Thursday, June 22, 2006

Nevada paper comes out for legalization The rural Lahontan Valley News came out in favor of Nevada's marijuana legalization initiative It's time to pass this multi-pronged approach to marijuana regulation and end years of speculation and fruitless debates. What the initiative offers is a chance for voters to change a decades-long war on marijuana that has failed to curb its prevalence among Nevadans of all ages. Long compared to the country's failed prohibition of alcohol in the 1930s, current marijuana laws foster an illegal market. Nevadans who use marijuana legally for medicinal purposes are forced to grow their own or obtain it through illicit sources. Detractors of the initiative argue that marijuana is a gateway drug that leads to use of more dangerous substances. But the same could be said of caffeine, tobacco, alcohol, gambling, sex or any other activity that stimulates the brain's pleasure zones. Some of the above mentioned activities are legal and regulated in Nevada. In fact, the state's most powerful industry caters to those same visceral pleasures. In a state where prostitution is legal in certain counties, bars are not required to close and children can legally possess and use tobacco, objections to marijuana legalization on a moral basis seem hypocritical. Education and parental involvement affect a person's decisions more profoundly than state policy. Good stuff. And it caught the attention of the AP, which has been running a story about the editorial. Kudos to Regulate Marijuana.org for their efforts so far. [Thanks, Bill] 8:03:19 PM |  drug policy | Links | permalink | comment []

Michigan High Court rules in favor of drugged driving arrests for no valid reason Nicholas Sarwark at Hammer of Truth has it right. 7:08:31 PM |  drug policy | Links | permalink | comment []

Soares, a reform fighter who won't back down when criticized Interesting article by Nathan Riley in the Gay City News about upstate New York District Attorney David Soares, who has made quite a bit of news lately. The important point in this article is noting that here is a drug policy reform politician who stuck to his guns, despite the usual sound-bite attacks, and seems to have succeeded. It's a lesson for other politicians who believe in drug policy reform, Democrat or Republican -- there's no need to run from the fight. 7:02:03 PM |  drug policy | Links | permalink | comment []

Bias' unintended legacy I was beginning to despair as to whether any of the non-blog media would cover the real story about the aftermath of Len Bias' death, but a couple have come through. Kevin Litten of the University of Maryland's Diamondback had contacted me about Len Bias, and I was able to steer him toward some alternate directions than what all the sports writers were doing. He managed to touch on the harsh mandatory minimums and got some good information from Eric Sterling, but neglected the racial implications. The Chicago Tribune's Clarence Page did better. In Bias' unintended legacy: Basketball star's overdose hijacked by war on crack cocaine. Page repeats some of Dan Baum's description of the hysteria at the time, and comments both on the fact that the new laws especially targeted crack (despite Bias using powder) and how the result was racially disparate. ___ Note: The drug czar's office didn't particularly distinguish itself with its (hopefully unintended) headline: Len Bias: A Stunning Death Remembered 7:35:35 AM |  drug policy | Links | permalink | comment []

Shock and Awe Radley Balko's got a good piece at Reason: Buffalo's Stampede Against Privacy -- City of Light's finest bomb houses, arrest scores, kill dogs, and achieve nothing 7:18:26 AM |  drug policy | Links | permalink | comment []