Saturday, January 8, 2005

Odds and Ends At 8 pm (ET) tomorrow, Loretta Nall will be debating Western Carolina University Police Chief McAbee on the Free Speech Radio program at Western North Carolina University. At Grits for Breakfast, Scott has a guest blogger who will be covering the Tom Colemen perjury trial. This week's Drug War Chronicle is a fascinating read. The first two items point out the challenges involved in Afghanistan, where the war on terror and the war on drugs are incompatible and are coming to a collision. 11:10:06 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

My Question Gets Picked So I guess I should feel honored. Drug Czar John Walters picked my question to answer in the White House chat yesterday. I tried to frame it in a way that would be critical, yet not too critical (so he wouldn't answer it). So here's what ended up: Pete, from Bloomington, Illinois writes: Isn't there a problem with giving kids misleading information regarding marijuana that overstates the actual dangers? I worry that when they find out we've been lying to them about marijuana that they'll stop believing us when it comes to more dangerous drugs. After all, when you call Canadian pot the "crack cocaine of marijuana," the message kids may hear is that crack must not be too bad. John Walters Actually Pete, you've got the question exactly backwards. Marijuana is a much bigger part of the American addiction problem than most people -- teens or adults -- realize. There are now more teens going into treatment for marijuana dependency than for all other drugs combined. And there are more teens now seeking treatment for marijuana than for alcohol. Today's marijuana is also twice as strong as it was in the mid 80's. One of the reasons we have such a serious problem with marijuana in our country is because of the misinformation that has been spread about it over the past 30 years -- that marijuana is "harmless" or a "soft drug" or a "rite of passage." These are all myths -- and for too many Americans they are costly myths. We need to educate Americans about the real harms of marijuana if we want to sustain the gains we've made over the past three years. We've recently released a report entitled "Marijuana Myths & Facts: The Truth Behind 10 Popular Misperceptions" to help get the facts out about marijuana. So I accuse Walters of downplaying the dangers of other drugs by hyping marijuana, and in his answer he does exactly that. He again overstates the dangers of marijuana (which leads to lack of confidence by teens that they're getting the truth). And he significanly downplays the dangers of alcohol. Of course, he pulls the same stunt that his office has been doing ad nauseum -- the false implication regarding treatment. The truth is that treatment percentages connect to referrals, not addiction, so the reason that marijuana numbers are high has nothing to do with the danger of the drug (marijuana only has mild dependency capability), but rather that people go into treatment to avoid expulsion from school or as a condition for a positive drug test on the job, or to avoid jail. As for the Drug Czar's "report" -- "Marijuana Myths & Facts is a joke. One of the commenters here is working on a detailed rebuttal to that publication -- I'll post a link to it when it's available. Of course, this was not a good format for me. I ask a question and he gets to answer it any way he wants to without rebuttal. So, for the record, I'll state once again -- I'll debate the Drug Czar anywhere, any time. I'll even pay my own way. Just let me know and I'll be there. 10:50:29 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

Excellent editorial And editorial in The Oregonian titled Stop Blocking Marijuana Research The bottleneck for legitimate researchers is that the agencies that are hostile to medicinal marijuana are the gatekeepers of its supply. Two suggestions: Federal agencies such as the DEA should stop blocking legitimate research that is conducted with proper security. Until the agencies stop erecting unreasonable barriers, the Supreme Court and federal appeals courts should recognize that FDA approval is not currently a viable option, so patients need to be afforded full protection of their states' laws. 10:36:27 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

Lawmakers call on President to Stop Covert Propaganda At BuzzFlash Democratic leaders in Congress today called on President Bush to stop the alarming use of illegal covert propaganda to promote government policy after two new accounts of such activity surfaced today. In a letter to the President, they pointed out that the use of covert propaganda has been revealed through independent investigations by at least three separate federal agencies. ... The letter was signed by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), the senior Democrat on the Government Reform Committee, Rep. George Miller (D-CA), the senior Democrat on the House Education and the Workforce Committee, Rep. David Obey (D-WI), the senior Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, and Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD), the outgoing Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus and the Senior Democrat on the Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources Subcommittee. The letter was in reaction to two reports today. USA Today disclosed that the Department of Education paid $240,000 to conservative political commentator Armstrong Williams to routinely promote the No Child Left Behind Act on his broadcast shows without revealing that he was being paid by the government to do so. Rep. Miller separately today requested that the Department's Inspector General investigate this contract with Williams. And the Washington Post and New York Times reported today on a General Accounting Office report to Rep. Waxman and Rep. Obey that found the Office of Drug Control Policy violated the law when it used video news releases to promote an anti-marijuana message without revealing to television news viewers that the on-camera "reporter" was really an actor, not a journalist. In May, the GAO found that the Department of Health and Services also violated the law by producing and distributing similar video news releases regarding Medicare policy. It seems to me that the drug czar's use of propaganda would normally have received less public awareness (it's almost the status quo). But since the report come out at the same time as the Armstrong Williams issue, there may be some attention paid. I doubt that a lot will come of this, but the public statement by these Representatives will help long-term. 10:30:33 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []