DEA Experts Call for Better Link Between Drug and Terrorism Policy
Executive Editor Tom Julia interviewed Mike Chapman, Richard Fiano, Derek Maltz and Steve Murphy for 90 minutes about federal drug policy and how the Trump Administration can better combat the dual — and increasingly linked — threats of illicit drug trafficking and the funding of international terrorism. […]
Asked what advice they would give president-elect Trump to use DEA’s strengths more effectively, Maltz and others urged a better understanding of how profits from the illicit drug trade are being used to fund terrorist groups.
“If you understand the link and how too break it, you can target your resources more effectively to fight both terrorism and drug trafficking,†said Maltz.
Sheriff Mike Chapman — Profile:
Richard Fiano — Profile:
Derek Maltz – Profile:
Steve Murphy — Profile:
Immediately after 9/11 took place, one of the denizens at DEAWatch was plugging the idea of spot-welding the War on Drugs to the newborn War on Terror.
I predicted as much here at CannabisNews I believe you’ll find my comments back then were quite prescient, given what happened later with the (choke, cough, spit) ‘PATRIOT Act’ and what came in its wake. But nobody needed a crystal ball to see what was coming down the pike.
And sure enough:
At last, we hear from DEAWatch on the (Sept. 10 2001 DEA head Asa Hutchinson/Garry Johnson) debate. And, just as predictable as an Eastern sunrise, we get…this:
12 Sep 2001, 14:09 PST, 5th Edition
“N.M. Gov. Debates Legalizing Drugs with DEA Boss, con’t:
Instead of screwing around with Gary Johnson Asa should be making public statements equating community drug dealers with terrorists.
We all know that a good portion of drug money is going to terrorist organizations. Drug dealers and terrorists are one and the same: they both work to undermind our national security. Somebody should tell Asa to leave the debates to ONDCP and start acting like a law enforcement executive. He is missing a good media opportunity to raise the drug war issue. Terrorists and drug dealers are one and the same… or is it only the flower part of the poppy that Afghanistan ships to the U.S.???
Need I say it? I told you that the antis would be scratching to make some hay from this tragedy, and exactly how they would do it. And here it is.
Well, the rest is history; history that has been ignored, as the DEA got its wish to run loose in A-stan, with the predictable negative results. And so once again history is being ignored, with the same stupid calls for blending the (demonstrably failed) War on Terror with the (incontrovertibly failed) War on Drugs. These idiots never learn because they never ever pay the full price of failure.
kaptinemo, interesting blast-from-the-past. Great analysis and predictions.
Curious if you knew that one of my cannabis heroes, Dr. Ethan Russo, replied to a couple of your comments on that thread back in 2001?
Cool.
Actually, yes, I knew. We had a few interesting conversations online, and I had met him and Observer from CNEWS earlier on during the NORML convention in DC that year.
I also met the pioneering online journalist Dan Forbes there and gave him a few tips about how the ONDCP might be (hell, they were) violating the Hatch Act. He dug into it and exposed the ‘payola’ style scandal that ONDCP was involved in, by ‘encouraging’ TV show producers to insert anti-drug propaganda into their programs. He even wound up testifying to Congress about it.
It all seems so long ago, and I am feeling my age in recalling it. It’s been a long, hard struggle for all of us, but it’s been worth it with half the country legal in one form or another. People like Sessions are urinating into the wind if they think they can go against the expressed political will of the electorate for very long, this time. The tipping point was reached in 2009 and is long past us; Federal intransigence at this point will only cause a slow burn to become a forest fire.
I saw an article where a legislator filed a bill to bar any cuts to the DEA budget,,do not know what is up with that but somebody fears something.
I was busy and missed capturing the link dammit,,may have been fake news or it could have been pulled cause I can’t search it out now.
I noticed the NCI edited out all mention of THC killing cancer cells from their report on cannabinoids and cancer. FYI.
Just another Catch 22² Clay…
Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III says leave it up to Congress
and then Eddie Munster blocks any cannabis legislation.
Including renewing the amendment. Isn’t that speeeecial…
Sessions on Enforcing Federal Marijuana Laws
http://cannabisnews.com/news/29/thread29018.shtml
Sessions noted that “the U.S. Congress has made the possession of marijuana in every state, and distribution of it, an illegal act. So if that’s not desired any longer, Congress should pass a law to change the rule.”
The Rohrabacher–Farr medical marijuana amendment is legislation first introduced by U.S. Reps. Maurice Hinchey, Dana Rohrabacher, and Sam Farr in 2003, prohibiting the Justice Department from spending funds to interfere with the implementation of state medical marijuana laws. The amendment does not change the legal status of marijuana however, and must be renewed each fiscal year in order to remain in effect.
“New rules implemented by Speaker of the House Paul (Eddie Munster) Ryan, “amendments related to guns, abortion, LGBT issues and marijuana will no longer be permitted†… ref
Get your same ol drug war here folks, step right up!
“DEA Experts Call for Better Link Between Drug and Terrorism Policy”
Linking.
Once you have a list of banned substances you may link any criminal activity to it, including the criminal activity of breaking your rules lists.
Without inspecting the source of the problem (which is the banning of the substances) you can create all the links you want. Like correlation without causation, gateway effects, terrorism, and black men craving sex with white woman, etc., etc., etc. ad infinitum.
The link is in the mind of the public. We are not talking about science here. We are talking about the black psychology of the manipulation of public opinion.
The beginning of the link, the lynch pin, is the list of substances that have been banned.
If the purpose is to save and help people from the dangers of the drugs themselves, creating a whole criminal sector of banned substances to operate from is the stupidest thing that could be done.
The source of the problem is having a drug war in the first place.
– Linking is what you do if you want to blow smoke up someones ass to mask your real purpose.
The source of the problem is easy to find,,money.
If people didn’t need to pay bills and eat they wouldn’t take the only decent paying job in the hood that pays a living wage requiring little or no structure/property to set up in,,,just product.
“The link is in the mind of the public. We are not talking about science here. We are talking about the black psychology of the manipulation of public opinion.”
The drug war in a nutshell. The whole thing is a p.r. campaign and always has been. Hence these four “retired” honchos now working as consultants for Drug War Inc. spouting their usual sales pitch.
“More” bad ideas sounds to me as if its only occasionally. Or they are in a slump and good ideas are waiting around the corner. The DEA is a bad idea in and of itself, and has never had a good idea in its entire worthless existence. They only prove how gullible and naive Americans really are by paying for a government office to lie and divert truth from them. I think it prudent at this juncture to never forget that “It” Can Happen Here. Or maybe more appropriate, It is Happening Here.
☛ How an ‘abuse-deterrent’ drug created the heroin epidemic
OxyContin, Limbaugh’s drug of choice…
☛ Court Says Climate Scientist
Can Sue Conservative Shills For Defamation
Then so can Cannabis Reform groups…
☛ Americans for Safe Access
Legally Challenge DEA Misinformation about Pot
☛ Politicians Use False Stats To Keep Marijuana Illegal
☛ This DEA tweet
accidentally reveals one of the big arguments for legalizing marijuana
The DEA pointed to the tobacco model as a success.
But tobacco is legal.
OT
Here’s a link, https://www.nap.edu/catalog/24625/the-health-effects-of-cannabis-and-cannabinoids-the-current-state to download a PDF of the study mentioned in this article:
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Landmark-study-marijuana-is-effective-medicine-10853435.php
It’s an update to the NAS study from 1999.
We the Congress have a mountain of evidence to prove the Ganjawar is a government/industry project sold to the tax payers using fraudulent information. Our only question is where can we burn the evidence before the people see it?
☛ Task-Farce: Reefer Madness 2.0!
This article details my analysis of the recommendations brought forward by the Liberal Government’s “Task Force on Cannabis Legalization and Regulation.†Full text of the report can be found here: Task force recommendations. As I see, and perhaps you’ll agree, their advice is based on “reefer madness 2.0†– the myth of inherent harm done
☛ Survey: Most Police Officers Feel That Bad Cops Are Not Held Accountable
☛ Why Canada’s Marijuana Industry Loves Donald Trump
Sessions unleashing the DEA on America’s nascent marijuana industry, reducing its multiple billions of dollars of economic potential to a smelly ash heap of broken dreams, wouldn’t be a tragedy north of the border. It would be an incredible (and incredibly lucrative) opportunity.
☛ DEA Under Fire for Wasting Money and Being Incompetent
☛ Private Prisons Could Flourish Under Trump Administration
This one slipped by…
The new law gives the department 12 months to submit a list of suggestions detailing how law enforcement agencies might begin policing cannabis impairment in a manner similar to how they handle alcohol.
☛ Trump Administration Responsible
for Establishing National Marijuana Impairment Standard
In December, President Obama signed a bill called the “Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (FAST Act), putting the U.S. Department of Transportation in charge of investigating possible approaches for detecting marijuana impairment along the great American landscape.
☛ How to Beat a Marijuana DUI
Alcohol is water-soluble, whereas cannabis is fat-soluble. If alcohol is in your body, it’s active until it’s flushed out. Cannabis is stored in fat cells, meaning its psychoactivity can be long gone—even if evidence of its presence remains.
To add more confusion, a regular user of cannabis will have a higher residual level of marijuana metabolites, the telltale compounds that remain in fat cells after the body has broken down active cannabinoids.
A regular user may have 5 ng/ml of cannabis metabolites in his or her system or more, days or even longer after using cannabis.
And unlike with drivers behind the wheel above the ironclad rule of 0.08 for blood-alcohol content, juries are siding with drivers who exceed 5 ng/ml for cannabis.
☛ Cannabis Users Are Safer Drivers Than Non-Users, New Study Shows
☛ Cannabis use and Driving
Howard was great guest tonight — talkin bout driving.
show 333 at 8:40 or so
https://www.spreaker.com/show/planet-green-trees
.
.
“Asked what advice they would give president-elect Trump to use DEA’s strengths more effectively, Maltz and others urged a better understanding of how profits from the illicit drug trade are being used to fund terrorist groups.”
—————————
And right under their noses is the answer to their perplexing dilemma, no need for a “better understanding”: convert the illicit drug trade to a licit one. While the black market would not end overnight, eventually it would shrink to the point where any “donations” to terrorist groups would also shrink to the point of becoming insufficient and inconsequential to their operating needs.
But, of course, to a career DEA agent this is madness. What with career advancement, a steady paycheck and the possibility of cavorting with prostitutes in Columbia at stake, what crazy person would suggest such a thing?
Nothing new at all being mentioned in my comment. The same concept has been described, in various ways, a thousand times before. Round and round we go…
.
.
Well whaddyaknow? Our old friend k’Lieman got ahold of that meta-study that just came out, and he seems to be singing his tunes in a different key now:
Not that he ever outright denied it, but we all remember how he couldn’t print the words medical marijuana without putting it in scare quotes and calling it a fraud:
So now it looks like he finally finds it politically palatable to take Dan Riffle’s advice:
And now his tune sounds more like:
Ahhh, “loose” de facto legalization sounds so much better than medical fraud, doesn’t it? So progressive! And to what do we owe this rapid progress?
Ah, yes: Politics! Now that the tipping point has been passed and the majority of US states have medical marijuana laws on the books, a new study comes out confirming what preceding studies found and we all knew from experience, and suddenly it seems to be much harder to keep a straight face while attacking medical marijuana laws with scare quotes and scare stories about kush doctors.
Who among us ever suspected that such a man of science would be so strongly influenced by political considerations?
Who among us ever suspected that such a man of science would be so strongly influenced by political considerations?
(Sputtering laughter) Good thing I hadn’t been drinking anything when I read that. Those “scientists”, who had sold their intellectual credit for an ideologically motivated paycheck in railing against cannabis re-legalization on medical grounds, are in the infamous company of one Trofim Lysenko.
Like Lysenko, their efforts have set back cannabis science by decades, when the issues of import could have been settled long ago, and cannabis’s medicinal (and other) utilities applied rigorously.
The countless numbers of people whose chronic conditions have benefited from cannabis could have been helped by it much sooner have these Latter-Day Lysenkoists to thank for their suffering.
Of course, “man of science” should be taken in the same way one might refer to Martin Shkreli as a man of medicine.
Funny how concerned they both seem to be with jacking up the price of relief as high as they think they can get away with.
Mark Kleiman’s polished turds appear to have tanked in market value. As marijuana’s legalization dawns, I sense he’s quoted far less in the media than in the days of totalitarian cannabis paranoia.
K”lie”man states:
Hmmm… that’s not how I remember it. Let’s see what this report actually said:
This doesn’t exactly sound like a report that ‘mocked the idea’ that inhaling cannabis smoke was medicine.
Klieboy is an asshole. That covers that. The IOM report in 1999 was a re-evauation of previous research back to the indian Hemp Commission. They never tested Cannabis plants or users. The only comparison with smoking is to cigarettes. With at east 599 additional poisons added, not in Ganja. Until we have these assholes held accountable for their lies. They will keep getting paid to spew them.
And now this,,it will only cost $10 trillion to end the ACA and zero to implement a GOP plan to replace it…cause they ain’t got one.
That is great,,now instead of 1/3 of the US population living one ER room visit from bankruptcy and possible homeless living 2/3rds are facing it.
And they haven’t even started talking about putting the cork back in this bottle.
Has anyone seen the 1992 movie ‘Bob Roberts’, about a right wing folk singer using the momentum–formula of the old 1960’s hippy movement to sing about the need to keep drugs illegal, while having his own beauty pageants, fattening his wallet with the stock market during the Savings and Loans crisis and using ‘charity’ money to buy airplanes for Iran-Contra operations so he could smuggle in crack and then run for the Pennsylvania Senate. In the movie is the line: Make America Great Again. How disturbing is it to watch a major Hollywood movie predict the rise of Bush and Trump. Allan Rickman, Tim Robbins, Gore Vidal, James Spader, Helen Hunt, Jack Black, Susan Sarandon, John Cusack and more.
Me and my team of experts (who probably read way too much, travel too much and go to too many art museums) have linked the DEA to physically funding terrorist groups. We do know for a fact that the DEA is actually funding terrorist groups first hand (and not just blow back call drug prohibition’s ability to create drug money). One way the DEA actually funded a terrorist group was through their man in Pakistan, David Headley.
OT: so the war on drugs, which helps fund at least 1/2 of all terrorism, thus creating a war on terror is costing us a fortune and this is money that could go to other programs like SCHOOL and even YOUTH activities for churches, scouting, sports, arts, creative writing, math clubs, parks and wildlife etc. There was a little 12yr old girl named Kaitlyn Davis from Georgia who live streamed her suicide by hanging. Wasted resources means our reach to help others is ultimately shortened. Our drug laws punish people for using them, instead society and her laws should be pitying those who use drugs because of sexual abuse, physical abuse, and bullying at school etc. Going to jail for drugs is sometimes an act of punishment for being a victim. Sometimes people are punished for no offense and an arrest or getting kicked out of school for drugs is a punishment for being punished. If this young girls was sexually abused by a family member, then maybe legal drugs of any sort could have soothed the monster who touched her . . . where he could pursue drug pleasures, instead of sexual ones with a family member so young.
Foreign powers know that anyone who controls the drug routes in the Middle East also controls the essential flow of money, goods and information, all important factors in warfare. The ongoing war there has first priority, while the elimination of drugs, and any impact they may have on the local culture, or the flow of contraband into Europe, is way down on the list. Since the drug flow can’t be stopped, the next best alternative, militarily, is to turn the socioeconomic aspect of drugs into a special operations tool, a tool of engagement, as the French and later the CIA did in Southeast Asia, and as the U.S. did in Central and South America.
Ending the Drug War is the most important thing in the world because it houses bits and pieces of (almost) everything that is going wrong with the world through man’s errors and greed: pollution, economy, healthcare, war, terrorism, needless spending, the breakup of the family, crime, over policing, the reduction of freedoms etc. Like a Petri Dish filled with more life than what our eyes could ever see inside of New York City, the war on drugs is a macrocosm of troubles housing a microcosm of problems. If we cannot solve 100 problems with the world by simply legalizing crystal meth and cannabis, then how on earth will we solve deforestation, the loss of jobs, pollution, our economy, the breakup of the family, war, terrorism, corruption, refugees/immigrants fleeing poverty/war/global warming etc, etc.
As Wall Street’s Monkey said, Our movement is “Too big to Jail.” I hope Trump doesn’t fuck this up for us or our nation too badly.
Ah, so is this why its called a drug “WAR”?
Do they think they can justify decades of persecuting tens of millions of American citizens with Military code? Justify lying in court and in every media broadcast or article written you can be sure to find at least, a line of bullshit among them. DARE trying to brainwash and entice kids into the mindset of legitimacy for a militarized police force since Daryl Gates and SqWAT.
The DEA qualifies as a schedule#1 controlled substance, Cannabis fails miserably. The Drug Czar and his minions have no medicinal value. It is shown on a daily basis how terribly addictive the Ganjawar is. They believe they have no control over it, just doing their jobs or for the message to the kids. Politicians risking their careers as states-persons spreading gossip, so easily disproved.
The obvious racially bias legislations punishing those possessing a S#1 substance, supported for years by the NAACP. Whiny politicians pleading for bankrupt Family Farmers in need of a cash crop, until Obama were voting against removing Hemp from the same class as crack and heroin. Calvina gnashing her teeth over putting a Hemp flag at the Capitol. While the Bible Belt cotton crop uses 90 million pounds of poisons, aborting pre-babies, poisons not used on Hemp. How do you fix generations of stupidity still handed down? Like Nancy Reagan said, Just Deny Reality.
Profit prisons and MaxCap contracts are clearly in need of a crime to fill the beds. Making them one of the greatest Menaces in History. One of the costliest to Citizens and the Treasury. Paying millions of dollars in our hard earned taxes to be lied too. For our own good no doubt. Can’t trust parents to lie properly to their children so old perverted SAM informs the parents with complete and utter hogwash. Hard to show people they are only fabricated hobgoblins when the majority have their heads in the sand.
Drug Czar is Required by Law to Lie
http://www.drugwarrant.com/articles/drug-czar-required
Seizures By Police Help Fund Drug War 07/10/01
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/499
The Assassins of Youth: FRCn PDFA/DARE
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/505
DAREyl SWAT Gates, LAPDog Perversions
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/sreply/565
Goldman Sachs-
If a consolidated group of Legal cannabis businesses, medical cannabis, growers, doctors, activists, celebrity activists, cannabis paraphernalia/culture businesses and pro-cannabis politicians, and everything hemp, hired a Goldman Sachs guy to help manage the growth of legal, medial and future legal cannabis businesses, then would victory spread regardless of Trump and a GOP Congress? Wouldn’t it be like giving the president a ‘reach-around’ since Washington cannot seem to say no to anyone with strong ties to Goldman?
You may find the following videos on YouTube a partial answer to your question, and why the DrugWar has continued for as long as it has. A hint: it props up insolvent banks and the petrodollar.
What I have been afraid to blog about: The ESF and Its History_Part 1 (Note: I am not the author or producer; that person has ‘gone to ground’ after publishing this information, and after you view some of it you will understand why)
‘ESF’ stands for ‘Exchange Stabilization Fund’ and has been a shadowy major power behind the scenes involved in drug money laundering. It is the ‘Plunge Protection Team’ that Obama and others have mentioned, which has (illegally) propped up the stock market (by buying stocks with taxpayer’s money and laundered drug funds) when it appeared to be crashing (August 24th 2015 was a perfect example of its actions).
Although it doesn’t get into the DrugWar aspects until later episodes, I recommend this series to all and sundry. It illustrates on a macro level why our economy is in very big trouble, such big trouble that no one person can possibly fix it. I would also recommend installing a video downloader add-on in your browser and downloading the videos to view at a later date, as this information is the sort of thing that gets YouTube sites ‘demonetized’.
Watched the part one and two.
They say after the 2008 crash, there was so much drug money that banks could still dish out some cash to those who still had money, therefore cashing checks and dispensing it through ATMs–before the bailout. So would this explain Wachovia Bank and it’s getting sunk because of the scandal exposing its link to the Mexican Cartels, like Goldman Sachs destroying their math man from France, Fabrice Tourre so he could be the scapegoat (“We at GS do not condone his actions”), since he was dumb enough to email his girlfriend via bragging the details about Abacus, unlike the rest of their guys who were better at covering their tracks? Wachovia wasn’t smart and Wells Fargo ate them up, possibly helping WF to save themselves by ‘devouring’ the evidence and keeping the good protein from going to waste.
Good stuff Kapt: To protect against all foreign and domestic threats. You have not given up your oath.
Part 5 is where the drug laundering/currency ‘repatriation’ and its disastrous effects on the economy are explained, but the previous episodes are necessary to understand a lot of what is happening.
And keep something in mind; the series was published in 2011. A Hell of a lot has happened since then, and none of it good. IMHO, for reasons that would take many paragraphs to explain, the financial system will eventually slag itself very shortly, a few days before or, at most, a few months after Trump’s Inauguration. This Dow 20K stuff is suckerbait to lure in the sheep before one last shearing…then it’s off to the slaughterhouse. The biggest stock-market Crash in Human history will follow right behind it.
A total stock market collapse was narrowly averted on August 24th 2015, and it was only averted by the ESF buying stocks to pump up the moribund stock market. They won’t be able to do that anymore. The next time you see a precipitous drop in the Dow, it may be repeated day after day until it totally crashes, and then all Hell breaks loose, across the planet, and within hours.
Which, incidentally, will make all ‘anti-drug’ crusaders like Sessions completely irrelevant; he’s an unwitting (in every sense of the word imaginable), blinkered tool of the very forces he thinks he stands against. And the ESF is his hidden, drug-dealing and money-laundering master.
Just had to smoke some weed to calm my churning intestines after viewing the videos on the ESF.
Really enlightening as it was frightening.
For those without the time to watch them all, this is from a chart in vid-5 which sums it all up.
The ESF (Exchange Stabilization Fund)
* IMF economic hitmen
* mortgage fraud
* Political/Regulatory system corruption
* CIA black ops (assassinations, vote rigging, etc.)
* ESF covert activity (DRUG TRAFFICKING + really NASTY stuff
* Many, many other frauds
* Gold/Stock Market manipulation
* Deriviative fraud
* Propaganda network
* Naked short selling
* HIV = AIDS fraud
I don’t holler for the effing dollar
Glittery gold has no hold on me
I don’t trust in God
I trust in weed
Oh yeah, almost forgot. To simplify things? The New York Fed = CIA. Watch the videos folks.
Like as not, our economy is propped up by drug laundered money. And that money was conjured out of thin air.
A very good YouTube channel that demystifies money and banking is Mike Maloney’s GoldSilver (Disclaimer: I don’t know the guy, never worked for him and never bought anything from him).
His animations spell out without a lot of gobbledygook how banking works, but he stays well away from the laundering aspects. Just think of nearly all those dollars zipping around in those animations as having been laundered from illicit drug proceeds, and you get the idea of just how crooked the whole game is…and how much any DrugWarrior is a demi-conscious tool of it.
Donald John Trump was in the money laundering business until his casino was busted a few years ago:
As a bigtime money launderer, DJ Trump will be averse to the drug war disappearing anytime soon.
Trump will make a great Criminal-n-Chief for the U.S. “Make America Clandestine Again.”
The guy is a totally mob connected, whether with Cosa Nostra in New York which gave him his start in the concrete racket (read Mexican Great Wall), or the Russian mafia including Putin who got him elected potus. I have no doubt that a smoking gun will emerge before too long and hopefully by then it won’t be too late to remove him. I’m reminded of the Brecht play about Hitler, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Resistible_Rise_of_Arturo_Ui
Details emerge regarding Trump’s attitudes about drugs and the drug war:
If Trump & Co. are using drug tests as a weapon against the media or anyone else, then they are doing the sort of things his predecessors have done with drug prohibition in the past. Color Donald John Trump a prohibitch.
Trump has knives out for whistleblowers
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/sreply/1151
Telling difficult truth from inside the U.S. government is about to become harder than ever, with a president who has scorn for facts.
John Kiriakou and Thomas Drake know firsthand what’s at stake. As a CIA whistleblower, John went to prison for two years. As an NSA whistleblower, Tom was dragged through years of Espionage Act prosecution.
John told us recently: “Tom Drake and I take very seriously the positions we’ve found ourselves in as de facto whistleblower ‘spokesmen.’ We speak at colleges and universities around the country, often for free and sometimes going out of pocket to get the word out.â€
People of all ages need to hear John Kiriakou and Tom Drake, but their personal finances were wrecked by legal persecution. As the Trump regime is about to take power, you can provide vital support now with a tax-deductible contribution; half of every dollar will go directly to John and Tom, while the other half will go to the Whistleblowers Public Education Campaign that they co-chair.
On the brink of the Trump presidency, John Kiriakou just sent us this letter: continued here
Who Will Protect the Whistleblower Under Trump’s Corporate Regime?
Just getting on the record that comments are evidently disabled on that Loudoun County, VA news interview of the DEA officials, who were interviewed by the newspaper’s executive editor, Tom Julia.
Julia’s email is probably available, though.
Without belaboring the point, the place is as crooked as a dog’s hind leg; I lived there for years. Corrupt isn’t the word for it. The argument over forfeiture funds is indicative that there truly is no honor among thieves.
Linking the war on terror to drug policies, or anything else, is part of a pattern now developing in parts of Europe due to reactions to recent terrorist attacks. Amnesty International cites some recent examples of the EU’s terror of terrorism:
And in the realm of thought crimes:
If the four prohibitionists of the Apocalypse, Chapman, Fiano, Maltz and Murphy have their way, linking terrorism to illicit drug trafficking under Trump would allow the United States to imitate Europe, where “…counter-terrorism measures have been proposed or enacted that have eroded the rule of law, enhanced executive powers, peeled away judicial controls, restricted freedom of expression and exposed everyone to unchecked government surveillance.†–much as the U.S. drug laws do already. However, U.S. laws imitating the French “apology of terrorism†or Spain’s glorification of terrorism statutes could then be used by Trump to shut down anti-drug-war websites, along with anything Trump’s opponents might say that is deemed terror glorifying or apologist in nature.
They’ve been trying since Clinton…
January 20, 2000
The Hatch/Feinstein Methamphetamine Anti-Proliferation Act of 1999 which could easily destroy all forms of Internet activism on drug policy on the Internet if implemented.
~ They want to ██████ the Internet
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/1834
~ Now They’re Coming For The 1st?
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/sreply/634
~ The Corporate Muzzle
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/1562
Years ago I sent a letter to Senator Diane Feinstein informing her that the chemistry reference books on my shelf contained many of the formulations necessary for producing precursor chemicals to make drugs like meth, meaning that I as a citizen, or even the local librarian, might be considered criminally liable for possessing such materials. I called her precious anti-proliferation act unconstitutional, an obvious First Amendment violation, and I said it made her look like an idiot for promoting it. I don’t know if my letter had any impact, but two months later Hatch and Feinstein dropped their anti-proliferation act, and never mentioned it again.
Maybe it did, but old drug worriers never die. They just wait for the next election and multiply like bacteria or mold left in dark damp silence. Feinstein/Hatch are still hardened criminals. There were few media outlets protesting that piece of crap legislation. Especially weird when they included Hemp. But the response I received from her clearly shows just how weird these politico’s are. The ACLU was one of the few fighting it But mostly it was an embarrassment to America that so few stood against it. Especially the so called free press and the so called party of the people.
DiFi responded on why she was against Hemp bills offered…
Making War On Free Speech
Although the ACLU and the American Booksellers Association saw some dangers and lobbied against the speech infringements, hardly anybody else paid much attention. And mainstream publishers might not be at much risk. But publishers on the fringes — the very people the First Amendment was designed to protect — might be very much at risk. And there’s little question that a limitation on speech or writing about manufacture and use would spill over into restrictions on political speech as well.
another bill, H.R.4553, the Club Drug Anti-Proliferation Act of 2000, with similar anti-free speach paragraphs, was introduced.
With a rational government Cannabis would never have been prohibited, so much for hoping for a rational Trump. I’d guess the first attempt to contradict his orders will be met with Marshall Law. They already have the CIM to censor anything.
“Through clever and constant application of propaganda,
people can be made to see paradise as hell,
and also the other way around,
to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.”
~ Benito Mussolini,
“London Sunday Express,” December 8, 1935
I received nothing back from Diane at all. Was it because I was rude and implied she was an idiot, or was it because I exposed drug war window dressing? Politicians have a habit of introducing absurd, extremist legislation for purposes of impressing their absurd, extremist supporters. We can’t know if Hatchling or Fiendstein were serious, or just posturing, as they blithely decided the fate of humanity employing surreal drug laws. A trial set before an international tribunal, like that of Eichmann, might produce some information, however.
I received nothing back from Diane at all.
Servetus January 19, 2017
You’re probably better off for it.
When I opened her email my computer threw up,
then gave me the finger.
L.E.A.P. will now be known as
the Law Enforcement Action Partnership.
We have some very exciting news to share with you: Law Enforcement Against Prohibition will now be known as the Law Enforcement Action Partnership.
For more than a year, our board and staff have been hard at work to expand into the broader field of criminal justice reform while maintaining a keen focus on our drug policy work. Not only will this expanded scope be a natural fit for our speakers’ criminal justice expertise, but it will also help us to become even more effective at moving the drug policy reform conversation forward. And, as I wrote on the Huffington Post this morning, when you care about something, you want it to be the best it can be. With the right criminal justice reforms, we can do better, for ourselves and for our communities. Our new name reflects the core of our organization:
Law Enforcement: Our commitment to addressing criminal justice issues from a law enforcement perspective and restoring trust between police and the communities they serve remains steadfast.
Corporal James Spadola, a Law Enforcement Action Partnership speaker, hard at work on his #HugACop program.
Visit our new website for more… http://leap.cc/
Action: continued
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/2082
What’s your thoughts on this DdC? At first blush I’m not that impressed, as it was pretty clear what their mission was previously. Now, not so much.
They’re really good folks and hopefully this enhances their organization’s ability to recruit more good folks. But I still don’t dig it. I feel like we lost something.
Hey NCN
I’ve always took a stand that LEAP were cops first and reformers due to the bad press the drug war brought cops. Over just bad laws being enforced or how great Ganja actually is. They also have access to the mic and have supported reform I felt was an incremental lesser evil or even a bad compromise. Mostly avoiding Fed CSA bs and backing state initiatives, always with a space for cops to keep a limited prohibition. With the usual disclaimer of taking baby steps… 45 years. No different than the same reformers with the same message of lesser evil over reality. So its still limited access and the so called news doesn’t take it seriously or politically as a top burner issue even with LEAP.
When they were LEAP and the AP part was “Against Prohibition”. It was a message in itself that will be lost with the new acronym. I am thankful for LEAP helping us try to be treated as adults in the mainstream media and giving cred to the cause and damage done. I support their support overall, even if its a lesser evil. In hope they can reach other cops with the prohibition is bad message.
I haven’t heard of any or many smoking pot. So there is still some stigma retained in their reform. I think at best most feel it is less dangerous than Anslinger spewed or take a libertarian stance of its nobody’s business. I have a problem with that blank statement when it comes to nukes and anthrax I don’t think its nobody’s business. Ganja is not radioactive or a banned weapon of mass destruction and shouldn’t be compared or placed in the same category. It should be legal because it doesn’t do harm and it is good for us.
This seems like they are trying to reform other things making cops look bad, rather than change the attitudes letting them act bad. Or busting the thugs. The thin blue line is pretty thick actually, and still hard to get cops to bring bad cops to justice. Racism and brutality and killings give cops bad reps, but if most cops continue to turn their heads on bad cops. They will be shunned by the majority of Copshops as they are with being against prohibition. At this point we need all the help we can get and if LEAP can get the conversation to places we can’t, its good. Reality is better, but getting to it is really really hard to do these days.
Cannabis Death’s = Zero
I hope LEAP will fight against cop special privilege issues like DAREyl SWAT Gates, LAPDog Perversions. and his insane policies such as Got SqWAT? or to the illogical ugly practice of Ganjawar Puppycide If they address Juicers in Blue. If they oppose POLICING FOR PROFIT it won’t hurt. ☮
What we said. http://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/WR1181.html
RAND Corporation has no chance of catching up to us:
https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/17/chronic-pain-management-opioids/
The American culture has grown too intolerant of pain, Lembke said.
I wonder if this doctor has ever experienced severe, chronic, makes-you-seriously-contemplate-suicide pain. I strongly doubt it.
The AMA allows the DEA to practice medicine without a license with its craven and cowardly knuckling-under to ideologically-motivated DrugWarrior bureaucrats determining how said doctors may treat their patients. Yet they seek to lecture the public as to what constitutes an ‘acceptable’ level of pain. ‘Acceptable’ by whose definitions, a physician in a white coat, or a bureaucrat with a badge? Given what is happening in ‘pain management’, is there any difference?
This goes all the way back to the original rationale behind the Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914. It’s just as morally bankrupt today (in denying patients adequate relief from pain out of fear of them becoming addicted) as it was a century ago.
When it comes to opioid prescription, I think the difference between acute pain and chronic pain is crucial.
After a a total of four “recreational research experiments” as a youth with various opioids (codeine; Hydrocodone/oxycodone; opium, first smoked, and then smoked/eaten) in the 1970s, I refrained from all opioid use until the last few years, when I’ve had Hydrocodone prescribed to me for pain from 1)a tooth implant; 2)shingles; 3) a back strain 3) a molar tooth extraction; and Oxycodone for post-op pain from minor surgery to remove a precancerous skin lesion.
I was a little bit sore from the tooth extraction. I took three the first day, and one the second day. Arguably didn’t need any. I had 11 left over.
The shingles pain was unbearable. Like hot coals on my back, or being stung by wasps. Except that the pain from bee stings eventually wears off, and this pain just kept on increasing for a day and a half until I realized that it wasn’t just hives, or chemical sensitivity, or some unwitting exposure to mass quantities of glass wool (fiberglass).
Thank G~d for Vicoprofen. I had things to do, and I was able to do them. I might have taken 3 at once, the first time. And after that, one every six hours when awake, and two to sleep (at last). The doctor gave me 30 with a refill. I think I used 12-14, over a five day span. I still have the rest. In all the time I was taking them, I fely myself edging toward comfortably numb euphoria just once. I made a conscious decision to not pursue it. It’s too strong a high to take the risk. I knew that from my last experience with opium, decades previously. Although I have a hunch that I didn’t experience the maximum intensity of effect available from opioids, I experienced enough. Enough to recall that I wouldn’t have cared if the drapes in my room had caught fire; I just would have lain there until my bed and my clothes caught fire, and maybe even after that. That’s too strong a high.
But I’m sure glad I had opioids when I needed them.
The shingles was the first time I had felt disabling pain since my early 20s, when I threw out my back and lay in agony for a day before crawling to my car and making my way to a chiropractor who just happened to really know what he was doing. He put his knee in my back, and I was out the door and practically all better, for $30 cash. I had considered an emergency room visit, but even in my early 20s I realized that allopathic medicine knows practically nothing about backs and spines, and they would have just given me some painkillers that would not have addressed the source of the problem.
Sometimes I think about how things would have been different if the spinal pain had continued at anywhere near its original intensity. Would I have chosen to use opioids regularly? Without a doubt. I’d be outraged if anyone attempted to limit my access to them. That was authentically severe pain, and if it had been intractable, I would have done whatever necessary to relieve it. The risk of addiction would have been a minor consideration. Something to think about if the pain ever got better.
But, to return to the topic of my recent medical prescriptions for acute pain: to be honest, out of the five opioid prescriptions I’ve had for pain, the only time I actually had a dire need for opiate-level pain relief was once, for the shingles. For the tooth implant and the back surgery, the prescriptions helped me get a good nights sleep, which is valid. But I still had a lot left over. For the molar extraction and the minor back sprain I had a few years ago (don’t lift and twist!), Ibuprofen was sufficient. I didn’t even use my Vicodin prescription. Because I didn’t want to make a decision that might tempt me to weakness. I can handle some pain, if I’m assured that it will eventually ease up and go away. I don’t want my pain threshold to lessen. And I don’t want to get into some cycle of making up excuses about some minor pain or strain, just so I can pop a few more Vicodin.
But the day still might come when I have to contend with pain that doesn’t go away. In the unfortunate event that possibility becomes reality, I don’t want anyone gainsaying my drug decisions.
Personally, I think that modern American society does encourage people to get soft. To some extent, that’s simply an inevitable side effect of modernity and affluence. People get used to being comfortable, and staying that way. In the old days most everyone had to get used to being more or less uncomfortable, for much of their lives.
The consumer retail market economy also encourages attributes like luxury, gluttony, passivity, dependency, pampered self-indulgence, and analgesia. I don’t think you need to be a dour Marxist or a hairshirt Puritan to notice that and find those ad pitches a bit bogus. But a lot of people don’t even seem to examine them, or to have put effort into developing an immune system against those suggestions. So I think that it’s probable that as an indirect result of enjoying a high standard of comfortable living, “pain” can get defined downward in a way that really works to weaken people.
To be more specific, have a look at this bullshit: http://www.thepoisonreview.com/2016/05/07/absolute-must-read-la-times-on-the-myth-of-oxycontins-12-hour-analgesic-effect/
“…“[Purdue] Sales reps pitched the drug to family doctors and general practitioners to treat common conditions such as back aches and knee pain. Their hook was the convenience of twice-a-day dosing. ”
…with 40-80mg of oxycodone.
oh, there’s lots more.
Some of you may have read that LA Times article already. I just read it today. All I could do was shake my head in bewilderment.
A Colorado survey reveals the extent of medical marijuana expertise and acceptance at CU School of Medicine at the Anschutz Medical Campus.
An excellent education on marijuana free of NIDA propaganda would benefit all medical schools, physicians and med students. In a country priding itself on freedom of the press, public health and freedom itself is at stake if we let the current federal government decide what gets studied, and what doesn’t.
Red Herring Salesperson Alert!
http://tinyurl.com/HumphreysWanker
The mistake most states made when legalizing marijuana is by taking advise from prohibidiots like Keith Humphreys.
Naomi Braine at Political Research Associates notes the relationships between the War on Terror and the War on Drugs as a manifestation of rising U.S. fascism over several decades:
Some say if you play certain Beatles songs backwards, then one can receive hidden messages. What if we played the War on Terror Backwards: 9/11 Never Happened. Proof 9/11 in all reality never occurred: no war bonds, no rations cards, no scrap metal/rubber drives, no victory gardens, no draft and no American celebrities doing their part in the armed services. This means the American people have allowed the government to do all the work, yet we believe we are a government for the people by the people, not a government for the government by the government. When Civilians don’t do work, they don’t earn anything. Today’s civilian is very much like the grasshopper playing around, while the ants gathered up supplies for the winter. NPR radio once stated that the vast majority of people living in America were not American citizens, but tax payers. I’ve typed my fingers off telling congress and senators and local reps about the need for civilian support during the war, instead of military support during the war. Our movement means we accepted the job as key master and gatekeepers for the American Dream and Constitution. Until I hear big name celebrities like Snoop Dog and Seth Rogan tell the people what is needed to be done (since they are loud mouth pieces) we’ll find it easier to push a chain up a hill than to get true change away from the subtly ensuing Right Wing mindset. When a man doesn’t become the grease and gears for the machine, then how the machine operates is none of his business. If more civilians pulled more weight during the war after ‘9/11’, could it have ended sooner . . . could our mistakes in Iraq been negated by making better decisions, instead of mistake after mistake . . . could the war be cheaper? “OK, we bought in to the lie about WMD’s but let’s not make over 100,000 armed Iraqi soldiers and ‘forced Bathists’ unemployed: solution to a mistake.
Maybe I should reword that: I’m not saying 9/11 didn’t actually happen, but does a lack of civilian response when compared to WWII indicate a lack of belief that 9/11 happened? There is no reason to react to an attack if the attack didn’t occur . . . I’m not passing out bottles of water to marathon runners during a time a marathon isn’t taking place. 9/11 being a distant memory from the past on September 12, 2001 means the nation fucked up and many liberals and conservatives went to Disneyworld with Bush and treated the attacks and her wars like it not be their problem, but only something the government responds to. And being against the war is not an excuse to not do one’s part at home . . . I hate waking up early for my job, but I do it anyway, which makes my complaint louder than that one guy at my job who usually shows up 30min-2 hours late 2 days a week for the past two years.
Lack of civilian response? As I remember 9/11, the civilian response was emotional. Everything and everyone was quiet. No cell phone calls or noise on public transit. No air traffic noise. People talked in hushed whispers, if they talked at all.
By contrast, the civilian response to Pearl Harbor was something anticipated. On December 5, 1941, my father told his next door neighbor he believed that if the Japanese attacked, they would attack on a Sunday, when no one was anticipating an attack. On December 7, 1941, a Sunday, the attack commenced. Check out the newspapers from that time, it’s eerie.
Here’s my civilian response. What the FUCK happened to building #7?
A magical earthquake? Or a demolition job?
I agree NCN. 911 covered up the investigation of the Labor Day Rainbow Farm murders. Bldg7 was supposed to be Gouliannies safe place in case of terrorist attack or natural disaster. No Rudy? They claim two diesel tanks exploded somehow. As with the heat melting steel beams but not hot enough to burn scraps of paper in pictures of the open hole in the tower wall. Or Marvin Bush, son of daddybush. Was head of security doing elevator maintenance the previous two weeks. I watched Fox news Shepard Smith from top of the Fox building. Reporting the second tower collapse as seeing bombs go off, flashes of light with each floor collapse. Never saw that clip again. All of the scrap metal was shipped to foreign junkyards. How convenient.
So many questions left unanswered. Hey it took a clown drunk like Junior and made it almost respectable so I guess it did its job. Paved the way for Haliburton to skim off some of the Trillion dollars spent on Iraq. Brought out Americans jerking the cheap plastic MalWart flags made in China from Iraqi crude oil. How patriotic buying Sadamns bullets for him. How long did it take to respond?
Knowing how the Ganjawar has gone down I have little left in me for anything but skepticism. Maybe Sadamn, Osama and the others are in a secluded part of China after doing their part to help Unk keep is afraid and paying tax dollars for protection. We need a 411 and Obama gave us a pardon for Bush Cheney. I really should be more upset with Trump but the past 45 years hasn’t left any of them with much credibility. Like they say when they try to suspend our rights, if they’re not guilty, why stop the investigations and why all the hoops to jump through and the cover ups and typical GOPer swiftboating any opposition?
THE BUSH-CHENEY DRUG EMPIRE
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/550
Busht Cheneynagans D.E.A.th & Oil!
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/1278
Bushit or Sadamn? Flip a Coin … 02/19/03
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/1241
Cheney’s Legacy of Fracking America to Death
It Can’t Happen Heeere
Halliburton Watch: fracturing Americans 1949 – ?
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/1745
Busht: Timeline of Treason – 12/02/03
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/414
“The size of the lie is a definite factor in causing it to be believed, for the vast masses of the nation are in the depths of their hearts more easily deceived than they are consciously and intentionally bad. The primitive simplicity of their minds renders them a more easy prey to a big lie than a small one, for they themselves often tell little lies but would be ashamed to tell a big one.”
~ Benito Mussolini,
“London Sunday Express,” December 8, 1935
Frankly, we do give a damn:
Study finds links between swearing and honesty
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170117105107.htm
Bundestag legalisiert medizinischen Cannabis
http://www.spiegel.de/gesundheit/diagnose/cannabis-bundestag-laesst-cannabis-auf-rezept-zu-a-1130675.html
“This is a further step towards the improvement of palliative care,” said Federal Minister of Health Hermann Gröhe (CDU). Marlene Mortler (CSU), Drug Commissioner of the Federal Government, welcomed the decision: “To whom cannabis really helps, they should now be able to get it, in quality-assured form and with the costs covered by the health insurance companies.”
Put that in your Alpine Horn and smoke it!