|
|
|
Drug WarRant
 |
Friday, January 4, 2008 |
Open Thread
 Via Siobhan Reynolds of the Pain Relief Network: Pain group rallies to doctor's defense
The New Mexico-based Pain Relief Network says it plans to file a civil lawsuit in Wichita federal court alleging the Controlled Substances Act as applied to doctors and patients is unconstitutional.
"The Wire" is entering its fifth and final season on HBO, and it continues to get critical raves. There have been quite a number of articles about it recently, including this one by Gal Beckerman, and this one in Time, and on and on. Just Google "the wire" and you'll get lots. Everytime "The Wire" gets mentioned, it's another reminder to people that we have this troubled and troubling institution of drug prohibition. And that's good.
I watched a number of episodes in the first season and thought it was excellent. But I don't seek it out -- not because I don't like the show, but perhaps because I deal with the real drug war every day right here. So when it comes to entertainment, I prefer Stardust.
This Chicago Sun-Times editorial delivered just the right kick of sarcasm in the title: Lawmakers Manage to Outlaw Licking an Obscure Plant
Those creatively efficient politicians down in the Illinois Legislature might be stumped on really important issues like funding the CTA or betting our future on casinos. But they are clear about saving us from ourselves -- even if we don't need it. Case in point: the salvia ban. [...]
Legislators must have been on something to zero in on this obscure organic substance, sometimes called "magic mint" or "Sally D" by salvia afficionados. The last time we checked, Illinois was not besieged by a salvia epidemic. We don't see the urgency in criminalizing a substance with no clear track record of causing people to act in a dangerous manner or hurt other people.
We don't condone drug use. However, considering how overcrowded our prisons are with dangerous criminals, trolling around for more nonviolent drug offenders to punish is counterintuitive.
9:51:07 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
Plan Mexico in trouble?
A fascinating post at Grits for Breakfast: Bush and Calderon on outs; 'Merida Initiative' may not pass Congressional muster
Given that internal forces in both countries are already very upset that the negotiation was done in secret, if Bush and Calderon are at odds, then Plan Mexico is on shaky ground indeed.
However, I can't help thinking that the lure of fluid and corruptible taxpayer drug war dollars (both the spending and receiving) is so strong, that they'll find a way to overcome their differences.
12:35:01 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
|
Thursday, January 3, 2008 |
Is that a bag of coke in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Naturally, Scott tracked this one down...
Customs officials on the other side of the Pond are on the lookout for curvy drug mules after customs officers arrested a woman for attempting to smuggle £50,000 worth of cocaine in concealed pouches built into her bra. Criminals are now being said to favor "tall, flat-chested women who don't arouse suspicion when they have fuller figures."
So, is the same thing true for men? Is this one of those times when being small is an advantage?
Not that I'm looking for a job or anything.
11:16:49 PM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
Open thread
An Open Letter to the Black Community On Behalf of Ron Paul by Robert A. Wicks
A Presidential candidate's position on the war on drugs is the first legitimate political litmus test I have seen within my lifetime. [...] Laws against drug use are no more justifiable than anti-miscegenation laws. They are laws which attack the root of the notion that all men are created equal by establishing that some have the right to rule over others, and those others have no similar right. What other justification is there for preventing an adult from inhaling, ingesting, or injecting the chemical of his choice into his own body? A large portion of the black prison population is imprisoned because of drug offenses. Many of those who are imprisoned for other offenses, such as property crimes and violent crimes are there as a result of the various violent consequences of the war on drugs. Ron Paul does not claim to be able to fix all this. As President, he can only Constitutionally stop the federal war on drugs, not those in which the states engage. But removing federal support for drug prohibition could have a tremendous impact nonetheless.
I haven't listened to the whole thing yet, but retired DEA agent Mike Levine has Bill Conroy of Narco News on his internet radio show to talk about the plane with 4 tons of cocaine that crashed in Mexico and was apparently used by the CIA and other U.S. agencies.
Death by Drug War -- via Radley Balko
The state of Washington's position is clear: If someone calls 911 when a friend is overdosing, not only does the witness risk charges for possessing or selling drugs (which 911 callers in these situations have feared since the passage of the Controlled Substances Act), but he or she could be charged with homicide, too. The end result? Overdose victims--who might survive with prompt medical care--may be abandoned and left to die.
If you get a chance, read the entire referenced article by Dominic Holden. It's pretty powerful.
8:39:59 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, January 2, 2008 |
What are we getting for all the money we'll be spending on Plan Mexico?
They're not even trying to be optimistic about it.
But U.S. law enforcement officials and analysts caution that even with the unprecedented level of anti-drug aid to Mexico, violence could actually rise as drug cartels respond forcefully to increased U.S. and Mexican pressure.
One U.S. law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, warned that 2008 "may prove to be even deadlier. We expect drug traffickers to respond aggressively to combined U.S. and Mexican actions and pressure."
Growing U.S.-Mexico cooperation will force "drug cartels to increase the political ante by increasing the level of violence," said Armand Peschard-Sverdrup, a political consultant with Washington-based Peschard-Sverdrup & Associates. [...]
"When pressure on them [drug traffickers] increases or continues from law enforcement officials, the usual response is to kick up the violence, especially directed at government and law enforcement officials, which might explain why deaths of law enforcement officials are up," said a senior U.S. official, also speaking on condition of anonymity.
Good thing we're supporting an effective approach in Mexico.
Still, Arturo Yañez, who trains detectives for the Mexico City government and has worked in federal law enforcement, questioned whether Mr. Calderón's counter-narcotics strategy is really working.
"Where are the results, the numbers ... ? Information is thin," he said. The influence of organized crime "is growing across Mexico. How exactly are we winning?"
Plan Mexico is a proposal developed in secret to spend billions of dollars ratcheting up the drug war in Mexico -- a proposal without the support of Congress, that generates strong misgivings in the people of Mexico regarding their sovereignty, and will probably increase the violence in Mexico without actually accomplishing anything. What's not to like?
9:58:22 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
Your son died impossibly
As you well know, it's physically impossible to overdose from marijuana use -- there are no legitimate recorded deaths as a direct result of smoking cannabis.*
That hasn't stopped the occasional quack in the U.K. from attempting to assign deaths to cannabis use. (See here, here, and here.)
Usually, these idiots are treated with some derision, but simply allowed to continue on, but Dr Louay Al-Alousi faced the wrath of the dead boy's parents -- who hired their own pathologist.
A consultant pathologist who was found guilty of professional misconduct will discover whether he can practice without restrictions later this week.
Dr Louay Al-Alousi admitted the charge when he appeared before a General Medical Council hearing in January last year.
The doctor, who works for the University of Leicester and the University Hospital of Leicester NHS Trust, carried out flawed post-mortems on two teenagers.
He wrongly attributed their death to cannabis use. His mistakes were exposed by the parents of 16-year-old James Burgess, of Leicester Forest East.
James's parents, Paul and Joanne, enlisted their own pathologist, while a coroner had a third expert examine James.
Both agreed his death was due to an unsuspected heart condition.
At the inquest, cannabis was ruled out as a cause of death and the family's solicitor called for Dr Al-Alousi to be reported to the GMC.
It's a shame that the parents had to do all that just to find out how their son died. Clearly they knew that it was a nonsensical post-mortem. It's also troubling that the panel is even considering lifting restrictions on this quack.
* (For that matter, even the indirect deaths (such as doing something stupid while stoned) are almost impossible to find. They invariably are anecdotal and involve multiple influences and only the presence of marijuana as proof of its contribution to the death.)
8:30:17 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
|
Tuesday, January 1, 2008 |
Speaking of racist outcomes...
Link
CHICAGO (AP) -- Emergency room doctors are prescribing strong narcotics more often to patients who complain of pain, but minorities are less likely to get them than whites, a new study finds. Even for the severe pain of kidney stones, minorities were prescribed narcotics such as oxycodone and morphine less frequently than whites.
The analysis of more than 150,000 emergency room visits over 13 years found differences in prescribing by race and ethnicity in both urban and rural hospitals, in all U.S. regions and for every type of pain.
"The gaps between whites and nonwhites have not appeared to close at all," said study co-author Dr. Mark Pletcher of the University of California, San Francisco.
The study appears in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.
Prescribing narcotics for pain in emergency rooms rose during the study, from 23 percent of those complaining of pain in 1993 to 37 percent in 2005.
The increase coincided with changing attitudes among doctors who now regard pain management as a key to healing. Doctors in accredited hospitals must ask patients about pain, just as they monitor vital signs such as temperature and pulse.
Even with the increase, the racial gap endured. Linda Simoni-Wastila of the University of Maryland, Baltimore, School of Pharmacy said the race gap finding may reveal some doctors' suspicions that minority patients could be drug abusers lying about pain to get narcotics.
The irony, she said, is that blacks are the least likely group to abuse prescription drugs.
10:04:51 PM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
Progressives missing the boat
Matt Stoller at Open Left is not happy with the Democratic candidates -- in part because the mainstream candidates are not addressing the real issues.
The issues we are dealing with today - health care, jobs, even a war in Iraq - are literally the same issues we dealt with in 1992. How can that possibly be considered progress? A real progressive candidate would take an apolitical problem and turn it into a mainstream political subject. None of our candidates have done that. Here are five easily mainstreamable problems ripe for the picking. [...]
Subject: End the War on Drugs
Factoid: There are 1 million people put in jail for doing what Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and George Bush have done.
Marijuana is America's largest cash crop, and it is responsible for around 225,000 arrests a year. Overall, the war on drugs incarcerates around 1 million people a year. Direct spending on the war on drugs this year is $50 billion dollars, about $600 a second. Around half of high school seniors have consumed marijuana (pdf). Simply put, why do some people go to jail for marijuana and cocaine, and others run for President?
[...]
Subject: End the cradle-to-prison superhighway
Factoid: 2 million people are in prison in America, by far the highest total of any other country in the world.
Think slavery has ended? Think torture is 'new'? Think again. With two million people in prison, and tens of thousands of sexual assaults every year, prison is a huge industry and a horrendous abridgment of the idea that is America. [...]
The cancerous symptoms are all around us, and leading Democratic Presidential candidates are too corrupt and morally crippled to even begin talking about them. But we'll get there.
Note: the comments section shows that Matt's got some strong disagreement within his readers regarding the "end the drug war" item, and that we've still got some major work to do.
9:59:12 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
When will we end the failed drug war?
Here's a good article to start the New Year -- an excellent piece by Atlanta-Journal Constitution editorial page editor Cynthia Tucker
Some four or so decades into an intensive effort to stamp out recreational drug use, billions of dollars have been spent; thousands of criminals, many of them foreigners, have been enriched; and hundreds of thousands of Americans have been imprisoned. And the use of illegal substances continues unabated.
With the nation poised on the brink of a new political era, isn't it time to abandon the wrongheaded war on drugs? Isn't it time to admit that this second Prohibition has been as big a failure as the last - the one aimed at alcohol? [...]
The nation's so-called war on drugs recalls that old Vietnam War phrase about burning the village in order to save it. It also brings to mind Albert Einstein's famous definition of insanity: Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
Our war on drugs really is a war on people. That's true insanity.
Strong words from a major newspaper.
9:49:04 AM | drug policy | Links | permalink |
|
|
|
|
|
|
