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"Hemp is of first necessity to the wealth & protection of the country."

- Thomas Jefferson

Famous Quote

"Make the most you can of the Indian Hemp seed and sow it everywhere."

- George Washington

Tony Newman And Stephen Gutwillig Attack The Myths Championed By Prohibitionists

Tony Newman And Stephen Gutwillig have written an article for The Huffington Post, titled "Dismantling the Talking Points of Marijuana Prohibitionists," in which they focus on a couple of prohibitionist spins on the war on drugs. Here are their take on the matter:

Opposition to this reform has crystallized within the drug war establishment, and so has their spin. Here are their top five talking points and the truth beyond them:

Drug Warrior Spin #1: Why would we authorize another harmful substance in our society?
The reality is that marijuana is already widely available in our society. Like it or not, it's a mainstream recreational drug consumed by millions, including one in ten Californians last year, according to federal data. The California ballot initiative simply acknowledges that marijuana is here and that it's more sensible to regulate this massive market, like we do with even more harmful drugs like cigarettes and alcohol. Prohibition of highly popular substances never works and brings terrible collateral damage. Alcohol prohibition didn't keep people from drinking, but it did give us Al Capone and gun battles in the streets. No one dies over sales of Budweiser today.

Drug Warrior Spin #2: Regulation will cause marijuana consumption to skyrocket with addiction rates to match.
The truth is rates of marijuana consumption aren't determined by penalties against it. If they were, the U.S. - which arrests an astounding 750,000 people for marijuana possession every year - wouldn't have double the consumption rate of The Netherlands, where marijuana sales have been tolerated for decades. That principle holds true across this country as some states that lowered penalties against marijuana possession years ago have among the lowest rates of use while some states that retained harsh marijuana laws have among the highest. As for addiction, the risk of becoming dependent on marijuana is mild compared to most other drugs including alcohol and tobacco. In fact, most people who enter treatment for marijuana addiction in this country today are referred by the criminal justice system, but 65% don't even meet the standard criteria for dependence.

Drug Warrior Spin #3: Regulating marijuana will aid drug cartels.
It is practically Orwellian to claim that state regulation of marijuana would benefit criminal cartels. More than 20,000 Mexicans have died in the last three years thanks to prohibition. There is nothing inherent about the plant that has caused these brutal murders. Banning marijuana makes it worth more than gold, so valuable that people are willing to kill each other over the right to sell it. By regulating marijuana and beginning to bring its production and distribution under the rule of law, we would eliminate the cartels' existing monopoly and dramatically siphon their profits. They would be the biggest losers in this reform.

Drug Warrior Spin #4: Regulating marijuana would cost society more than the taxes it generates.
Taxing marijuana like alcohol statewide would generate $1. 4 billion in California alone, according to the state Board of Equalization. Californians will also save hundreds of millions in scarce law enforcement dollars currently devoted to enforcing these futile laws. Yet opponents say that drugged driving, increased health care costs, and lost productivity will end up costing much more than taxes would generate. By that logic, alcohol, which causes nearly 100,000 American deaths annually, should be illegal and warrant life without parole. The bottom line is that marijuana is California's largest agricultural commodity, freely consumed by millions with no regulations or protections, and with no financial benefit to the state. In this economic climate, this is a reality we literally can't afford to ignore any longer.

Drug Warrior Spin #5: What kind of message does regulating marijuana send to kids?
The irony is that failed marijuana prohibition does nothing to protect kids. Despite 30 years of "Just Say No," half of high-school seniors admit to trying marijuana. Students are more likely to smoke marijuana than cigarettes and say it's easier to buy marijuana than alcohol because drug dealers don't ask for ID. Even more chilling, of the 78,000 Californians arrested for marijuana offenses in 2008, one in five was a child under 18 and half were under 30. Out of control access and mass arrests are prohibition's true impact on our youth. State regulation will reduce that access, separate marijuana from harder drugs, and allow us to focus on effective youth drug education programs.

Tony Newman is the Media Director and Stephen Gutwillig is the California Director of the Drug Policy Alliance (www.drugpolicy.org), the nation's leading organization promoting alternatives to the failed war on drugs.

California Ballot Measure For Legalization Of Marijuana

By Kevin Kelley

After the collection of 694,248 signatures by proponents of the measure, and with those signatures verified by random sampling, California voters will have the opportunity to vote on whether or not to legalize the possession and sale of marijuana, as well as allowing individuals to grow a certain amount in their home for personal use.

While opponents view this as the first step in defeating the measure, the fact that it is going to be on the ballot is a tremendous success in it's own right, due to the percentage of people who support legalization and the quantity of signatures gathered. Support for the ballot measure has also come from across the board, from traditionally pro-legalization groups to fiscal hawks who see taxation as a way to dig the state out of financial ruin, but whatever the reason may be, the hard part comes in mobilizing voters to the polls.

Obama Signs Historic Legislation Into Law

By Kevin Kelley

After over a year of debate, President Obama had signed health care reform legislation into law today, after a late night vote on Sunday in the House of Representatives passing the Senate version of the legislation that was voted on in December of 2009.

All that is left is to pass supplementary reconciliation package in the Senate, but as of today, health care reform is a reality.

Shifting Rhetoric From Decades Old "War On Drugs"

By Kevin Kelley.

From an article by Mike Lillis at The Washington Independent:

Quietly, free of headlines and fanfare, the Obama White House is toning down the bellicose “war-on-drugs” position that’s defined the country’s narcotics policy for the last 25 years.

Appearing in Vienna last week for the 53rd annual United Nations meeting on global drug policy, administration officials shifted away from the decades-old approach of attacking drug use as a crime to be penalized. Instead they moved toward a strategy of tackling addiction as an illness to be treated, a number of health and human rights advocates who attended the event told TWI.

Drug reformers for years have promoted so-called “harm reduction” measures as a more effective and humane way to treat drug addiction and the diseases that often accompany it — an approach that runs counter to the punitive attitude epitomized by the Reagan administration’s “war on drugs.” And while the Obama White House — behind Gil Kerlikowske, the White House drug czar, and his deputy, Thomas McLellan — remains officially opposed to the hot-button harm reduction language, officials have also conceded that the current strategy isn’t working, advocates say. That sharp break from past administrations has left reformers hopeful that the Obama White House will mark a new era in the nation’s fight against drug abuse — one that prioritizes treatment and prevention above rap sheets and prison time.

“There was virtually no reference to a criminal justice approach,” Allan Clear, executive director of the Harm Reduction Coalition, an advocacy group, said of the U.S. delegation in Vienna. “I’m just so used to being appalled by their behavior … It was very encouraging.”

Deborah Peterson Small, executive director of Break the Chains, another group advocating for drug-policy reforms, agreed, noting a brand new willingness among White House officials to embrace certain elements of the harm reduction strategy. When she spoke about treatment reforms to U.S. drug officials in Vienna in 2008, Small said, the entire delegation walked out on her. “This year it was completely different,” she said. “We finally had a sense that they were listening.”

The comments mark quite a departure from those that drug reformers were making a year ago at the same U.N. event, where the Obama administration killed international efforts to include harm reduction language as part of a U.N. document that will guide the next decade’s global drug policy. Harm reduction refers to things like drug-substitute treatments and clean-needle exchanges — programs being tried (with promising results) in a number of countries to battle the spread of HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis C and other drug-related illnesses. The White House has argued that the broad harm reduction language is “ambiguous” and could include controversial programs the administration doesn’t support, including drug legalization, drug consumption rooms and heroin prescription initiatives.

This news is very promising for some, but is far from the absolute goal of legalization. It would most likely be safe to assume that once sensitive legislative measures, such as health care or immigration reform, are done with, the Administration might take a more open approach to politically risque subjects.

States Lessen Marijuana Restrictions

By Kevin Kelley

A USA Today article recently published has identified a growing trend among states becoming more willing to address the legalization of marijuana, but not outright.  These moves have been coming in steps, with passage of legislation allowing for medical marijuana use or decriminalization of the substance.  Marijuana still remains as an illegal drug, but many local governments are taking steps to lessen limits, and the movement is gaining converts - conservative converts who were once the stalwarts of drug enforcement.

James Gray, a former superior court judge and congressional candidate has officially changed his position, stating that it is becoming easier for children to acquire the drug then compared to alcohol because marijuana is not regulated by the government.  Steven Gutwillig of the Drug Policy Alliance had stated that "we are absolutely in an important new era in which increasing majorities of Americans are not just questioning the wisdom and efficacy of marijuana prohibition but are demanding alternatives."

According to Kurt Gardinier, spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project, politicians have been increasingly tackling this once politically risky subject because "politicians are finally catching up with the American public."  We can only hope that this trend continues and debate on the subject does not stop.