Drug enforcement frauds and scandals have political consequences. In recent years it’s been far more difficult for Democratic or Republican lawmakers to gain political stardom by promoting corrupt and punitive drug policies. Millions have suffered personal damage or died needlessly due to drug laws that were predictably flawed and destructive. And according to researchers at Bocconi University in Milan, corruption indefinitely influences choices made by first-time voters:
8-Nov-2018—Research finds that political corruption has a long-term scarring effect on trust in democratic institutions and on voters’ behavior and that such an effect differs according to one’s age cohort, with first-time voters at the time of corruption revelation still being affected 25 years later.
In particular, Bocconi University’s Arnstein Aassve, Gianmarco Daniele, and Marco Le Moglie focus on the Italian Clean Hands scandal that, between 1992 and 1994, revealed widespread corruption among Italian politicians. […]
The effect is stronger for less educated individuals and for people more exposed to TV news in the areas most affected by the corruption scandal. …the age of the first-time voters … entails an unprecedented exposure to politics and political news. […]
First-time voters at the time of the scandal also report harsher attitudes towards immigrants and refugees in 2018…suggesting…a fascinating spill-over effect, whereby the detrimental effects of corruption might not be limited to trust and voting, but they might extend to policies supported by populist parties.
Politically corrupt drug enforcement plays a pivotal role in deliberately misleading the public about drugs and consumers. Its corruption increases drug ODs and the diseases transmitted by opiate addictions. It turns drug enforcement into a weapon that inflicts racist policies, culls rebellious teenagers, eliminates the poor, or boosts nationalist, cultural or religious hegemonies.
As public scrutiny of drug policies increases, Republican and Democratic party leaders still have several options left. A solution to the drug war crisis can be achieved either of two ways. End the drug war and the corruption ends. Or what may be easier and more expedient, end the lies and corruption and the drug war will likewise fade away.
I just reviewed a local ballot in my county on funding our schools with bonds at a fixed rate (10%) for the next decade. I don’t want to vote for it because we are broke and we need recreational cannabis, the medical stuff won’t cut it tax wise. And even then, our war debt is so horrible and our state is not doing the best financially either, how risky are those bonds. Will I be forced to pay a higher tax rate locally (to pay for the bonds through my taxes) because our state isn’t AAA or AA? The Financial Crisis occurred at the same time I was in Iraq. So, my whole life and political life is revolved around the War on Drugs and understanding banking. And the banking scandals and this ballot has resulted in this long rant:
This might sound crazy, but I’m speculating that I have proof America has no Law Enforcement:
In the 1990s, cops—the DOJ and DOC hauled off over 1000 bankers with felonies because of the Savings and Loans Scandal. None could be found for the 2008 extravaganza. And those bankers stole a lot more and around the world. Where was INTERPOL? I haven’t started yet. The above is beside the point. But it is grounds for precedent, and because it happened, it donald trumps not jailing them in 2008.
HSBC (as did Wachovia—now Wells Fargo) laundered Drug Money for numerous cartels, not all of them of Hispanic or European/Australian origin. Al Qaeda says what? The very fact that the bank funds the very people who threaten law enforcement with gang money from drug deals, to the treason of not arresting them during a time of war, because of 9/11 and the War on Terror and all the terror attacks in between–that It behooves law enforcement to oust these bankers. And not just the above banks, but all bankers who were a part of the Financial Crisis—because the bankers who knew how to play the game, got away with it, so they are still in business and it behooves the criminal element to do business with the PROs . . . Cartels are buying and insuring bank loans (whole and sliced) and they are insuring large equity/assets contracts for global companies, and other bonds. Because it rinses their money and moves it around. They are buying gold, REITS, Aluminum Mining Trusts, Master Limited Partnerships (and its insurance) RMBS, Commercial Real Estate bonds, CDOs, ABSs, they buy swaps and credit default swaps, other derivatives, treasury notes, corporate bonds of varying maturities and Sr./Jr. notes, convertible bonds, Preferred Stocks and Common Stocks, and Bitcoin/ether, municipal bonds, they are buying the insurance for Municipal/State bonds, buying warrants(options), buying commodities, buying the insurance (whole or sliced) on larger warrants and commodities contracts . . . because it circulates their money in a way to hold it over everybody’s heads and in a way that they can simply reach around the corner and grab some of their equity/liquid for furthering their business. It behooves them too. I would. You would. They do. If cops cannot stop the drug money by stopping the drugs, they have failed. Capitalism turns one cocaine dollar into two with some financial engineering and guys who have enough power tend to own men or do business with firms that have an ISDA. $400 billion dollars a year. They bet against smaller portions of their money so they lose small and win bigger than their loss via contracts and derivatives. I bet they even own a couple of hedge funds and day traders who can further drain the coca of all its liquid.
If Law Enforcement cannot nab the very people who supply bullets that kill cops, then what good are the police? You don’t see this sort of problem when it comes to car smuggling rings, or groups of criminals who pirate electronics, data, false designer apparel/accessories, black market oil, and human trafficking. The appetite for the above things is nada in comparison to drugs. Granted, drug money does tie itself with the above criminal enterprises, but drugs are the criminal underworlds’ Bread and Butter. Legalize drugs, then many disappear and get weaker, while others go legit or merge with other organizations for financial security. With drug money, a heat seeking rocket can cost as little as $3,000-$5,000, which can down a multi-million dollar military machine, or a few cents can buy AK rounds to off a soldier who is insured for a million and costs a million or more in training and equipment and housing. Big War Companies played with Financial Engineering because war cannot be leveraged longer than a split second, yet that split second of leverage can gain said Big War Company more equity and assets. The banks are always (they hope) leveraged for tomorrow. So the War on Terror (fighting drug money) is the big gaping hole that allowed our housing market to plummet, simply because the big nasty war had SENIOR NOTES on the whole thing, thus getting paid first and then tomorrow as well. The Financial Engineering was the big zipper in the sky, unzipping the fly and pants so the crisis could piss out trillions of the world’s assets and equity and homes and jobs. During the last Financial Crisis, the drug cartels bought a bunch more stock because it was cheaper. They don’t have to worry about losing money with a product like theirs and the payouts now in finance can double their equity to the point that they simply need to apply just a percentage of new value into more various securities.
The rich will devalue our currency by giving away all their money to us, but only after they bought enough to survive, thrive, and then barter with.
Weed makes me long winded, and I just got done going for long walk in the woods with my pipe, pot, and puppy (8yrs old, but forever my puppy).
We are too damn smart on this couch to lose the war on drugs, especially in a world void of real cops, lest I be the real Saint Nick because I dress like him on Christmas, going ho-ho-ho, and giving gifts to kids at the VFW. I cannot remember the time I’ve seen a legitimate cop . . . just because your tax dollars directly funds Halliburton etc, doesn’t make them FEDERAL.
I.E. the failure to do their job automatically results in said officer being fired or at least their authority nullified. Slavers had power, guns, their buddies, and handcuffs, didn’t make them real cops, did it? When a man who is stripped of authority because the law is illegal (thank God we have a Constitution), then we have proof that cops are just selling drug offenders into slavery . . . how many are forced into lock ups and forced labor? And cops get paid to do it too. Slaver. In a world where cops finance their own deaths, financial losses/pension losses, the war on terror, and their nation’s debt, then said members of the blue uniform cannot be law enforcement. Only a real cop can arrest a banker (like in the 1990s), so where are all the real cops? Their job has to be way too easy to begin with, if they are hard pressed to give criminals financial incentives.
The difference between Roman police officers of the old Empire and American of this new Empire, is that Rome didn’t have small or large enemies capable of decimating any of their cities. Many lands plagued by drug money backed radical Islam, are home to uranium mines (the Sudan) . . . drug money goes a long way at building and buying radioactive toys. Maybe they will and maybe they won’t. Roman cops never endorsed laws that could destroy Rome by giving the enemy financial capabilities.
And if keeping drugs illegal automatically increases the population of drug users, it is obvious that cops are simply muscle for drug dealers. England claimed an increase after outlawing smack in 1964, to overwhelming junkie numbers in 1968 with the need for numerous rehabs and rehabs on back order.
Are you sure that was weed in your pipe?
Weed forces my mind to start comparing Richard Thaler (Behavioral Economics) vs. the idea of Strong-Efficiency, Weak-Efficiency, Semi-Strong-Efficiency. The 2008 Crisis was a Pareto Efficiency, so The Efficient-market hypothesis couldn’t work with so much correlated and the idea that one can bet against oneself–is illogical because of the necessity of loss, though it can be designed (swaps) for an optimal payout. Math isn’t people, nor does it calculate greed for factoring out value.
Drug Cartels would be wise to do the above. What are the odds that they don’t do Wall Street type deals as a way of making themselves more liquid and becoming more present inside the bloodstream of society.
If you study all the talking points, books, instruments of the Crisis, and history, it sounds like an Acid trip (selling portions of yourself just to afford yourself, while selling the product responsible for the need to sell portions off in the first place–so you can afford yourself, now the multitude of products dilutes the products inherent value, making the overall transaction a total loss, after it was bought with debt to begin with) and nothing rational can be seen. One expert called Synthetic CDOs the equivalent of Fantasy Football . . . you are buying an index that is based on more people buying the bonds, insuring them, and those who are betting that the bonds will fail (while having to pay possible prices that can make you lose your bet if you fail to pay for your bet’s ongoing race) . . . You bought a Fund designed to payoff on the notion that 1 minus 1 equals 0 and you lose, simply because the fund was 50% winner vs 50% loser and it sold for Billions. I’ve had visions on mushrooms that made more sense than that, and I ended up chewing on rubber bands as a way to mimic the creation of the world.
If the bankers got away with it, then the drug cartels simply have to recruit the banks and bankers who know how to set the stuff up and buy various instruments and assets in specific increments. The U.S. Will BAIL OUT the CARTELS when the system collapses (and cash/gold is king) again and the Cartels don’t even need the FEDs to do it.
Didn’t we “Nudge” the bankers after all?
And the Cartels might not even know what they are doing after they set this stuff up, just like the bankers, making it all a free for all that’ll pay them enough money to grow, and then have enough money when others don’t . . . just a loss recorded on paper when the next big one happens, though not in real assets and equity.
Medical Marijuana Is Literally
Too Popular for Oklahoma to Handle
https://t.co/fVJ434ec5j
This Week in Weed:
California May Experience a Drought!
https://twitter.com/DendeCannabist/status/1102252573195612161
New Study Shows
Hair Bleach Degrades Cannabinoids,
Can Alter Drug Test
https://t.co/VwlJX37ZlV
What Is Ganja Yoga?
The History of Cannabis & Yoga
https://twitter.com/DendeCannabist/status/1102229940424957953
Top 25 Cannabis Blogs and Online Magazines 2019′
https://twitter.com/DendeCannabist/status/1101973994557792257
Higher Education Adapting Courses
to Train for Cannabis Industry Skills
https://t.co/ZkdDNYEzYS
Well, well, well. What have we here? Oh gee, looks like researchers from some school (Harvard) found actual IMPROVEMENT in brain function among Medical Marijuana users. Funny, but in typical researcher style, they suggested that that might be because MMJ is different (!?) from plain Jane Mary Jane, since we all know that recreational pot users live in their parent’s basements and can’t remember to put the milk away in the refrigerator. https://www.inc.com/cynthia-than/the-surprising-way-to-be-better-at-brain-teasers-a.html?fbclid=IwAR0S9xuVz2mwcut5j4DSOrY8Hr_HqhcKL9HOfXP4_cmvE4FZHdqfw3zAbj0
The problem with Joe:
‘This version of “folksy Joe†even touted himself as “labor from belt buckle to shoe buckle.†There’s only one problem with this carefully cultivated image: Joe Biden’s entire career’
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/joe-biden-2020_n_5c796502e4b087c2f295ba31
The know nothings are strip searching children for e-cigarettes now: https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/local/arizona-investigations/2019/03/05/arizona-charter-schools-parents-complaints-objections-find-nowhere-turn-american-leadership-academy/2871812002/
Is anyone surprised?
Not surprised at all. As the original progenitors of public education in the US made very clear:
The methodologies employed in the process of creating such a regimented population took generations to implement, but a cinder block was dropped on the gas pedal in the 1970’s with the DrugWar, which provided the ‘rationale’ for the further and accelerating acclimatization of each succeeding generation to ever increasing inroads on once inviolable freedoms. This crap with the e-cigs is just more proof.
Here, on this blog way back in the early 2000’s, it was said that if you teach kids that rights are fungibles, those kids will grow up and teach their teachers the same lesson, someday. The way things are going, with society fraying at the edges, that day may not be too far in the future, but very close, indeed.
Types of Cannabinoids
https://citiva.com/types-of-cannabinoids/
Cannabinoids and the Endocannabinoid System
https://citiva.com/cannabinoid-science-research/
Tell the US to Support Global Cannabis Rescheduling
https://www.leafly.com/news/politics/tell-the-us-to-support-global-cannabis-rescheduling #cannabis #leafly via @Leafly
International Drug Scheduling; Convention on Psychotropic Substances; Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs; World Health Organization; Scheduling Recommendations; Dronabinol (delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol) and its Stereoisomers; Cannabis, Cannabis Resin, Extracts and Tinctures; Cannabidiol Preparations; and Pharmaceutical Preparations of Cannabis; Request for Comments
https://www.regulations.gov/document?D=FDA_FRDOC_0001-9069
Manafort’s Sentence Being Shorter than Marijuana Charges Stokes Outrage
https://news.weedmaps.com/2019/03/manaforts-sentence-being-shorter-than-marijuana-charges-stokes-outrage/