Drug WarRant

Are you familiar with CNTPO? I wasn’t either. Maybe by its full name: The Defense Department’s Counter Narco-Terrorism Program Office. Nope? Me neither.

Pentagon’s War on Drugs Goes Mercenary

An obscure Pentagon office designed to curb the flow of illegal drugs has quietly evolved into a one-stop shop for private security contractors around the world, soliciting deals worth over $3 billion.

This is the kind of thing we constantly face — pots of money and power all over the place that depend on the drug war (as well as the war on terror and other such never-ending wars).

The office, known as CNTPO, is all but unknown, even to professional Pentagon watchers. It interprets its counternarcotics mandate very, very broadly, leaning heavily on its implied counterterrorism portfolio. And it’s responsible for one of the largest chunks of money provided to mercenaries in the entire federal government.

Mercs. Drug War. Terrorism. Funding. What a combination.

For the vast majority of people who’ve never heard of CNTPO, the organization answers to the Pentagon’s Special Operations Low-Intensity Conflict Directorate, within the Counternarcotics and Global Threats portfolio. It’s tucked away so deep, bureaucratically speaking, that it doesn’t actually have an office at the Pentagon.

The organization, run by a civilian named Mike Strand, has been around since 1995. In 2007, it made a big push into contracting, hiring the Blackwater subsidiary U.S. Training Center as well as defense giants Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and ARINC for “a wide range of Defense counternarcotics activities,” according to a statement provided to Danger Room by the agency. That award, which has doled out $4.3 billion so far, is the precursor to the current bid. […]

In its new contract, the office explicitly stakes out a broad definition of its mandate: “to disrupt, deter, and defeat the threat to national security posed by illicit trafficking in all its manifestations: drugs, small arms and explosives, precursor chemicals, people, and illicitly-gained and laundered money.” It declares its practices “beyond traditional DoD acquisition and contracting scopes.”

Visiting relatives this week and my first stop will have no WiFi and very little G3. Posting will be light for a few days.

Talk amongst yourselves (not that I need to tell some of you that).

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Bleg for any model train enthusiasts out there…

Looking for help in getting a starter electric train set for someone who really likes trains, is retired, has very limited space, and has a very limited income. He has done a lot of scroll saw work (can handle small detail very well and has patience), but is pretty much done with that and looking to possibly switch hobbies. (And anyone reading this who knows who I’m talking about, keep quiet – this is a secret.)

Should I look at an N-guage set because it’ll take up less space and he’d be able to do more complex set-ups on a standard table? Should I go H0 because it’s more common and easier to get stuff for it? Something else? Recommendations on a starter set or brand?

One of the entrenched problems of the drug war is there are so many pots of money and power that can be tapped that too many people have a shot of getting some for themselves.

Senator Jim Webb is greatly admired by those of us in the drug policy reform community for his tireless work trying to institute a blue-ribbon commission “to look at every aspect of our criminal justice system with an eye toward reshaping the criminal justice system from top to bottom.”

While the commission was recently shot down in the Senate on 10th Amendment concerns(!), Webb has never wavered in his commitment to criminal justice reform.

As he’s noted: “Irregularities and inequities in America’s criminal justice system challenge our notions of fundamental fairness.”

A great guy to have in the Senate, right?

And yet…

Webb seeks to include all SW Va. counties in federal drug designation

The inclusion of those three localities followed a February request by Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., to have all 13 Southwest Virginia counties included in the designation.

In a letter addressed to Office of National Drug Control Policy Director Gil Kerlikowske, Webb requested that the review of the remaining counties be expedited to ensure fairness.

“In order to ensure basic fairness in the application of federal resources, I ask that you expedite the inclusion of the remaining 10 Southwest Virginia counties into the Appalachia HIDTA,” Webb wrote in the Oct. 31 letter. “The continuation of Appalachia HIDTA into all 13 Southwest Virginia communities will allow the Appalachia HIDTA to assist the local communities unduly burdened by this regional epidemic, in order to effectively locate and eradicate these systemic drug networks.”

Now what’s the advantage of being designated a High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA)? Federal funding.

And how is that funding most commonly used? Creating a multi-agency drug task force.

And from whence do many of the “irregularities and inequities in America’s criminal justice system” that “challenge our notions of fundamental fairness” stem? You guessed it. Drug task forces.

Not only do multi-agency drug task forces lead to systemic abuse, they aren’t particularly good use of funds, as indicated in an audit of the program.

While many task forces are effective, they are too often assembled indiscriminately. Some task forces in the five sites reviewed were put together to address circumstances where an absence of coordination among enforcement agencies was clearly identified as an obstacle to effective enforcement. But such task forces appeared to be the exception more than the norm. More often, it seemed, task forces were created on the assumption that having personnel from different agencies work together would necessarily improve enforcement. Given that individual agencies have distinct operational approaches, procedures, organizational cultures, and esprit de corps, this is not always the case.

Moreover, even task forces that are successful at promoting law enforcement coordination may not always represent the best use of HIDTA resources. At least some of the coordination that occurs under the auspices of HIDTA task forces would take place without HIDTA funding and designation. HZDTA did not invent the idea of coordination among law enforcement agencies, nor is HIDTA the exclusive patron of such efforts.

But to Senator Jim Webb, it’s another source of funding for his constituents that is very popular with law enforcement.

Everyone wants a piece.

Copenhagen votes to legalise marijuana

Marijuana could soon be legalised in Copenhagen, after the city voted overwhelmingly in favour of a scheme that would see the drug sold through a network of state-run shops and cafes.

The scheme, if approved by the Danish parliament at the start of next year, could make the city the first to fully legalise, rather than simply tolerate, marijuana consumption. […]

“We are thinking of perhaps 30 to 40 public sales houses, where the people aren’t interested in selling you more, they’re interested in you,” said Mikkel Warming, the Mayor in charge of Social Affairs at Copenhagen City Council. “Who is it better for youngsters to buy marijuana from? A drug pusher, who wants them to use more, who wants them to buy hard drugs, or a civil servant?”

I’ve had a life-long dream of going into space. I was at the launch of Apollo 13 and voraciously read science fiction since I was a young boy.

I always thought the shuttle program missed a golden opportunity to help fund itself by having a lottery to win a space on each shuttle. I would have bought lottery tickets. Lots of them.

Now Reason notes that NASA is accepting applications…

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has a need for Astronaut Candidates to support the International Space Station (ISS) Program and future deep space exploration activities.

KEY REQUIREMENTS

Position subject to pre-employment background investigation
This is drug-testing designated position
Frequent travel may be required
Selectee must pass a pre-employment medical examination

Key requirements?

There goes my dream. I won’t apply for a position that requires drug testing on principle. (Not that I’m young enough to be an astronaut anyway, or would have a chance of being in physical shape to do it.)

The odd part to me is that I would assume that the medical examination for an astronaut would be so comprehensive as to know what you had for lunch last week and would certainly know whether you had taken any drugs. It’s the listing of drug testing as a key job requirement that puts it on my do-not-apply list.

… or why you should be.

Woman Gets Jail For Food-Stamp Fraud; Wall Street Fraudsters Get Bailouts by Matt Taibbi

Here’s another thing that boggles my mind: You get busted for drugs in this country, and it turns out you can make yourself ineligible to receive food stamps.

But you can be a serial fraud offender like Citigroup, which has repeatedly been dragged into court for the same offenses and has repeatedly ignored court injunctions to abstain from fraud, and this does not make you ineligible to receive $45 billion in bailouts and other forms of federal assistance. […]

Anita McLemore, meanwhile, lied to feed her children, gave back every penny of her “fraud” when she got caught, and is now going to do three years in prison. Explain that, Eric Holder!

Here are two unrelated stories, yet there is a connection…

Boy, 13, arrested for selling meth in Lincoln

A 13-year-old boy, not even 5 feet tall and less than 100 pounds, was arrested Wednesday night for selling methamphetamine. […]

According to court records, the boy sold two grams of meth to an undercover officer for $200 in a parking lot near First Street and Cornhusker Highway about 7 p.m. Wednesday.

11-year-old turns in parents for marijuana use

HASTINGS, Minn. — An 11-year-old Minnesota boy who says he was fed up with his mom and stepfather filling their home with marijuana smoke took photos of the drugs, which were then sent to police.

Drug agents served a search warrant on their home in Ravenna Township near Hastings last month and arrested Heidi Siebenaler, a Dakota County probation supervisor, and her husband, Mark Siebenaler.

These two young boys are both pawns in a vicious drug war that destroys families and ruins childhood.

It seems clear that in the upcoming election, siding with Calderon’s all-out drug war isn’t going to be politically popular. And now the main leftist rival has specifically distanced himself in this area.

But the whole mess can be cleared up in the first six months of a new administration. At least, that’s the campaign pledge of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the silver-haired presidential hopeful of the Mexican left. […]

“You can’t fight violence with violence,” Lopez Obrador said on national radio Wednesday. “We need a loving republic. We need opportunities for young people so they don’t fall into the arms of organized crime.”

Between now and the election day in July, Lopez Obrador says, he will convince the Mexican people for a new peaceful approach — as opposed to the military policies of the present President Felipe Calderon or the former ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party.

Calderon’s war on drug cartels, the leftist candidate said, has been a disaster for Mexico, unleashing more bloodshed and destroying the economy.

Of course, he’s absolutely right on that last count, but he’s also a bit overly optimistic if he thinks he can solve the problem in six months regardless of the approach — but then again, that’s campaign promises for you.

I suspect what he plans is a kindler, gentler drug war with a lot of positive social programs to make people feel better about their lives (and government), combined with a kind of hands-off approach to the trafficking organizations.

After all, the one thing that no candidate for President in Mexico can solve is the main cause of their problem — the destructive drug policy of the United States.

At The National Interest: Re-Framing Drug Violence

If there’s a fire in your kitchen, the temptation is to throw water on it—but not if it’s a grease fire. In a similar vein, the U.S. government’s get-tough approach to drugs is counterproductive. […]

Like putting out a grease fire with water, employing the tools of war against the social phenomenon of drugs has been wholly destructive. […]

Accountability for drug violence must be laid at the feet not only of ruthless drug cartels but also of American analysts and officials too obtuse or self-serving to see the failure of their policies.

An effective analogy.

However, I think my own analogy may be a bit more apt:

“Some days it feels like I’m watching a house on fire. And one idiot wants to put it out with a machine gun. The other one wants to use grenades. And I’m standing there with a bucket of water and they look at me like I’m crazy.”

Schoolchildren sign police car at assembly

SHRINK-WRAPPED CAR

The final touch in the preparations for Drug Awareness Week was wrapping Clarke’s police car in red vinyl.

After students make the pledge, they go out to the car to sign it.

Heidi LeBrun from the Family School Association said this last addition got the kids excited.

“Did you hear the sound when (Clark) said, ‘Do you want to sign my car?'”

She said the students all gasped.

It’s bound to work. Years from now, someone’s going to offer Ethan some LSD and he’ll say “No, thank you. I signed a red vinyl shrink-wrapped police car.”

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And in Vidor, Texas, elementary and special education students celebrated “We are Drug Free Deep in the Heart of Texas” week by seeing the principal’s horses Jake and Miss Lilly.

Not sure about the significance of the horses… maybe they were drug free?

Of course, it’s really about bribing kids to get excited about your message. “Sign this drug free pledge… Hey look! Free stuff! Hey look! A red vinyl shrink-wrapped police car! Hey look! Horsies!”

In addition to admiring Glenn Greenwald’s powerful writing in opposition to authoritarian trends in government, politics and media, I now have reason to be extremely jealous of him.

For years, I used to dream of the notion of being able to debate Bush’s drug czar John Walters. Ever since 2003, I’ve said that I’d debate him any time, and even pay my own way.

Glenn Greenwald got there first.

Last Thursday at Brown University, I debated former Bush drug czar John Walters on the virtues of drug legalization, and the video is below. The aspect of With Liberty and Justice for Some that has received the most attention is the shield of immunity for elite lawbreaking, but the other side of that rule-of-law evisceration — the incomparably harsh and sprawling penal state America has created for its ordinary citizens — is at least as important, and it is the Drug War that personifies the worst abuses of that punishment system and accounts for much of it.

I began the debate by presenting a 25-minute argument, which was followed by Walters’ doing the same, and the next hour was composed of a quite contentious question-and-answer session with the audience of roughly 300 people. This was a vibrant and confrontational debate that, I think, really underscores the key issues in the controversy and will be worthwhile for anyone with an interest in these questions:

Full video is at the link. Haven’t had time to watch it yet, but I’m looking forward to it.