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Didn’t those things get discontinued? I never can recall if it was the makers of the Urinator or the Whizzinator that got a Federal conviction for selling their product but the business that didn’t would surely have thanked their lucky ducks and discontinued their production, no?
Ha, I have no idea. I’ve always passed my pre-employment drug tests the old-fashioned way (temporary abstinence plus lots of hydration). As far as I can tell they’re both still in business:
http://www.urinator.com/
http://www.thewhizzinator.com/whizzinator.html
Look out, cartels. The war on drugs just added a powerful new weapon to its arsenal… “animated, online propaganda comics set to electronic beats.”
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/09/mexico-attacks-cartels-with-comics/
Electronic beats?!! Looks like shit just got real! The featured comic in the series “10 mitos de la lucha por la securidad” (“10 Myths of the Struggle for Security”) addresses the “myth” that “the solution to violence is to negotiate with criminals.” It turns out that’s muy falso. Let me hit you with a little realidad. The solution is actually to “put behind bars those who undermine the peace of you and your family.” While “betting on the law, institutional strengthening, and the fight against crime can be difficult, it is the only effective way to institute a genuine and lasting security.” So to recap, there are only two possible approaches to cartel violence: “negotiating with the criminals” or … more of the same. (I mean, I certainly can’t think of any alternatives?) And it turns out that, as between our two choices, “more of the same” is the way to go. Not only that, it should (any day now, I’m guessing) “institute a genuine and lasting security.” Got it.
This is just another negative result extending from the false notion that our public servants are authorized to legally define risk.
To legally define risk is to legally define liberty, which is unacceptable in the U.S., according to the U.S. Declaration of Independence.
Liberty is self-evidently a naturally-given and unalienable right (which only a fool would believe is not legally protected by the ninth amendment in the U.S. Constitution).
The fact is there are brilliant revolutionary principles that “We the people” should embrace, but instead continue to avoid them, embracing the dominant, pre-American philosophy that regulation objectively produces better outcomes (a baseless philosophy, but it feels good for many people).
Our nation was established in opposition against the abuse of power. Our nation can only thrive in opposition against the abuse of power.
Yet the public majority continues to opine about where the legal lines should be drawn regarding liberty, and our public servants muddy the waters by regulating this and that to protect our children.
It is one thing to ban murder, assault, and theft, as every instance of those acts directly infringes upon the rights of another person, which is where the legal line should be drawn.
It is another to have a Controlled Substances Act that states that our public servants have concluded that certain recreational drug use “has a high potential for abuse” (i.e. is too risky) and therefore a law (ridiculously ruled constitutional due to the Commerce Clause) against harmless acts involving such drugs (e.g. possession) can exist.
It greatly hurts society to add the unethical support by the mainstream media for such lawless laws.
The answer to this mess is a simple message repeatedly communicated to the masses via entertainment about how liberty is actually defined (the only limit against your liberty is the right itself).
If “We the people” continue to generally fail to understand the fundamental requirements in our nation, the people in power (in the public and private sectors) will continue to grab whatever more power they can, without any regard for societal benefit.
Life is risky, no matter what legal structure is in place. Allowing our public servants to oppose our fundamental rights to legally define risk is ironically a serious risk against society.
“We the people” continue to watch the net resulting public servant revolution against the limits of power set in our Constitution to oppose the abuse of power, so far without the ability to finally organize the effort required to put down that revolution.
The real “Tea Party” movement is fueled by the frustration from pulling the voting lever for blue or red, and getting the same unacceptable, un-American result.
The real movement is just beginning.
I agree 100%. But keep in mind that different people respond to different arguments. I love the rights-based approach, but it simply doesn’t resonate with everyone. For example, I once saw a commenter respond to the statement that individuals own their own bodies by arguing that “our bodies are actually God’s property.†And, according to this commenter, God is most definitely NOT cool with marijuana on his property—presumably for liability reasons. (It turns out that the Biblical reference to God’s gift to man of “every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth†was a bit of a typo. Obviously God didn’t really mean every herb bearing seed, just the ones approved by duly-appointed government agencies.)
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We also shouldn’t forget that the Declaration of Independence has the legal force of the very eloquent “Dear George” letter that it is. I do enjoy pointing out to those who espouse mindless obedience to any law in existence that the DoI was produced by 56 old white men who knowingly conspired to and did commit high treason against the crown by signing it, which established the American tradition of not suffering unjust laws, but breaking them until they’re repealed. But aside from the symbolism of the very first document produced by our government being the product of a capital crime it’s pretty much meaningless as far as the law is concerned.
“The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
That is the ninth amendment in the U.S. Constitution.
Despite our public servants successfully ruining this amendment while traveling the legal path connected to it, any sane person clearly understands what that amendment says, and why it says it.
Other rights retained by the people must include the truths to be held self-evident in the U.S. Declaration of Independence.
Now find me one American patriot who will get up on the national stage and publicly disagree with that declaration with regards to our fundamental rights.
Find me one prohibitionist who will do that.
and not a single nom de plume among the signers of the Declaration.
Yeah, well King George couldn’t REACH them. The British had just a handful of conscripts in the colonies. If you’ll recall, he had to assemble his army from other posts and send them, via long and perilous sea journey to the upstart colonies. The DEA is so close to my house they could hit it WITH A FUCKING THROWN ROCK. Brian, if that’s your REAL name, STFU.
Actually, they were not “old” men when they wrote those documents.
Dude haven’t we had enough martyrs and victims?
Poof… Wake up. It’s not 1776 and we’re not fighting the British.
“We have met the enemy and he is us” ~ Pogo
@darkcycle: do you not even see the irony of your own words? “if that’s your real name,” quoth the anonymous jackass. fucking priceless! and you claim to be educated? so gasbag, give it a try sometime and make me shut up.
@ddc — yes, we totally have enough martyrs and victims: we get to read about them every time there is another swat raid. it’s way past time to think that being chickenshits is a way to improve our lot.
the anonymous are easy to deprive of their rights — hell, they don’t even have the balls to sign their names to their words.
Brian you’re living in cyber reality. I donate to many groups and causes. Ganjawar related and other groups doing local work. I have to use my own name to use my own credit card. Collecting sigs or advocating one on one or to groups is the same. I have no problem using my own name when I have a say in who I’m speaking with or too. For all we know you could be some pervert looking for small boys. You say your name is Brian but it’s the fucking net dude. The information is here to read and pass on or debate or disregard at your wish. The arguments can get as intense as need be to a point when its not serving the issues. No one has a problem with that. You remind me of the trolls whining about the envelope of the message being dirty. Just to disregard the message. Your name or moniker doesn’t mean diddly shit and your boasting about your bravery is sorta like boasting about how we all like you. That just isn’t in your power to do. It’s our choice and no amount of bragadociousness is going to make you any braver or tougher because of your sig. Except in your own mind. So go on and reject info from nick names and accept those with proper sounding titles. At the end of the day you will be as ignorant as when the day started. One of dem plastic flag jerkers eh? Plastic Patriots wear red white and blue ployfiber and chemical cotton. So damn fussy about how they look like someones definition of how a patriot should look. All while demonizing and degrading those wearing natural organic Hemp that actually takes away profits from the deemed enemies of the Mid East. Your moniker happens to be your name. That just tells me you’re too boring to think of an alias. Is that your password too?
well ddc, clearly you are incapable of addressing the points i make and instead resort to puerile attempts to attack my character. what a shock! i’ve chewed up and spit out hundreds of idiots such as yourself all over the internet.
so let’s see, hmmmm …. who’s opinion should i care about: the borderline psycho and his incessant incoherent babbling, or the educated people who value my work and use it in their own efforts, those who write about me and my work in books, and those who interview me on their radio shows? gee, what a dilemma!
so babble on jackass — you’re doing a really spectacular job of making pot smokers look respectable.
and here’s a really wild-assed thought: if you don’t like what i write, don’t read it. god knows i don’t waste any time on yours.
brain bennett
September 12, 2011 at 10:30 pm
You are entitled to your opinion but I’m sure you have no original thought, therefore original opinion. you are not entitled to steal others opinions. I disagree with your typical boring self righteous “points” that are all you provide. Statistics that are very well done and helpful in a proper setting of debate. What you are inept at comprehending is the very fact that we are not in a level playing field. That all the truth in the world has no meaning in a vacuum. You keep insisting we’re right like none of us know that. Like your enlightening us with some kind of puritanical nobility and pride, honor and obedience. Join the fucking army. Brian you have every right on earth to tell the world your social security number and give out your credit card while your at it. But you have no right to demean anyone else for choosing sanity.
Says you. That is until it’s time to actually prove it or bring a ref. You are informed as well as any of the groups you put down. None of you are fighting real enemies. All of you are trying to somehow reform what is not part of any Constitutional basis. It’s corporate sponsored, corporate profits and corporate perpetuation that you keep yelping about. Not the government. The government is held hostage and your answer is to compromise. Just kill half of them. Dude you can brag about your pot adventures all night. Tell us war stories and grow tips whathefuck ever floats your boat. But ya still ain’t got no right to demand others do as you choose to do. No one is the lesser for using a moniker in public. Your all pixels Brian. For all we know your a fat old lady from Oklahoma who gets off on making charts. I don’t really need to mention what I have done to punks on the net. My rudeness is well known when push comes to shove. I just never learned to get along with bullies or stupid people with an agenda that hurts other people. You are a part of the solution, not the solution. Many roads to rome bla bla bla. Get over yourself and let others see you for what you bring on their own terms. I;d appreciate any advise on technical errors or hope others take my ammo dumps and put them in proper formats. Its just info dude. i’m an x corporate utilities tech. Boilers and Ammonia refrigeration. After cashing out my early retirement I started a business doing hospice work in central cal. As a cannabis caregiver I’ve done my share, as I said. But I have no right to tell anyone else what to do. I would be going against my own grain of Liberty for all. So don’t be an asshole and I assure you I won’t call you on it.
See, now you’re being an asshole. If you can type it then you can disprove it. Just because its over your head doesn”t mean its false. Actually what I say is always backed by the source of where my opiinion was formed. You just say, what? Infalibility came to you with Ed McMahans sweepstakes ticket? Your opinion is pedestrian. Made for lawyers to fight lawyers then have a beer laughing about it. Boring. I bring totally referenced ideas you fear for some reason. that tells me something before you even mumble another incoherent sentence. If it’s babbling why are you worried about it? wun wabbit wun!
educated on censored school books, now from pro choice texans, design or evolution. Do you even realize how many doctors and nurses haven’t a clue to the mapping of the cannabinoid system? Your work is stats. I show you stats and its whooof over your head. Red flags coming out your ass and you and most of the deform movement totally miss. Most of the eradications are hemp ditchweed. Duh? so what? 404 gag rules prevent medicinal testimony… ah…. more abortions from cottons pesticides than they shoot doctors over. In the bible belt. OpResQ preggo’s. Nuthin! Mindless. Your not firing on all cylinders asshole. Prove anything I say is false Brainiac. Anything. Most would have already brought it if they had it. Those who cry and whine never have proof or even a ref to their thoughts. You wish to stifle speech by intimidation. Might as well be an x-commie in Siberia.
Ghee mister celeb can I have your autograph? Words dude. Still have nothing to do with you telling others what to do. Or degrading them for disagreeing. Me, take your best shot asshole. i mean sir asshole.
In your delusions. I smoked a bowl with Jack Herer and Ed Rosenthal. you want to kiss my ass now or later? Don’t mean shit dude. What I do for patients is between me and the patient and I care less if anyone else thinks. So far, 20 years and they all seem to appreciate my care. Working steady. Living with Ganja and Hemp seed and oil. Not just talking about it. Or bragging about it. One prob I see boopy, You on the radio crying that no one ever helps you win the war on drugs. Its always been you and no one appreciates it. So sad.
Babylon Jackass? WTF you talkin bout jethro? If you can prove its babble and not referenced documentation or journalists articles with references you most certainly would have. You’re a coward Brian. Same lame troll tactics. Blurt out whatever. No link to the subject. Just denialism or fear of change. You dismiss anything that you haven’t already decided in your little world. On old notes. Even without all the facts. Instead of learning from the people here, you ridicule them and always fall back on me brian, me me me. Now silly name calling. not even a moments thought into fitting the slur with the sentence or issue or person. Just babble on jackass. As boring as your charts to prove the ONDCP is wrong even though they have the same charts. Brian I think its time to take a rest. The war ain’t going nowhere fast. it will be here when you get back. No ones even fighting the actual war. too many red herring battles going on. To many wanting to actually eat their cake too. Rest Brian. Try some Ganja, I hear its good fer that.
Thanks, but they have always been respectable. Only politicians selling bullshit reform on dysfunction policies that should be abolished say that. only big headed idiots relying on the educated ignorant. Their sheepskins are nothing more than parts of a resume. In corporate land where drug wars come from. Where the legalizers stand and shout and show pretty charts at strangers. In their suits and haircuts, selling pot stories to lifer politicians. The system is broke dude you can put all the quarters in you want but its been tilted since 1937. Grow up.
What else ya got?
How will I know?
does god tell you that tse knows? Is that supposed to affect me? Like the beauty queen voting popular wins over reality? Sorry I don’t do plastic superficial dysfunction’s. What I do is as obvious as i can make it. I bring refs and different views and they even have pictures for illiterate numbnuts in love with themselves like you. Really Brian I only wanted to inform you that you were full of shit on one issue, telling people they were less than you for using monikers and not proper names. Are you related to Bill? I think he does charts too? How about Chris? Or Rene’? Are you sure you’re the only brian bennett on the net? Are you the only cannibal chewing people up and spitting them out somehow? Or just a blowhard with a few too many sips of suds? Got something to say dude, that’s why we’re here. Just swallow your ego and ask. I have no problem splainin anythin lucy.
“I love the rights-based approach, but it simply doesn’t resonate with everyone.”
I truly appreciate your agreement, but your valid point is the problem that “We the people” must address.
“We the people”, according to our Constitution, are the real government. We are the leaders of our nation. That is why we have “public servants” who take an oath to uphold our Constitution (which implicitly defines the limits of their power).
The only proven effective way to deal with the abuse of power is to sustain a balance of power, providing a real disincentive against abuse.
The masses require just enough power to counter the abuse of power. Otherwise, the abuse will destabilize everything, and eventually an extreme correction (e.g. a revolution) will occur to reset the balance.
What we have is a public majority that was never taught to embrace that in any real way. Students only learn to memorize the famous parts of our founding documents at an age when they could not care less about the contents within.
They are also encouraged at times to get lost in the use of the word “men” and “Creator” to discredit the definition of liberty there.
Our founding fathers sacrificed their lives (and those of their loved ones) to establish independence from what they felt was a power-abusing king.
Now we have the rampant abuse of power in our nation (there are czars and unreachable bureaucrats here, for crying out loud), and everyone is effectively crying about how powerful our public servants are, and how hopeless we the masses are.
I believe as the legal precedence supporting the CSA (i.e. the Commerce Clause allowing our public servants to regulate anything they can get away with) applies more oppression against the masses (e.g. perhaps forcing them to buy health insurance), more people will resonate with the simple definition of liberty in our land, for the same reason it exists in our most popular declaration.
When the definition of liberty transcends humanity (because humanity puts it there, of course), then the commenter you mentioned can feel free to opine about this and that, but can never take away your right without being able to objectively prove direct rights infringement.
Since the act of breathing indirectly or potentially leads to all rights-infringing acts, allowing laws against liberty based on indirect or potential infringement automatically opposes the word “unalienable”, and creates the legal slippery slope we are on now.
Liberty is in part defined by what people believe are acceptable and unacceptable acts that indirectly or potentially harm others. People are defining liberty and that is wrong.
Liberty, as simply defined in the U.S. Declaration of Independence, is the power of the minority, as well as the majority. This must resonate with most Americans to achieve a balance of power.
That way, one can simply proclaim that possessing a plant can not directly infringe upon another person’s rights, and the possession remains legal, while society is forced to find other ways to deal with plant abuse.
I am not proposing an angle for our movement. I am doing my best to express the root problem that needs addressing by the masses, including the people within our movement.
Nowdays, colleges only teach one to become an “employee.” They don’t teach how to have your own business. Right, Pete? It was the School of HK or “Street Tech” that taught me that, as my own boss, I don’t require me to pee on command. I been a happy camper ever since.
That’s often true, ezrydn. But not always. I’ve actually been named a Coleman Fellow this year – a special program working with faculty who teach entrepreneurship. As someone who teaches Arts Management, I’ve always been heavily involved with the entrepreneurial approach.
Of course, then again, the arts have not been much into drug testing.
ezrydn, you might enjoy this recent article that makes a similar point: http://reason.com/archives/2001/10/01/schools-out
“Compulsory mass schooling is an aberration in both history and modern society. Yet it was the ideal preparation for the Organization Man economy, a highly structured world dominated by large, bureaucratic corporations that routinized the workplace. Compulsory mass schooling equipped generations of future factory workers and middle managers with the basic skills and knowledge they needed on the job. The broader lessons it conveyed were equally crucial. Kids learned how to obey rules, follow orders, and respect authority — and the penalties that came with refusal.
This was just the sort of training the old economy demanded. Schools had bells; factories had whistles. Schools had report card grades; offices had pay grades. Pleasing your teacher prepared you for pleasing your boss. And in either place, if you achieved a minimal level of performance, you were promoted. Taylorism — the management philosophy, named for efficiency expert Frederick Winslow Taylor, that there was One Best Way of doing things that could and should be applied in all circumstances — didn’t spend all its time on the job. It also went to class. In the school, as in the workplace, the reigning theory was One Best Way. Kids learned the same things at the same time in the same manner in the same place. Marshall McLuhan once described schools as “the homogenizing hopper into which we toss our integral tots for processing.” And schools made factory-style processing practically a religion — through standardized testing, standardized curricula, and standardized clusters of children. (Question: When was the last time you spent all day in a room filled exclusively with people almost exactly your own age?)”
Francis, that is an arguemnt for dismantling the public school system. The problem is that education is needed for alot more than just preparing industrial workers. Education provides the basic literacy needed to function as a participating member of a democracy. It assures that even when parents don’t do their jobs (as often they don’t) the basic educational and socialization needs of the children will be met. School functions to teach us the intricacies of living in a culture of primates, without simply being a bunch of shit flinging monkeys (shit throwing is in the human programming, I worked in enough mental institutions and jails to know about that first hand).
Since knowledge is cumulative, and you cannot learn particle physics until you have mastered addition and subtraction, multiplication, division, then Algebra and so on, a base must be established early, and it needs to be constantly extended and expanded upon. Also, the base needs to be a common base, so that when the child matriculates to the next level, he will be ready, along with kids from other schools, to continue the work without delaying the instruction by having to catch up to his or her classmates. That’s why we group them by age. Furthermore, in a culture where two parents need to work full time jobs to subsist, the schools are vital in their role en loco parentis. With two parents working, who is it who stays home to teach the child ANYTHING?
In a crowded world, the idea that we might lose public education as we know it actually terrifies me.
I don’t necessarily read it as an argument for the elimination of a public role in guaranteeing access to education. (But then again, this is reason.com we’re talking about.) I think the more interesting argument is that our current conformity-based, top-down, one-size-fits-all approach is misguided. But as someone with strong libertarian leanings, I find the argument that “education is so important, the government must be heavily involved” a lot less compelling than the argument that “education is so important, we can’t trust the government with it.”
How about this? I’m about as comfortable with the government deciding what should go in our children’s minds as I am with them deciding what should go in my body.
Dude…look around at some of the parents….That’s a lovely sounding sentiment, but in some cases we’re talking about people who can’t hold a spoon.
And again, if two parents are required to work to support a household, who, exactly, stays home and tends to the basic, let alone the educational needs of a child? That’s a dangerous fantasy we all should agree is spun from just so much horseshit. Unfortunately it is “common wisdom”…just because it sounds so damn seductively simple. The implications of dismantling the public education system are so staggeringly far reaching that I’m hard pressed to think of a facet of life that wouldn’t be irrevocably changed for the worse.
If we do eliminate free public education in this country, I would suggest investing your money in the Corrections industry. Because if we’re not spending money on schools, we’d better start spending more on prisons. Myself, in that event, I’ll be taking my family elsewhere, perhaps Canada, perhaps Spain. But I think under those circumstances I’d feel better with an ocean between us and what will become of this society. And I assure you, that’s not hyperbole.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKci3_cmlqI
http://iwcenglish1.typepad.com/Documents/Holt_How_Children_Fail.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Holt_(educator)
Told my wife about Linn State Tech (she’s a college professor) she responded: “Don’t they have a lawyer?” I said, “Of course, they have a lawyer.” Then she said “Then do they have a lawyer that graduated from Lynn State Tech?!”
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The lawyer did in fact pass his urine test.
When I was in Kentucky I just couldn’t believe the peer pressure to institute drug testing for my employees, complete with the horror story of 3 young children who were squished by a mobile home because the installer was on methamphetamine. “How can you be against urine testing, do you want to see more toddlers squished by mobile homes?” It didn’t matter in the least that the installer that squished the kiddies had been subject to urine tests, nor that their idiot parents let them play underneath a trailer being installed, nor that it just isn’t that hard to tell when a guy is tweaking. Those children got squished because of the greed of the owner of the toter company who overlooked his man high on meth because he was working so diligently, and the sloth of their parents who didn’t provide even the most basic parental supervision.
Please don’t ask how I ended up in the mobile home industry in Kentucky, I really don’t care to talk about it much. It’s one of my most horrid memories. Trailer parks in Kentucky, one place where the stereotypes are not only true, they’re totally understated.
Duncan. That’s awful. Not the toddler, working in the mobile home industry in Kentucky, THAT’S awful.
You paid your dues, buddy.
I’ve come across all sorts of militant outrage about drug testing stories and we seemed to have ceded a huge piece of ground by ignoring (not talking about) the drug testing industry. When will we see serious activism for shutting down the drug testing industry? I suspect the industry lobby had a hand in this university’s policy yet nobody’s curious about it.
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My mind wanders to the subject of kickbacks, pre-paid hookers and complimentary [cocaine and/or pricey booze] vis a vis the people with the authority to implement such policies when such people start lobbying for urine testing where it’s so obviously unneeded to the point of being inappropriate. Such kickbacks might include, but not necessarily limited to the items listed above. Currency works for almost anyone so inclined and we can’t forget that blackmail can be very effective indeed.
I swear that if we can link the urine testing industry to the sale of synthetic urine and other items promoted as effective baffles for drug testing we could blow the lid off the entire scam. Did somebody say “follow the money”?
it is highly unlikely that dupont bensinger and associates is selling synthetic urine, or otherwise attempting to play both sides — the market simply isn’t big enough, and pales in comparison to the revenues they can generate via their current strategy of universal drug testing.
it isn’t an issue of following the money — it’s an issue of exposing the un-American fascist assholes for what they are.
We’ve talked before about the fact that one of the dangers of extra-curricular drug testing in public schools is that it builds in young people the sense that providing pee to the government (proving your innocence) is a normal part of being a citizen in this free society.
what really caught my eye is this so-called “…free society”. wow–that’s laughable. either pete and others don’t read about liberties and such, or just have money that keeps em comfy and warm and are just outta touch. i recommend that pete and others read whats on da side: glen greenwald, agitator, raw story, etc. respect for this blogger is long gone now.
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Well here’s another one in favor of just giving up. We may as well just commit suicide if we accept fukhead’s fantasy land analysis as if it were true.
So fukhead, what are you waiting for?
Bummer day, Duncan? 9/11 getting you down? Just remember to:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1loyjm4SOa0
anybody notice in the recent assault on teachers and state employees that the “online education” system continues making inroads and soon kids won’t even need to go to school, they can just sit in front of their computers 8 hrs a day… Bill Bennett is part of that movement – K12 or K-12 I believe.
Now officially an old fart (turned 60 the other day) I find that when political discussions reach drug policy and I start mentioning things like “the land of the free” and “sweet land of liberty” and how we’ve become the most incarcerated population on the planet, many folks start getting squirmy… as if discussion of such topics is radical or that *gasp* someone might hear us say the word “drugs” or “freedom.” Or even worse, use them in the same sentence.
One need not be a cynic to know that we’ve gone a long ways down a dark and scarey road and our guides are ever so much also our tormenters… worse yet, the road back to liberty promises some hair raising and not-so-charming scenarios. And if we don’t go back… the machine wins.
Remember Soylent Green? Well, aren’t those 30,000 deaths a day from starvation and malnutrition among the poorest of the world’s poor a very literal harvest, the fuel feeding the compassionless engine driving civilization? Such a force relinquishes power reluctantly, if at all, unless of course, its fuel line is disconnected. Monkeywrenching is essential. Disrespect and mockery (extra points for eloquence and creative delivery) are like a thousand paper cuts, irritating but not fatal. The beast still feeds, voracious and unchallenged and we needs us a slayer we do…
Dark days ahead my lovelies, dark days ahead…
Well said.
Who needs hog slopping 101.