Barthwell watch

Just because we have a time-honored tradition here of not letting her get away with it…

Barthwell maintains call for tough-minded drug policy

Former federal drug policy official Andrea G. Barthwell, MD, who now directs addiction treatment centers in Illinois and North Carolina, pulled no punches in an Aug. 24 talk at the National Conference on Addiction Disorders (NCAD) when discussing today’s policy landscape. While Barthwell’s talk sought to make sense of the many changes occurring in substance use service delivery and payment systems, she left no doubt that she sees harm reduction and legalization initiatives as a significant threat to the field and the families it serves.

Citing data about the negative consequences of marijuana use among young people, Barthwell used several stages of her presentation to criticize initiatives to legalize marijuana for medical or recreational use.

Of course, she did.

She said the mindset of legalization supporters can be summed up as, “We intend to legalize all drugs.”

Well, yeah. As opposed to what? Supporting the unregulated black market like she does?

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23 Responses to Barthwell watch

  1. Pricknick says:

    Damn Pete. Just going to the site and seeing the name “Behavioral Healthcare” with the small print under it “The Business of Treatment and Recovery”, was revolting.
    If it were not a business, they’d have nobody listening to them.

  2. Duncan20903 says:

    .
    .

    I think that it’s unlikely that I’ll be getting over this migraine anytime soon. I suppose I really should start wearing a safety helmet. I’m going to put this one in the “it sure looks like everyone and anyone have decided to shit on the prohibitionists” category:

    Don’t Be a Lab Rat’ teen pot campaign coming to Boulder — but BVSD wants no part

    /snip/
    Boulder Valley School District, for one, already has announced it will not participate in the campaign.

    “We had concerns about the use of human-scale rat cages being an effective tool for getting 12-to-15-year-olds to understand the risks involved with their developing brains,” BVSD spokesman Briggs Gamblin said.

    Superintendent Bruce Messinger emailed all district principals prior to the launch of the cages in Denver, informing them that the BVSD administration would formally oppose “Don’t Be a Lab Rat” on the grounds that “a human scale ‘rat cage'” may not be the most effective prop for the campaign’s message.

    “No BVSD school campus will be made available for the temporary siting of the ‘rat cage’ or distribution of campaign materials,” he wrote in the email.
    /snip/

    • Tim says:

      It seems whoever came up with this campaign not only doesn’t have theory of mind (how others, especially young black men, would take the cage as a prison cell) but also fall for the “developing brain until 25” theory, which I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.

      If this “theory” is not checked, this tool could be used to continue the infantalization of people until even later in their lives. (Two small examples, driving laws mean that one can’t have a full driver’s licence until well into their twenties, and my 81 year old father being carded for buying a bottle of wine south of Boston last week.)

      Odd. They still let you enlist at 17, though. Funny that when it’s hard to rent a car under 25, let alone drink.

    • Tim says:

      I see prohibitionist commenter Thee Leviathan is a “a local government attorney” which enforces my thesis that he’s shitting bricks over his job security. Well, welcome to the rest of the country, bub. Are government employees somehow special?

  3. ZullenWijGaan says:

    The increasing use of military equipment by local police is a symptom of growing authoritarianism, not the cause. The cause is policies that encourage police to see Americans as enemies to subjugate, rather than as citizens to “protect and serve.” This attitude is on display not only in Ferguson, but in the police lockdown following the Boston Marathon bombing and in the Americans killed and injured in “no-knock” raids conducted by militarized SWAT teams.

    http://original.antiwar.com/paul/2014/08/24/ferguson-the-war-comes-home/

  4. claygooding says:

    Every former drug czar and DEA administrator,TMK,is vested in some industry that feeds off the war on drugs…how long before main stream media starts asking them about that?

    Now I have to make a list of former DEA admins and drug czars listing their new careers.

    We know Dupont is a drug screen king,Barfwell is rehab,,McGaffery is drug screening,Tandy is a lobbiest for Motorola/Phillips on saliva testing machines,,Walters is running a survey company “Monitoring the Future”,,sounds like he contracts through SAMSHA.

    Add more as you find them

    • claygooding says:

      DEA Administrators

      John R. Bartels, Jr.
      October 1973-May 1975—-Law Firm

      Peter B. Bensinger
      February 1976-July 1981—Bensinger became president and CEO of Bensinger, DuPont & Associates
      Francis M. Mullen, Jr.
      July 1981-March 1985—After retiring from DEA on 1 March 1985, Mullen became the director of the Mohegan Tribal Gaming Commission
      John C. Lawn
      July 1985-March 1990—In 1998, he was serving as the chairman and CEO of The Century Council, a national organization dedicated to fighting alcohol abuse.
      Robert C. Bonner
      August 1990-October 1993—On June 24, 2001, President George W. Bush nominated Judge Bonner as Commissioner of the United States Customs Service, later known as U.S. Customs and Border Protection. He announced his resignation from that position on September 28, 2005, having served four years which included the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and the transfer of the Customs Service to that department, and retired on November 25, 2005
      Thomas A. Constantine
      March 1994-July 1999—Constantine has been active in a number of police organizations including the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP). He was elected to and served on the Board of Officers for the IACP from October 1992 to April 1994, and he currently serves as a member of the IACP Executive Committee and as Chairman of the IACP Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Committee.

      Donnie R. Marshall
      June 2000-June 2001—Independent Security and Investigations Professional
      Washington D.C. Metro Area Security and Investigations
      Asa Hutchinson
      August 2001-January 2003—In early 2005, Hutchinson founded a consulting firm, Hutchinson Group, LLC with partners Betty Guhman and Kirk Tompkins, in Little Rock and accepted a contract for a one-year position with Venable LLP in Washington, D.C., as the chair of its Homeland Security practice. Hutchinson ended his contract with Venable LLP in March 2006 to focus on his gubernatorial campaign and his consulting firm in Little Rock. In January 2007, Hutchinson rejoined Venable.
      Karen Tandy—On October 22, 2007, she announced her retirement from the DEA, and took a position with Motorola. Tandy is senior vice president of Public Affairs and Communications. Ms. Tandy serves as Motorola’s top public policy spokesperson on issues related to global telecom policy, trade, regulation, spectrum allocation, and country relations

      • claygooding says:

        ONDCP Admins
        William Bennett
        Bennett is a member of the National Security Advisory Council of the Center for Security Policy (CSP). He was co-director of Empower America and was a Distinguished Fellow in Cultural Policy Studies at the Heritage Foundation. Long active in United States Republican Party politics, he is now an author, speaker, and, since April 5, 2004, the host of the weekday radio program Morning in America on the Dallas, Texas-based Salem Communications. In addition to his radio show, he is the Washington Fellow of the Claremont Institute. Further work at the Claremont Institute includes his role as Chairman of Americans for Victory Over Terrorism (AVOT). He was also a political analyst for CNN until his termination in 2013.

        Bob Martinez
        After leaving the governor’s office on January 8, 1991, Martinez was appointed by President George H. W. Bush to the cabinet rank position of Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (or “Drug Czar”) where he served until January 20, 1993.
        Since then, Martinez has served as a consultant to Florida-based businesses and law firms[11] and is a political analyst for Bay News 9 television. He is a trustee of the University of Tampa, and a director of the Hillsborough Education Foundation, Tampa’s Lowry Park Zoo and the Tampa Bay History Center, all local nonprofit groups involved in some way with education.

        Lee P. Brown
        Brown was the first African American to be appointed Police Chief to the City of Houston, and served from 1982–1990. He was first appointed by Mayor Kathy Whitmire. There he implemented methods of Community Policing.
        Brown is a co-founder of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE). Brown is chairman and CEO of Brown Group International, http://bgi-intl.com/, which is a business solutions organization.

        Barry McCaffrey
        In October 2004, McCaffrey was elected by the board of directors of HNTB Corporation to serve as the board chairman of a newly formed subordinate company, HNTB Federal Services. In January 2008, McCaffrey was elected to board of directors of The HNTB Companies, an employee-owned organization of infrastructure firms with 63 offices nationwide—known and respected for their work in transportation, tolls, bridges, aviation, rail, architecture and urban design and planning.

        John P. Walters
        No info on present employment

        Gil Kerlikowske
        On August 1, 2013, President Obama nominated him to serve as Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. On March 6, 2014, the U.S. Senate confirmed as the first permanent commissioner for the agency that oversees both customs and immigration officers at the country’s ports of entry and the Border Patrol since before Obama took office in 2009.

  5. Servetus says:

    Moral panics have a half-life. Prohibition is well past its halfway mark and is clinging to an ever-descending curve of social respectability. Andrea Barthwell needs a new clown act if she expects to keep her addiction clinics in Illinois and South Carolina operating at full capacity.

    Drug legalization and regulation is a problem for Ms. Barthwell, a black Republican who once set her sights on running against Barack Obama for U.S. senator from Illinois. As a promoter of a massive addiction fraud in the form of drug clinics designed to persecute marijuana consumers wrongly diagnosed as addicts, her career ambitions conceive of no bounds. Along with other political hacks who began in politics as drug prosecutors, for example, Dan Lungren (R-CA), Rudy Giuliani (R-NY); she sought to use the drug war and its victims as a means to achieve wealth and political power. Thankfully, the anti-drug avenue to career advancement no longer exists for ambitious politicians. Nixon’s ghost continues to fade.

    Ms. Barthwell’s categorical or essentialist thinking on drug use implies she has no imagination. She can imitate, but not create. So no new clown acts for her. Act III of her comedy is likely to be written by someone else who exhibits a superior sense of humor, someone likely to subject her and her colleagues to civil and criminal charges of human rights violations. Andrea Barthwell probably won’t be laughing much when it happens, but the rest of America will be.

  6. Duncan20903 says:

    .
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    If I end up having to wear a girlie man wrist watch I’d much prefer to wear a Hello Kitty over a Barthwell watch every day of the year.What’s next? Calvina clocks that skip from 4:19 to 4:21?
    —————————-
    It seems that not many days go by lately without something make me ponder the proverbial Chinese curse of living in interesting times. Well there’s no doubt that we’re in that particular soup but since it’s a curse I keep thinking that means that something bad is going to happen. But it’s just struck me…it isn’t us who have been cursed.

    Cartoonist Jim Morin takes a look at how marijuana is advertised.

    Mr. Morin is not channeling Kev-Kev or Stupidpatrick. But it appears that he is doing his part to make their lives more interesting.

    Jim Morin has been with The Miami Herald since 1978. The Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist says that the most important requirement of “editorial” cartoons is that the drawing take a point of view, humorous or not.

    • Tim says:

      I think I won over my father with that technique. I just sat and watched CNN with him for a few hours and counted the pharma ads, then we watched Hockey Night in Canada and I pointed out the beer and car ads.

      Add a little lecture on Bernays and some Terry O’Reilly, and then told him about The Partnership of Pharma for Drug Free Kids (formerly America) and beer baron Hickenlooper and then he realized the fraud. (Which for an accountant, is worse than sin.)

  7. FRIENDS OF NIDA says:

    Tired of hippie-types causing dissent and trouble in the serene gardens of your TREATMENT clinic?

    Well, don’t fret, because Andrea Grubb Barthwell welcomes you to join and donate to Friends of NIDA.

    We at Friends of NIDA understand the importance of enforced treatment and of course supporting MORAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP.

    We’d love to have you and your wealthy friends donate money to our cause. And, of course NIDA is set up to allow and accept donor-sponsored research. Feel free to contact us with your check and demands. Scientists looking to support the ideals of “harm reduction” NEED NOT APPLY.

    Remember as Moral Entrepreneur’s we can become “Rule Creators” or “Rule Enforcerers.” Either choice will help keep money and human fodder flowing to our clever business model backed by congress.

    ———————————————————

    Couch, the above is NOT snark. I wish to god it was.

    As Servetus pointed out in his comment, Andrea is a BLACK REPUBLICAN. That mental pathology is a crazy outside my pay grade and I’ll just leave it at that.

  8. allan says:

    SC head slap to Yuma County Sheriff:

    Court: Yuma sheriff must return card holder’s medical marijuana

    The Supreme Court has refused to overturn Arizona court rulings ordering the Yuma County sheriff to return marijuana that was seized from a woman with a California medical marijuana authorization honored by Arizona.

    The justices’ order was issued without comment Monday in the case of Valerie Okun, who had marijuana in her car when a Border Patrol agent stopped her and her husband in Yuma County, Ariz., in 2011. -snip-

    • Duncan20903 says:

      .
      .

      State of Arizona v Okun is a dictionary picture worthy example of government abuse of power. Why do I call it abuse? Because the frackin’ issue had already been laughed out of both State and Federal Courts in City of Garden Grove v Felix Kha, 157 Cal. App. 4th 355; 68 Cal. Rptr. 3d 656 (2007) The facts in the cases are all but identical.

      The State of Arizona had absolutely no reason to think that they could get a friendly ruling whether in Court or on appeal. Why in the world would anyone think that the response of the SCOTUS would have been different in 2014 than it was in 2007? Were they just plain incompetent and unaware of the existence of the ruling in Kha?

      Yes, this was the second time that this specific issue was in front of the SCOTUS and the Court wasn’t even interested in hearing arguments. Justice Roberts summarized and spelled out the Court’s opinion. B-O-R-I-N-G!

      Also see: State of Arizona v Valerie Okun, Case No. 1 CA-CV 12-0094 (AZ Ct. App., Div. 1, Jan. 10, 2013)

  9. This has so much bearing on the drug war, and the DEA and other related agencies, it makes SOD look tame:

    How the NSA Built Its Own Secret Google
    http://tinyurl.com/o3rwfmf

    I just read it and I am currently trying to wrap my head around the ramifications of it, but I thought I would share.

  10. Tim says:

    Is Barthwell on the SAM train? You know, Stupid Attempts at Marketing? (Or is it Sabet’s Attempt at Moneymaking?)

    And yes, all drugs should be legal and regulated. At this point it’s clear what I observed twenty years ago: opposition to legalization is more about job security than public good.

  11. Duncan20903 says:

    It appears that the Grubb lady is a wanton trollop!

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/2004/07/15/lewd-past-mars-barthwell-ill-senate-overtures
    July 15, 2004

    /snip/
    At the drug policy office, Barthwell oversaw national efforts to prevent and treat drug abuse. She won bipartisan praise after being nominated by President Bush in 2001.

    The report says her staff had “the highest regard for Dr. Barthwell’s credentials and knowledge, but … almost uniformly stated their fear and discomfort with what they consider to be unusual behavior patterns and displays of temper.”

    The lewd and abusive behavior finding stemmed from a Dec. 19, 2002, staff gathering. Barthwell made comments about a staff member’s sexual orientation after the staff member misspoke in an earlier conversation, the memorandum said.

    “Dr. Barthwell made reference to this staff member sitting on men’s laps. A kaleidoscope pointed upward was placed on a chair by Dr. Barthwell as the staff member was about to sit down,” it said.

    “Dr. Barthwell suggested that the staff member would want to cut the cake available for the gathering because the knife was ‘long and hard’ and he might ‘enjoy handling it.’ When the cake was cut, Dr. Barthwell referred to the pieces as ‘most’ or ‘beefy’ and she said to the staff member, ‘I know you like it big and meaty.”‘
    /snip/

    • Tim says:

      A sex addict in the ‘addictionology’ field. Colour me surprised.

      In my world, adultery is exponentially worse than drug dealing. Breach of marriage contract, goes to character.

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