Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Just like Mom used to bake This is causing a bit of a stir: High Number of Moms Admit Pot Use A number of mothers in the Phoenix area admit they use marijuana to wind down after a long day, television station KPHO reported. Shay Pausa surveyed hundreds of mothers through her Web site, Chikii.com. She targeted women in affluent suburban areas. [...] They're women like Jan, who's 30 and has one child. "I like it just to relax, if I'm very stressed out and I just need some time, just to relax. It's good for that," Jan said. [...] Of the hundreds of mothers Pausa surveyed, 52 percent said they smoke pot at least 10 times a year. Twenty-seven percent said they smoke it one to seven times a week. Some of the women even said they would someday tell their kids about their secret. That's what most concerns some anti-drug groups. "So what kind of message is that sending to a child? If it's OK to smoke pot in the house, is it OK to steal? Bottom line, it's illegal," said Sarah Christiansen of NotMyKid.org. Yep. Pot smoking and stealing. Where do these drug warriors learn how to make analogies? (Like the one where they say "Well if you think legalizing will reduce the criminal activity, why don't you legalize murder as well?") And I've had just about enough of "sending messages to children." Everybody who wants to control what adults do always talks about messages to children. Guess what? The children are not interested in, or listening to, your "messages." (And they know you're just using them, because they know how to read between the lines very well.) Try talking to children, instead. Tell them the truth. Have the guts to raise a human being instead of trying to train a puppy. 9:31:55 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

Odds and Ends (and open thread) Alex at Drug Law Blog has a very interesting post (inspired by a discussion in comments here at Drug WarRant): Civil Disobedience, the War on Drugs, and Fiorello LaGuardia. Where's our Fiorello LaGuardia? From Jerry Large of the Seattle Times (and picked up elsewhere): Rescuing drug war's prisoners The crack we're addicted to is an over-reliance on police and prisons, which, among other things, perpetuates America's racial divide. Jerry Large also has this piece: Politicians are beginning to realize something's broken, too. Voters need to support them. Let them know we no longer think looking beyond easy answers is being soft on crime. The ramifications of militarizing the drug war in Mexico are starting to surface. The Chicago Tribune reported: Officials say most of the complaints statewide involve soldiers entering homes without warrants and illegally detaining residents without probable cause. [...] "We need to take a few steps back and ask ourselves if a society like Mexico wants its military occupying the plazas, the city halls," Sierra said. "In the long term, I don't think it is healthy for a democracy." Looks like things may not be going so well for the feds in the Ed Rosenthal trial When police departments depend on seizure money for their operations... 9:20:14 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []

More from Gravel A presidential candidate saying such things? Note, the transcript of this interview is pretty rough, but the meaning is clear. Timothy Gatto had an interview with Mike Gravel and this is one part: Gatto: I have seen what Cocaine, Heroin and Meth do to good people. What would you do to stop the abuse of these drugs if they are legalized? Senator Gravel: First of all, I do have a program to legalize the regulation of hard drugs. I think we ought to stop the prohibition of Marijuana and let marijuana be sold in liquor stores. You get a much bigger high off of drinking a fifth of scotch, than you would off a couple of packs of marijuana. That's why it should be legalized. Now the regulation, the legalization of hard drugs is a whole other matter. What we have to do is stop criminalizing this whole drug problem, the addiction problem. This is a public health problem. It's not a criminal problem. What we need to do is to one; to identify these drug users so that they can get their drugs by prescription from a doctor, they are thereby registered to a registry, so that we can begin to monitor these people and try to proselytize them, and help them to get off of drugs. That's not what happens today, what happens today... you're criminalized, you're thrown in jail, half the people in jail have a drug problem, and we don't address that at all. It's a health issue and we don't look at it for what it is, it's a health issue, ,so my hope would be, this whole war on drugs is a hoax we spend 50 to 70 billion dollars a year on it, and it's no more effective than prohibition was against alcohol back in the 20's. All it does is criminalizing a major segment of our population and cause another major segment to break the law, lose respect for the law, because it is just bad law, and so I would really push on both sides of that and keep in mind, those that try to tell the American people that they have nothing to fear but fear itself. That's what I would try to do under this present situation is that you don't need all this fear of the terrorists, of people of color, gays this is overblown, totally overblown, in addition to fighting this problem of fear with the American public through leadership, I would call on the courage in us, not the fear in us to address our collective problems. Then, at the same time like Roosevelt, I would do away with the prohibition that we have in respect to marijuana, and bring the legalization of hard drugs, legalization of the regulation of hard drugs. Gatto: I wrote an article on the war on drugs it's the same as the war on terror, it's a never-ending thing, it's a self-perpetuating thing. When are the American People going to realize that? Maybe when you're the president? Gravel: Yes we engage these issues. You don't hear the front tier candidates talking about this on the drug war. You don't hear them talking about the military industrial complex. With their interviews, its politics as usual, they say a lot, but don't say anything. 8:59:04 AM | drug policy | Related  | permalink | comment []