BC has just decriminalized hard drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and fentanyl. BC could have learned from Portugal but went the US/ Portland way. Portland has had an increase of 20% in death overdoses since. The BC gov’s attempt will backfire because the street supply of illegal drugs is tainted. That is what is killing people. If you are seriously trying to eliminate drug overdoses you must supply the users with a clean supply of these drugs. It’s a half-ass plan that will not work. Just look at how BC dealt with Covid. It’s still offering Covid vaccines despite the fact that these experimental jabs are more dangerous than the actual disease. Lou
So what would happen if America actually ended its 52-year-old War on Drugs? What can we learn from the example of Portugal, which decriminalized all drugs in 2000? What about Oregon, which decriminalized them in 2021? What if the U.S. not only decriminalized drugs by ceasing to prosecute users but actually legalized commercial sales? Is any of this even possible amidst an opioid overdose crisis fueled by fentanyl? Join Reason’s Nick Gillespie and Zach Weissmueller this Thursday at 1pm E.T. as they discuss all of these questions and more. Watch and leave questions and comments on the YouTube video above or on Reason’s Facebook page.
In his speech to the UN General Assembly, the Colombian president highlighted the necessity of ending the war on drugs and saving the environment
“You are only interested in my country to spray poisons on our jungles, to take our men to jail and put our women in exclusion. You are not interested in the education of the child, but in killing the jungle and extracting coal and oil from its entrails. The sponge that absorbs the poison [the rainforest] is useless, they prefer to throw more poisons into the atmosphere.”
They invaded in the name of oil and gas. They discovered in the 21st century the worst of their addictions: addiction to money and oil. Wars have served as an excuse not to act against the climate crisis. Wars have shown them how dependent they are on what will kill the human species.
On the first day of the United Nations General Assembly, Colombian President Gustavo Petro made his first address to the body. The speech sharply deviated from those of his conservative predecessors. Petro did not shy away from calling out global North countries for their role in the destruction of the environment and in the perpetuation of the War on Drugs, as a symptom of their capitalist greed. He accused
“You are only interested in my country to spray poisons on our jungles, to take our men to jail and put our women in exclusion. You are not interested in the education of the child, but in killing the jungle and extracting coal and oil from its entrails. The sponge that absorbs the poison [the rainforest] is useless, they prefer to throw more poisons into the atmosphere.”
This is Petro’s first trip to the United States since he was inaugurated in August. He was received on Sunday night September 18 by hundreds of supporters in Queens, NY who manifested their support for his administration’s commitment to working for peace and ensuring the wellbeing of the Colombian people.
Below is a full transcription of his speech on September 20, 2022 to the United Nations General Assembly.
I come from one of the three most beautiful countries on Earth.
There is an explosion of life there. Thousands of multicolored species in the seas, in the skies, in the lands…I come from the land of yellow butterflies and magic. There in the mountains and valleys of all greens, not only do the abundant waters flow down but also the torrents of blood. I come from a land of bloody beauty.
My country is not only beautiful, but it is also violent.
How can beauty be conjugated with death, how can the biodiversity of life erupt with the dances of death and horror? Who is guilty of breaking the enchantment with terror? Who or what is responsible for drowning life in the routine decisions of wealth and interest? Who is leading us to destruction as a nation and as a people?
My country is beautiful because it has the Amazon jungle, the ChocóWar jungle, the waters, the Andes mountain ranges, and the oceans. There, in those forests, planetary oxygen is emanated and atmospheric CO2 is absorbed. One of these CO2 absorbing plants, among millions of species, is one of the most persecuted on earth. At any cost, its destruction is sought: it is an Amazonian plant, the coca plant, sacred plant of the Incas. [It is in] a paradoxical crossroads.
The jungle that tries to save us, is at the same time, destroyed. To destroy the coca plant, they spray poisons, glyphosate in mass that runs through the waters, they arrest its growers and imprison them. For destroying or possessing the coca leaf, one million Latin Americans are killed and two million Afro-Americans are imprisoned in North America. Destroy the plant that kills, they shout from the North, but the plant is but one more of the millions that perish when they unleash the fire on the jungle. Destroying the jungle, the Amazon, has become the slogan followed by States and businessmen. The cry of scientists baptizing the rainforest as one of the great climatic pillars is unimportant.
For the world’s power relations, the jungle and its inhabitants are to blame for the plague that plagues them. The power relations are plagued by the addiction to money, to perpetuate themselves, to oil, to cocaine and to the hardest drugs to be able to anesthetize themselves more. Nothing is more hypocritical than the discourse to save the rainforest. The jungle is burning, gentlemen, while you make war and play with it. The rainforest, the climatic pillar of the world, disappears with all its life.
The great sponge that absorbs planetary CO2 evaporates. The savior forest is seen in my country as the enemy to be defeated, as the weed to be extinguished.
Coca and the peasants who grow it, because they have nothing else to grow, are demonized. You are only interested in my country to spray poisons on our jungles, to take our men to jail and put our women in exclusion. You are not interested in the education of the child, but in killing its jungle and extracting coal and oil from its entrails. The sponge that absorbs the poison is useless, they prefer to throw more poisons into the atmosphere.
We serve them only to fill the emptiness and loneliness of their own society that leads them to live in the midst of drug bubbles. We hide from them the problems that they refuse to reform. It is better to declare war on the jungle, on its plants, on its people. While they let the forests burn, while hypocrites chase the plants with poisons to hide the disasters of their own society, they ask us for more and more coal, more and more oil, to calm the other addiction: that of consumption, of power, of money.
What is more poisonous for humanity, cocaine, coal, or oil? The dictates of power have ordered that cocaine is the poison and must be pursued, even if it only causes minimal deaths by overdose, and even more by the mixtures necessitated by clandestinity, but coal and oil must be protected, even if their use could extinguish all of humanity.
These are the things of world power, things of injustice, and things of irrationality, because world power has become irrational. They see in the exuberance of the jungle, in its vitality, the lustful, the sinful; the guilty origin of the sadness of their societies, imbued with the unlimited compulsion to have and to consume. How to hide the loneliness of the heart, its dryness in the midst of societies without affection, competitive to the point of imprisoning the soul in solitude, if not by blaming the plant, the man who cultivates it, the libertarian secrets of the jungle.
According to the irrational power of the world, it is not the fault of the market that cuts back on existence, it is the fault of the jungle and those who inhabit it. The bank accounts have become unlimited, the money saved by the most powerful on the earth will not even be able to be spent in the time of the centuries. The sadness of existence produced by this artificial call to competition is filled with noise and drugs. The addiction to money and to having has another face: the addiction to drugs in people who lose the competition, in the losers of the artificial race in which they have transformed humanity.
The disease of loneliness will not be cured with glyphosate [sprayed] on the forests. It is not the rainforest that is to blame.
The culprit is their society educated in endless consumption, in the stupid confusion between consumption and happiness that allows the pockets of power to fill with money. The culprit of drug addiction is not the jungle, it is the irrationality of your world power. Try to give some reason to your power. Turn on the lights of the century again. The war on drugs has lasted 40 years, if we do not correct the course and it continues for another 40 years, the United States will see 2,800,000 young people die of overdose from fentanyl, which is not produced in Latin America. It will see millions of Afro-Americans imprisoned in its private jails.
The Afro-prisoner will become a business of prison companies, a million more Latin Americans will die murdered, our waters and our green fields will be filled with blood, and the dream of democracy will die in my America as well as in Anglo-Saxon America. Democracy will die where it was born, in the great western European Athens. By hiding the truth, they will see the jungle and democracies die. The war on drugs has failed.
The fight against the climate crisis has failed. There has been an increase in deadly consumption, from soft drugs to harder ones, genocide has taken place in my continent, and in my country, millions of people have been condemned to prison, and to hide their own social guilt they have blamed the rainforest and its plants. They have filled speeches and policies with nonsense. I demand from here, from my wounded Latin America, to put an end to the irrational war on drugs. To reduce drug consumption we do not need wars, for this, we need all of us to build a better society: a more caring society, more affectionate, where the intensity of life saves us from addictions and new slavery. Do you want less drugs? Think of less profit and more love. Think about a rational exercise of power.
Do not touch with your poisons the beauty of my homeland, help us without hypocrisy to save the Amazon Rainforest to save the life of humanity on the planet. You gathered the scientists, and they spoke with reason. With mathematics and climatological models, they said that the end of the human species was near, that its time is no longer of millennia, not even of centuries. Science set the alarm bells ringing and we stopped listening to it.
The war served as an excuse for not taking the necessary measures. When action was most needed, when speeches were no longer useful, when it was indispensable to deposit money in funds to save humanity, when it was necessary to move away from coal and oil as soon as possible, they invented war after war after war. They invaded Ukraine, but also Iraq, Libya, and Syria.
They invaded in the name of oil and gas. They discovered in the 21st century the worst of their addictions: addiction to money and oil. Wars have served as an excuse not to act against the climate crisis. Wars have shown them how dependent they are on what will kill the human species.
If you observe that the peoples are filling up with hunger and thirst and migrating by the millions towards the north, towards where the water is; then you enclose them, build walls, deploy machine guns, shoot at them. You expel them as if they were not human beings, you reproduce five times the mentality of those who politically created the gas chambers and the concentration camps, you reproduce on a planetary scale 1933.
The great triumph of the attack on reason. Do you not see that the solution to the great exodus unleashed on your countries is to return to water filling the rivers and the fields full of nutrients? The climate disaster fills us with viruses that swarm over us, but you do business with medicines and turn vaccines into commodities. You propose that the market will save us from what the market itself has created. The Frankenstein of humanity lies in letting the market and greed act without planning, surrendering the brain and reason. Kneeling human rationality to greed.
What is the use of war if what we need is to save the human species? What is the use of NATO and empires, if what is coming is the end of intelligence? The climate disaster will kill hundreds of millions of people and listen well, it is not produced by the planet, it is produced by capital.
The cause of the climate disaster is capital. The logic of coming together only to consume more and more, produce more and more, and for some to earn more and more produces the climate disaster. They applied the logic of extended accumulation to the energy engines of coal and oil and unleashed the hurricane: the ever deeper and deadlier chemical change of the atmosphere. Now in a parallel world, the expanded accumulation of capital is an expanded accumulation of death.
From the lands of jungle and beauty. There where they decided to make an Amazon rainforest plant an enemy, extradite and imprison its growers, I invite you to stop the war and to stop the climate disaster. Here, in this Amazon Rainforest, there is a failure of humanity.
Behind the bonfires that burn it, behind its poisoning, there is an integral, civilizational failure of humanity. Behind the addiction to cocaine and drugs, behind the addiction to oil and coal, there is the real addiction of this phase of human history: the addiction to irrational power, profit, and money. This is the enormous deadly machinery that can extinguish humanity.
I propose to you as president of one of the most beautiful countries on earth, and one of the most bloodied and violated, to end the war on drugs and allow our people to live in peace. I call on all of Latin America for this purpose. I summon the voice of Latin America to unite to defeat the irrational that martyrs our bodies. I call upon you to save the Amazon Rainforest integrally with the resources that can be allocated worldwide to life.
If you do not have the capacity to finance the fund for the revitalization of the forests, if it weighs more to allocate money to weapons than to life, then reduce the foreign debt to free our own budgetary spaces and with them, carry out the task of saving humanity and life on the planet. We can do it if you don’t want to. Just exchange debt for life, for nature. I propose, and I call upon Latin America to do so, to dialogue in order to end the war. Do not pressure us to align ourselves in the fields of war.
It is time for PEACE.
Let the Slavic peoples talk to each other, let the peoples of the world talk to each other. War is only a trap that brings the end of time closer in the great orgy of irrationality.
From Latin America, we call on Ukraine and Russia to make peace. Only in peace can we save life in this land of ours. There is no total peace without social, economic, and environmental justice. We are also at war with the planet. Without peace with the planet, there will be no peace among nations. Without social justice, there is no social peace.
*
Featured image: Gustavo Petro addressed the UN General Assembly on September 20, 2022. Photo: UN
When you have been involved in politics as long as I, you become almost immune from the stench of hypocrisy which attaches itself to political debate and mainstream media coverage of those debates.
With mixed emotions, I read the two-page spread and leading opinion piece in yesterday’s Scottish Daily Record newspaper concerning the Westminster Scottish Affairs Committee Report which has called for the decriminalisation of illegal drug use and several other progressive measures designed to tackle problem drug use as a health problem, not a criminal problem.
On the one hand, I am pleased that the sane, evidence-based and expert research-informed opinions on tackling illegal drug use are at long last being taken seriously.
Far too many lives have been blighted and/or lost on the back of a stupid and counterproductive “war on drugs” approach which has always been an insane waste of resources and energy.
Too many politicians have shamelessly thumped tables during public meetings and debates and demanded tougher police action and longer sentences for illegal drug users and suppliers while snorting white powder regularly in private and consuming copious amounts of the most dangerous drug in society, namely alcohol.
Politicians and their newspaper editor friends have long been known for their private cocaine habits and love affair with expensive brandies and other spirits while they lambasted working-class users of cannabis and heroin as low lives who require the full force of the law mobilised against them. Working-class adherents to hash are no-good layabouts while the middle-class offspring are merely curious rebels harmlessly dabbling with mummy and daddy’s generous allowances paying for quality pot.
The nonsense and hypocrisy at the heart of the “war on drugs” policy and philosophy pursued by the likes of the UK and US Governments was and is unsustainable. After serving my six months sentence in Edinburgh’s Saughton prison in early 1992 for trying to stop a poll tax warrant sale, I became even more acutely convinced about the futility of existing drugs laws than I already was before being incarcerated.
Most of the prisoners were decent working-class guys from similar housing scheme backgrounds to my own. Those convicted of crimes of dishonesty were often trying to provide for a family through shoplifting or bank robberies. Those convicted of violent crimes almost without fail had one thing in common – alcohol.
I remember one day sitting with a group of six or seven prisoners in one guy’s cell and they were discussing their charge sheets in preparation of appearance at court on other charges. These were decent individuals who I had shared laughs with and played football in the exercise yard with.
Yet when I read the charge sheets I was taken aback. They all had convictions for violent assaults and one involved the use of a stolen car to run over a victim several times.
“What on earth were you thinking of?” I said to the perpetrator of that heinous crime. “I don’t know Tommy, I can hardly remember anything I was absolutely steaming (very drunk), mate”, was the response.
All of the other guys then relayed their tales of being so drunk on alcohol that they could hardly recall what they did or why.
Throughout my upbringing in the working-class housing scheme of Pollok in the Southside of Glasgow, I became acutely aware of the violence, inducing qualities of alcohol. Whether in house parties or on street corners alcohol was always at the root of fights, stabbings, slashings and sometimes murders.
Alcohol also played a part in turning some of the adult parents I knew from likeable individuals into monsters who mistreated their wives and children. I wanted to be a professional footballer as a kid so my dad always advised me to stay away from alcohol and try and stay fit.
Rehab residents (back L) sleep in their quarters damaged by drug addicts who escaped from a compulsory rehabilitation centre the night before, in the southern Vietnamese province of Dong Nai on October 24, 2016
I never made it into the professional ranks but that sound advice has informed my life and approach to alcohol. It is not a harmless substance but an addictive and personality changing drug which often spawns violence in particular circumstances.
Yet not only was alcohol legal it was actually promoted widely and effectively through expensive advertising campaigns which made it appear cool and normal to consume. Cannabis, on the other hand, was demonised and frowned upon by the great and the good in society.
Yet in Saughton Prison cannabis was easily accessible with the right contacts and currency. It was consumed by a large section of prisoners. The truth is most prison officers turned a blind eye as the guys having a toke at night in their cells were likely to be relaxed and chilled out. No bother for the night shift.
That experience of mine in Saughton Prison for my part in organising the prevention of a poll tax warrant sale almost thirty years ago can be generalised and extrapolated to illustrate the futility of drugs laws. If cannabis can be supplied in the strict closed conditions of a prison how the hell can you hope to prevent it being available in open society?
A war on drugs really means a war on ordinary people and communities. Nowadays with the introduction of mandatory blood tests for the prison population, it is heroin and Valium which is more prevalent as cannabis stays in the bloodstream for days compared the quick exit of the other drugs. It was a stupid measure in my opinion.
Many occasional cannabis users have entered Scottish prisons without serious addictions but exited with dangerous heroin habits. Use of drugs is rife in prisons to help counter the boredom and pain of isolation from families and loved ones.
My position in relation to the futility and counterproductive nature of drug laws has been consistent throughout my adult life. Not so the tabloids like the Daily Record and many politicians.
Here’s what I had to say in the Scottish Parliament about illegal drugs eighteen years ago on March 22nd 2001 during a debate on a Committee Report that confirmed more and more Scots were addicted to and dying from the use of illegal drugs, mostly heroin.
“We have major problems in our society with problem drug misuse, but they are not all related to heroin. Last year in Scotland, there were 13,000 premature tobacco-related deaths, 1,000 premature alcohol-related deaths and, tragically, 163 premature heroin-related deaths, according to the Registrar General for Scotland… in 1994 there were 52 deaths from heroin and in 1999 there were 163 deaths from heroin.
That is a 200 per cent increase in premature deaths… We must shift towards a change in our drugs laws. We must break the link between heroin supply and cannabis supply. Let us stop criminalising one in four of the Scottish population for using a drug that is no more harmful than tobacco or alcohol. Let us promote no drugs; let us promote alternative lifestyles.
Finally, we should investigate what happens in Switzerland and the Netherlands, where addicts are now supplied with pharmaceutical heroin, in recognition of the fact that methadone is more addictive, more toxic and can be more damaging than pharmaceutical heroin. We must investigate other maintenance programmes”.
Here’s what the tabloid Daily Record had to say about my contribution eighteen years ago when it had a considerably bigger circulation than it has now. Under the front-page headline “Working Class Zero” they wrote on March 23rd 2001:
“Sheridan cut a lonely, isolated figure on the parliament’s crossbenches. He even launched a vain bid to have the parliament endorse legalising pot. But the move was thrown out”.
The Daily Record editorial that day was markedly different from their editorial line yesterday. Under the strident headline ‘RECORD VIEW You’re such a bam-pot, Sheridan’ they said:
“In a bizarre display, which provoked the fury and disgust of his fellow-members, Tommy Sheridan destroyed what little credibility he had left. The difference is that Sheridan spouts about the link between drugs and deprivation, while others are prepared to tackle the hard issues head-on. Scotland is marching with the Record against drugs. Only the shameless Sheridan is out of step”.
The reason I was daubed “shameless” was because I refused to sign up to that newspaper’s hypocritical “Scotland Against Drugs” campaign and march in April that year as it was nauseatingly hypocritical. It was giving out free lager tokens to those who purchased the paper while pressurising everyone else to endorse their campaign.
It wasn’t me who was “shameless”, it was them. They were trying to boost dwindling sales by pretending to care about Scotland’s drug abuse problem while giving away free alcoholic lager tokens at the same time. It was an absolutely pathetic strategy that many more MSPs should have had the courage to expose and resist.
Earlier that month that newspaper was angry that I organised an event to promote legalisation of cannabis to coincide with their hypocritical march against drugs.
In another front-page tirade on 7th March 2001 under the headline “THE WIT AND WISDOM OF DOPEY TOMMY” they wrote:
“Socialist Party leader Tommy Sheridan lamely tried to defend his attempt to hold a pro-pot march as ‘a protest against drug abuse in a different way’… And the dopey MSP even claimed that his protest is just another approach in the fight against the evils of the drugs trade destroying a generation”.
Therein sits the hypocrisy of tabloids like the Daily Record and many politicians. They have changed their tunes now on the need to change the drugs laws to tackle the problems of illegal drug use but without an apology to the many people who have been arguing for such an approach for years and facing ridicule and scurrilous headlines as a result.
When I was arguing for the drug laws to be changed as part of a multi-faceted strategy of increased rehabilitation and treatment services and the change from a criminal to a public health approach the number of heroin-related deaths was 163. That was eighteen years ago. The number of drug-related deaths in Scotland last year soared to 1,187, according to official statistics.
The figure is 27% higher than the previous year, and the highest since records began in 1996.
And the country’s drug death rate is now nearly three times that of the UK as a whole and is higher than that reported for any other EU country.
Tackling the scourge of problem drug use requires more than one response. Recognition that it is a health problem and not a criminal one is essential but must be tied to increased resources for drug addiction treatment and support as well as wider measures to eradicate poverty and the hopelessness it brings in its wake.
Head of Advocacy and Policy with the leading children’s rights organisation said that the problem of children being trafficked and then forced into working in the illegal drugs trade is not new to the UK.
All drugs currently illegal should be legalised, regulated, licenced and taxed. Advertising should be prohibited but the state not criminal and violent gangs should be responsible for the sale of drugs. The millions in tax revenues generated should be dedicated to the treatment of drug addiction.
The current provision of such services is woefully inadequate. Even the leading candidate in the Democratic Presidential nomination race, Bernie Sanders, endorses this approach with his clear and forthright commitment to legalise marijuana in America.
Alcohol is legal but not everyone who drinks is an alcoholic. Tobacco is legal but less and less people are smoking. Cannabis, heroin, cocaine being legally available under strict licenced conditions will not lead to more addicts but it will lead to safer use. Education and investment in healthier living and lifestyles are central to qualitative life improvements but the drugs laws are part of the problem not part of the solution. They have to be changed fundamentally as soon as possible.
The views and opinions expressed in the article do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.
‘If we don’t control it, we will lose people,’ says Elizabeth May
Elizabeth May says she wants to pressure other federal party leaders to commit to harm reduction strategies like a safe drug supply. (Ben Nelms/CBC)
Green Party Leader Elizabeth May says it’s time the federal government declared the opioid crisis a national emergency and decriminalized illicit drugs to prevent deaths.
“This is not a criminal issue. This is a health issue, and we have to adequately support people in our society who are dealing with illness and ill health,” May told Stephen Quinn, the host of CBC’s The Early Edition.
The CBC has asked all federal parties to comment on the issue of a safe drug supply. Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer has declined to comment. The NDP and Liberal parties have not yet provided a response.
During the CBC interview Tuesday morning, May, who is also MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands on Vancouver Island, did not explicitly support the idea that the government should provide a safe supply of opioids, which are increasingly contaminated with fentanyl.
“If we don’t control it, we will lose people,” May told Quinn. “You can die from a very small amount of fentanyl, so our position as the Greens is we have to decriminalize.”
Late Tuesday, May’s spokesperson clarified in an email to CBC that she does in fact support a safe supply, as well as decriminalization of illicit drugs across Canada.
May acknowledges Canadians and politicians have been resistant to the idea of government providing illicit drugs to those struggling with addiction. She believes part of the reason is due to the framing of the issue.
“I think we mischaracterize it when we refer to the deaths as overdoses. These are poisonings.”
She adds that the cost of investing further in harm reduction is also a factor in the lack of political will.
The Green Party leader says her party’s election platform will identify new revenue sources to fund mental health and addiction treatment.
(Natural News) Many parts of the United States are still stuck in the stone ages when it comes to their antiquated stance on cannabis (marijuana), and the World Health Organization (WHO) has a message for them all: stop prohibiting it already!
Not only is the WHO recommending that legislators take a “more rational” approach to laws dealing with cannabis, but the international agency is also stressing the fact that, contrary to the Drug Enforcement Agency’s (DEA) official position on the matter, cannabis is medicinal.
The WHO’s Expert Committee on Drug Dependence (ECDD) recently made an official proposal that cannabis be rescheduled – constitutionally speaking, it should be de-scheduled entirely – in light of new scientific findings demonstrating an extensive array of medical benefits.
Last fall, the committee held its first formal discussion on cannabis laws since the advent of the International Drug Control Conventions in 1961. This one discussion brought to bear the obvious: that it’s basically a crime against humanity to keep cannabis illegal.
“The Committee recognized the public health harms presented by these substances, as well as their potential for therapeutic and scientific use,” reads an official press release from the committee following the meeting.
“As a result, the Committee recommended a more rational system of international control surrounding cannabis and cannabis-related substances that would prevent drug-related harms whilst ensuring that cannabis-derived pharmaceutical preparations are available for medical use.”
It’s time for all countries, states, and municipalities to finally “free the weed”
Among the emerging research in favor of ending cannabis prohibition is a 2015 study which found that cannabis is at least 114 times safer than alcohol, as well as a study published last year which found that nobody has ever died from using cannabis.
Meanwhile, tens of thousands of people die annually from drinking toxic alcohol, which damages the liver and other vital organs from normal use.
We also now know that in states were cannabis is legal, opioid use is way down – as opposed to prohibition states where abuse of opioids and other damaging drugs is on the rise.
Studies also show that cannabis is highly beneficial for the brain and nervous system, helping to slow brain aging and even reverse it.
Cannabis really is God’s medicine – and the Bible supports this claim
This and so much more proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that cannabis really is nature’s medicine – the literal fruit of one of God’s seed-bearing plants, which he declared to be goodin Genesis 1:29.
“These recommendations are of monumental importance as they may lead to the overcoming of barriers to research, enhance access of patients to cannabis-based medicine, and allow free commerce of cannabis products internationally,” stated Ethan Russo from the International Cannabis and Cannabinoids Institute in response to the WHO’s new official position on cannabis.
Michael Krawitz, a global policy adviser at the non-profit cannabis advocacy group FAAAT, agrees, having told Newsweek that the WHO’s placement of cannabis in the 1961 Convention was a “terrible injustice.”
“The WHO has gone a long way towards setting the record straight,” he’s quoted as saying in response to the news.
“It is time for us all to support the World Health Organization’s recommendations and ensure politics don’t trump science. Advocates thank the WHO Experts for their work, and WHO leadership for consistently defending the medical needs of our world.”
To learn more about the many health benefits of medical cannabis, including its potential role in the natural treatment of cancer, be sure to check out MarijuanaToday.news.
You can also keep up with the latest cannabis news from an unbiased perspective at MedicalMarijuanaUpdate.com.
(TMU) — In a vast stride forward for the nationwide movement to legalize psilocybin—or “magic” mushrooms—the Oakland City Council has voted unanimously to decriminalize natural psychedelics—including mushrooms—making the major California Bay Area city the second city in the United States to do so.The resolution orders law enforcement to immediately halt the investigation and prosecution of those who use the drugs and applies to psychedelics that derive from plants and fungi, including psilocybin mushrooms and the psychedelic plants ayahuasca, cacti and iboga. The law will not apply to synthetic drugs like LSD, MDMA (ecstasy), or other manmade chemicals.The move comes one month after voters in Denver approved the decriminalization of psilocybin mushrooms, halting the use of city resources to pursue criminal penalties for people over 21 who use or possess magic mushrooms.
Following the vote in Oakland, 100 supporters rose from their chairs, clapping and cheering for the move, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Nicolle Greenheart, co-founder of Decriminalize Nature Oakland, said:
“I don’t have words, I could cry … I’m thrilled. I’m glad that our communities will now have access to the healing medicines and we can start working on healing our communities.”
Save the date and spread the word!!! June 4th, 2019! We will start gathering at 7pm to prepare for the final City Council vote to #DecriminalizeNature#Oakland! There is room for more than 2-300 people with overflow, let’s pack the house! pic.twitter.com/0Db4xARHFt
— Decriminalize Nature (@DecrimNature) May 31, 2019
In addition to demanding that police halt the policing of the drugs, the resolution also instructs state and federal lobbyists from Oakland to push a decriminalization agenda. The resolution further calls for the Alameda County district attorney’s officials to “cease prosecution of persons involved in the use of Entheogenic Plants or plant-based compounds” that are presently listed in Schedule I of the federal Controlled Substances Act.
The resolution was championed by Councilman Noel Gallo, who introduced it after meeting with Decriminalize Nature, supporters of the use of natural psychedelics for mental health and people’s wellbeing.
Gallo told the Chronicle that the move is a strong step toward legitimizing the medicinal use of the plants, explaining:
“My grandmother took care of us. She didn’t go to Walgreens to heal us spiritually and physically, she did it out of plants we use as Native Americans.”
The Oakland City Council listened to the testimonies of 30 people who emphatically laid out how psilocybin helped them deal with mental health disorders including depression, anxiety, addiction, and trauma, according toUSA Today.
During public comment, one woman said:
“I wasn’t really living a life, I was so disconnected … it was hard for me to survive everyday. It has helped me reach deep inside my soul and helped cure damage that had been done to me.”
Another man who explained that he struggled with heroin addiction said:
“It was the most beautiful and life-changing thing that ever happened to me.”
The council president, Rebecca Kaplan, thanked supporters of the resolution for sharing their “deep and personal and profound” stories.
An amendment to the resolution clarifies that it does not authorize the commercial sale or manufacture of the plants, possession or distribution in schools, or driving while under the influence of the psychedelic drugs.
The amendment also explains that potential users of psychedelics who are in the throes of depression or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) should first consult with a doctor before taking a dose, adding that natural psychedelics should be used in small doses for inexperienced users and “don’t go solo.”
The move comes as a growing body of research has laid out the benefits of magic mushrooms. Recent studies have shown how a microdose of psilocybin—far from the level needed for a full-blown trip—actually increases the creativity and empathy of participants. Advocates note that psilocybin has shown great promise in psychotherapeutic settings, shattering the decades-old stereotype of magic mushrooms as some intoxicating and hallucination-inducing party drug that drives its users insane.
Speaking before last week’s public safety committee, Councilman Gallo explained:
“We want to be able to provide another medical service… to be able to help us at home and that is what this is all about … And it’s nothing new. It’s been happening for thousands of years in different countries, in different spiritual backgrounds.”
The passage of the resolution comes amid a wave of activism supporting policy changes that would decriminalize natural psychedelics, with similar efforts advancing in the state of Iowa along with efforts to place a psilocybin legalization measure on the ballot in Oregon.
In a bold move, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador—commonly referred to by his initials AMLO—has issued a proposal that would see nearly all drugs decriminalized in the country and calls for negotiating with the United States to take similar steps.The move would be a drastic turnaround for a country that has been plunged into violence, corruption, and organized crime thanks to the war on drugs and raging battles between cartels vying for control of the illicit drug trade. Mexican experts believe that the decriminalization of narcotics—such as marijuana, cocaine, and opium poppies—would lead to a drastic reduction in the violence that has racked the North American country over the past years.
Funds typically used in the never-ending battle with cartels would instead be transferred toward the treatment and rehabilitation of addicts, addressing the root causes of addiction. In the meantime, Mexican diplomacy would be geared toward ensuring the success of the new strategy with international partners—and especially the U.S., which is the key consumer of drugs produced in, or trafficked through, Mexican territory.
Santiago Roel Garcia, the founder of Mexican public safety group Semáforo Delictivo, believes that the legalization of some narcotics could see murders plunge by up to 80 percent, given the significant blow to the power of organized crime that an end to prohibition would entail.
The plan would make good on AMLO’s pledges to drastically change the manner in which Mexico has been governed for decades. In the policy proposal, included in AMLO’s National Development Plan for 2019-2024, the government argues that the current “prohibitionist strategy is unsustainable,” adding that “the ‘war on drugs’ has escalated the public health problem posed by currently banned substances to a public safety crisis.”
A woman is consoled while wiping away tears during a memorial service to remember those who have died in the province as a result of the drug overdose crisis, on International Overdose Awareness Day in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, B.C., on Thursday August 31, 2017. (Darryl Dyck/THE CANADIAN PRESS)
The new president of the Canadian Medical Association is calling on politicians to have an “open and courageous” debate about decriminalizing opioids in the face of a nationwide overdose crisis.
“I think the time for having those conversations is now,” Dr. Gigi Osler told the CBC’s Chris Hall in an interview airing Saturday on CBC Radio’s The House.
“With the opioid crisis at the stage it is now, it’s probably worth it to have that open and courageous conversation, to look at whether decriminalization would be part of the solution or would it contribute to the problem.”
Osler said she uses the word “courageous” to describe such a debate because Canadian society’s prevailing attitudes toward substance abuse — particularly of opioids — make such a conversation politically perilous.
“There’s still a lot of stigma associated with people who have an opioid use disorder,” she said. “To decriminalize opioids almost means for some people they need to accept it.”
Dr. Gigi Osler is the new president of the Canadian Medical Association, and is calling on Canada’s politicians to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of decriminalizing opioids. (Dr. Gigi Osler)
At least 1,036 Canadians died in the first three months of this year of what appeared to be opioid overdoses, raising the opioid epidemic’s national death toll to more than 8,000 people since January 2016, according to newly released government figures.
“The opioid crisis certainly is a huge public health crisis right now,” Osler said, echoing Montreal and Toronto’s health departments, which are urging the federal government to treat drug use as a public health issue rather than a criminal one.
Trudeau: decriminalizing opioids ‘not part of the plan’
In the House of Commons on Wednesday, discussing the Liberals’ approach to the opioid crisis, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his government “will not treat this as a criminal issue” — a statement his health minister, Ginette Petitpas Taylor, has echoed.
But for now, the door to decriminalization remains firmly shut. At a town hall in February, Trudeau said lifting criminal penalties for illegal opioid use is “not a step that Canada is looking at taking at this point.”
In July, a spokesperson for Petitpas Taylor said the government is working instead to reduce barriers to treatment by approving more than 25 supervised consumption sites and making it easier for health professionals to provide access to opioid substitution therapies.
Osler said those strategies are “all very much needed.”
“The one strategy that continues to be needed is optimal prescribing practices,” she added. “We continue to work with our physicians so we’re part of the solution in terms of appropriate opioid prescribing, recognizing when alternate therapies are available.”
It’s also getting worse, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada’s latest trend report. In 2016, slightly more than 3,000 Canadians died of apparent opioid overdoses. That number grew to close to 4,000 deaths last year.
Scientists say evidence is growing that cannabis-based medicines such as CBD oil can ease epilepsy and other conditions. The British government announced Thursday that doctors can soon legally prescribe them. (David Zalubowski/Associated Press)
Britain will soon allow doctors to prescribe medicinal cannabis, following a relaxation of the law governing drugs derived from the banned plant.
Interior Minister Sajid Javid said on Thursday that specialist physicians would be able to prescribe cannabis-derived medicinal products beginning in the fall. Recreational use will remain prohibited.
The decision follows the high-profile case of a 12-year-old boy with severe epilepsy who was denied access to cannabis oil, which prompted a national debate and reviews by experts.
“Recent cases involving sick children made it clear to me that our position on cannabis-related medicinal products was not satisfactory,” Javid said.
“Following advice from two sets of independent advisers, I have taken the decision to reschedule cannabis-derived medicinal products meaning they will be available on prescription.”
Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has promised sweeping change in a country fed up with drug-related crime and corruption (AFP Photo/ALFREDO ESTRELLA)
Mexico City (AFP) – Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has given his future interior minister “carte blanche” to explore the possibility of legalizing drugs in a bid to curb violent crime, she said Tuesday.
Olga Sanchez Cordero, a former Supreme Court judge tapped to lead the interior ministry, drew applause when she made the comment at a university seminar on addressing brutal violence fueled by Mexico’s drug cartels, the biggest suppliers to US consumers of cocaine, heroin and other narcotics.
It was one of her first public events since Lopez Obrador, a leftist widely known as “AMLO,” won a landslide victory in Mexico’s July 1 election with a promise of sweeping change in a country fed up with crime and corruption.
A little-noticed public statement issued by the United Nations last week contains a dramatic shift in thinking on the issue of “illicit” substance use. After recommitting to the failed idea of prohibition just last year, the UN is now calling for the worldwide decriminalization of drug use and possession.The statement, put out by the World Health Organization (WHO) as the U.S. is in the midst of a nonsensical debate over health care, calls for “ending discrimination in health care settings.” The WHO calls on states to end discrimination against “marginalized and stigmatized populations” in a variety of ways, and includes a blunt and rather shocking statement on the drug war.
“We, the signatory United Nations entities, call upon all stakeholders to join us in committing to taking targeted, coordinated, time-bound, multisectoral actions in the following areas. Supporting States to put in place guarantees against discrimination in law, policies, and regulations by… Reviewing and repealing punitive laws that have been proven to have negative health outcomes and that counter established public health evidence. These include laws that criminalize or otherwise prohibit…drug use or possession of drugs for personal use.”
This is an admission that the problem of drug abuse is a public health issue, not a criminal justice issue. Locking people in cages for the victimless behavior of ingesting substances arbitrarily deemed illegal by the State does nothing to reduce drug use or supply, as evidenced by the utter failure of the War on Drugs.
Prohibition has also denied people the miraculous healing powers of cannabis. For decades medical research of cannabis was stifled by a drug war borne of racism and political suppression. But research has increased exponentially in recent years as governments around the world take steps to decriminalize this medicinal plant, notably among states in the U.S.
With this awakening have come amazing stories of healing through cannabis, such as stopping seizures in children with debilitating epilepsy, treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in veterans where all other treatments have failed, and healing a host of other illnesses without the dangerous side-effects of pharmaceutical drugs.
In terms of health care, prohibition is truly discriminatory, and the drug war only degrades public health.
Portugal decriminalized all drugs in 2001 and it has been a resounding success. Drug usage rates, addiction rates, overdose deaths and sexually transmitted diseases have all declined.
The WHO statement is also notable because it contradicts the UN’s reaffirmed support of prohibition during their 2016 “special session on drugs.” The special session was the first to be held in almost two decades, and many were expecting a softened approach from the failed war on drugs.
Despite the pleas of countries like Mexico—suffering from horrendous black market drug violence—to “move beyond prohibition,” a prohibition framework remained in place. In the UN’s 1998 ‘special session on drugs’ the world body agreed to work toward a “drug free world” by 1998. The sheer lunacy of this position is blatantly obvious now more than ever. Despite decades of prohibition and trillions of dollars spent, drugs remain easily accessible.
The WHO statement comes at a time when the U.S. drug war is in a pivotal moment. More and more U.S. states are decriminalizing cannabis at both the medicinal and recreational level, putting themselves at odds with the ongoing federal prohibition of cannabis as a Schedule 1 narcotic. U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a well-known rabid prohibitionist, is taking steps to ramp up the drug war, calling for increased police measures and prison sentences—even though this approach is proven as a failure.
There is little hope that Sessions and other drug warriors around the world—such as Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte who is now having his police forces murder drug users on the spot (with the explicit blessing of Trump)—will pay any attention to the WHO call for decriminalization.
Nevertheless, the WHO statement is an encouraging sign that the tide has turned against prohibition. As the drug war is dismantled piece by piece—in Portugal, U.S. states, Mexico (which recently legalized medical cannabis) and Canada (soon to legalize recreational cannabis)—the wisdom of ending prohibition will become ever more obvious.
Toronto Public Health is recommending the city ask the federal government to decriminalize the possession of all drugs for personal use amid a growing number of overdose deaths. (Darryl Dyck/Canadian Press)
City council should push the federal government to decriminalize the possession of all drugs for personal use while scaling up harm reduction efforts, Toronto Public Health is recommending.
The recommendation comes following a public consultation process that found many Torontonians don’t believe the current approach to dealing with drugs is working — especially with opioid-overdose deaths reaching record levels across Canada.
Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health, said in a news release that the criminalization of those who use drugs is adding to the problem.
The situation remains urgent and too many people are still dying.– Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health
“It forces people into unsafe drug use practices and creates barriers to seeking help,” she said in a news release.
In 2017, Ontario’s chief coroner found there were 303 opioid overdose deaths in Toronto. That marks a 121 per cent increase from 2015.
The city has responded by opening several supervised-injection sites, however many who work with drug users warn it’s not enough. De Villa’s report seems to agree.
“While considerable work has been done, the situation remains urgent and too many people are still dying. This is why I am calling on the federal government to take urgent action,” she said in a statement.
New approach needed
Toronto Public Health, in its new report, also recommends the city’s board of health urge Ottawa to create a task force to explore options for the legal regulation of all drugs.
Speaking on CBC’s Here and Now Monday afternoon, de Villa said the scientific evidence and experience of other jurisdictions suggests criminalizing drug use is not the answer.
“What we need to do is take a more public health focused approach, treating drug use as a social issue rather than a criminal issue, which our current regime does,” de Villa said.
A new report, which is expected to be tabled at the city’s board of health meeting next week, includes a survey that suggests Torontonians do not believe the current approach to drugs is working. (Rafferty Baker/CBC)
“Those potential harms are always exacerbated or made worse when people are forced to consume, or produce, or obtain those drugs in the realm of the illegal,” she said.
“What we need to do is take a more public health focused approach, treating drug use as a social issue rather than a criminal issue which our current regime does.”
The city’s board of health is set to vote on the matter next Monday.
Health officials urged the City of Vancouver to provide safe opioids to drug users as another tactic to combat the ongoing health crisis. (Graeme Roy/Canadian Press)
Health officials have urged Vancouver city council to push forward with new strategies to curb the high opioid death rate, including providing a safe supply of drugs to addicts.
Dr. Patricia Daly with Vancouver Coastal Health and Dr. Mark Tyndall with the B.C. Centre for Disease Control made the suggestion during a presentation to council at city hall Wednesday morning.
“We’ve become so used to this horrible situation,” Tyndall said. “We have to do something different.”
About 300 people died from drug overdoses in Vancouver last year, with numbers yet to come for the last two months of the year.
Daly said she expects the numbers across the province to top 1,400 once the final tally comes from the B.C. Coroners Service.
Deaths preventable, says doctor
“The deaths are still far too high. These are people who are at the prime of their life — almost all the deaths are between 19 and 59 years of age,” Daly said.
“We can’t forget behind these numbers are individuals and families who are affected. Everyone of these deaths is preventable.”
Tyndall and Daly were joined by the city’s fire chief and the city’s managing director of social policy.
Daly said the number of overdose deaths in Vancouver has improved since last April — including numbers from police and hospital emergency departments that suggest that the number of opioid-related deaths didn’t increase over the Christmas holiday period.
The previous year, that number rose over the holidays.
The improvement shows that some of the city’s current strategies, which include supervised injection sites, Naloxone distribution and addiction treatment, have been helpful.
‘We have to do something different’
But Tyndall advised the city to keep on trying new strategies to fight the opioid crisis, including providing safe drugs who need help beyond the current tactics.
This is what you do when you use science based facts instead of spouting nonsense like Sessions the Idiotic, who will forever be remembered as an idiot, like is boss.
In a bid to assist addicts, rather than lock users in cages, Norway’s parliament voted last week to decriminalize all drugs — citing Portugal and its general success lowering addiction and incarceration rates, getting those who need it into treatment, and drastically reducing crime and other issues related to the illegality of substances for personal use — thus, becoming the first Scandinavian nation to do so.
Four major political parties campaigned in favor of the revolutionary shift in policy, and a majority vote in Storting, Norwegian parliament, brought to fruition their efforts to, as Nicolas Wilkinson, health spokesman for the Socialist Left (SV) party, explained, “stop punishing people who struggle, but instead give them help and treatment.”
“It is important to emphasise that we do not legalise cannabis and other drugs, but we decriminalise,” Storting Health Committee Deputy Chairman Sveinung Stensland told national publication, VG.
“The change will take some time, but that means a changed vision: those who have a substance abuse problem should be treated as ill, and not as criminals with classical sanctions such as fines and imprisonment.”
The Independentreports the parties backing the measure included the Conservatives (Hoyre), Liberals (Venstre), the Labor Party (Ap), and the Socialist Left (SV) — with those voting in favor of full decriminalization directing the Norwegian government to reform its drug policies accordingly.
It wasn’t just the relative success in Portugal that motivated Norwegian politicians to act in addicts’ better interests, but Norway’s own timid experimentations with decriminalization.
Newsweekreports of the historic vote, “It’s a big next step for the Scandinavian country, which has been dancing around the possibility of decriminalization for several years. In 2006, it started to test a program that would sentence drug users to treatment programs, rather than jail, in the cities Bergen and Oslo. In early 2016, the country gave Norwegian courts the option to do this on a national level.”
“The goal is that more addicts will rid themselves of their drug dependency and fewer will return to crime,” Justice Minister Anders Anundsen, quoted byNewsweek, asserted at the time. “But if the terms of the programme are violated, the convicts must serve an ordinary prison term.”
In the broadest strokes, this mimicked what Portuguese officials initiated on July 1, 2001, with its groundbreaking — indeed, all but unheard of at the time — decision to offer compassion and effective patient care for addicts wanting treatment, while saying no to the U.S.-led and utterly failed planetary war on drugs.
Micelaborated on Portugal’s policies in February 2015, “If someone is found in the possession of less than a 10-day supply of anything from marijuana to heroin, he or she is sent to a three-person Commission for the Dissuasion of Drug Addiction, typically made up of a lawyer, a doctor and a social worker. The commission recommends treatment or a minor fine; otherwise, the person is sent off without any penalty. A vast majority of the time, there is no penalty.”
With nonviolent drug offenders cramped into overcrowded prisons, decriminalization frees space for violent criminals and others most traditionally given lengthy prison terms, while clearing overstuffed court dockets and freeing resources needed in other areas of law enforcement.
Portugal had experienced the worst of opioid crises and the highest proportion of drug-related AIDS deaths in the European Union prior to mass decriminalization, notes the Independent — which notes the nation now ranks second lowest in the same for all drug-related deaths.
Further, as journalist Glenn Greenwald, who authored an oft-cited Cato Institute white paper, Drug Decriminalization in Portugal: Lessons for Creating Fair and Successful Drug Policies, published in April 2009, reiterated for Newsweek two years ago, “none of the nightmare scenarios touted by preenactment decriminalization opponents — from rampant increases in drug usage among the young to the transformation of Lisbon into a haven for ‘drug tourists’ — has occurred.”
Nonetheless, decriminalization hasn’t garnered unanimous support among parliament — detractors cite both legitimate and propagandically false information in argument — and concerns linger over the ostensive message sent to criminals, addicts, and users, when punitive measures are considerably loosened.
Portugal, the Netherlands, Uruguay, and a smattering of locations and cultures around the world — and, now, Norway — have opted for the common sense and proven efficacious treatment of addicts as patients in medical need, instead of wholly useless punishment and incarceration.
Although a smattering of articles in the international press reporting on decriminalization in Norway included ‘several U.S. states’ among those having loosened drug laws, it must be noted the legalization and decriminalization measures in various states — and, almost exclusively pertaining to cannabis, only — come weighted with governmental red tape and sticky fingers in the form of questionable taxation codes, restrictions, and more. And the United States remains gripped in the dark vortex of a spiraling opioid crisis — a situation mirroring that of Portugal years ago.
In September, economist and professor, Jeffrey Miron, of Harvard University and the Cato Institute, opined for Fortune the probable benefits should America choose to examine the crisis sans the goggles of decades of anti-drug propaganda, asking, “Could Legalizing All Drugs Solve America’s Opioid Crisis?”
Miron concludes, appropriately, “Around the world, liberal drug policies have had great success in reducing the harms from drug addiction, such as HIV and overdoses. Faced with a raging opioid crisis, the U.S. would be wise to model its own drug policy after countries that have undergone similar experiences.”
Claire Bernish began writing as an independent, investigative journalist in 2015, with works published and republished around the world. Not one to hold back, Claire’s particular areas of interest include U.S. foreign policy, analysis of international affairs, and everything pertaining to transparency and thwarting censorship. To keep up with the latest uncensored news, follow her on Facebook or Twitter: @Subversive_Pen.
(RPI) — Attorney General Jeff Sessions kicked off the New Year by reversing the Obama-era guidance for federal prosecutors to limit their enforcement of federal marijuana laws in states that have legalized marijuana for medical or recreational use. In what is almost certainly not a coincidence, Sessions’ announcement came days after California’s law legalizing recreational marijuana sales went into effect. Sessions’ action thus runs counter to the wishes of the majority of the people in the most populous US state, as well the people of the 28 other states (and DC) that have legalized some form of marijuana use.
Federal laws criminalizing marijuana and other drugs have failed to reduce drug use. However, they have succeeded in giving power-hungry politicians and bureaucrats what was, before 9-11, the go-to justification for violating our civil liberties. The federal war on marijuana has also wasted billions of taxpayer dollars. Far from reducing crime, outlawing drugs causes crime by ensuring criminals will control the market for drugs. Outlawing drugs also provides incentives for drug dealers to increase the potency, and thus the danger, of drugs, as higher potency products take up less space and are thus easier to conceal from law enforcement.
The US Constitution does not give the federal government any authority to criminalize marijuana. Thus, the question of whether marijuana is legal is one of the many issues reserved to the states under the Tenth Amendment. If the Constitution gives Congress the power to ban marijuana, then why was it necessary to amend the Constitution to give Congress the power to ban alcohol?
Sessions’ usurpation of state marijuana laws is the type of federal intrusion into state issues usually opposed by conservatives. Sadly, too many conservatives are just as willing to sacrifice constitutional government and individual liberties for the war on drugs as they are for the war on terror.
Conservative hypocrisy is especially strong when it comes to medical marijuana. Many Americans have used medical marijuana for conditions such as cancer and glaucoma. Yet many conservatives who (properly) decry Obamacare’s mandate forcing every American to purchase health insurance cheer Jeff Sessions’ effort to deprive suffering individuals of the medical treatment of their choice. Cruel paternalism in healthcare policy is often associated with progressives, but unfortunately conservatives are just as guilty.
States that have legalized medical marijuana have fewer deaths related to opioid abuse. These states have also experienced a decrease in crime and black market activity. This is perhaps because some have found medical marijuana a viable alternative to opioids.
Laws outlawing marijuana criminalize peaceful behavior that, while potentially harmful to the individual, does not violate the rights of others. Therefore, these laws, like all laws authorizing government force against peaceful, if immoral, actions, are incompatible with a free society. Once again we see the hypocrisy of conservatives who decry progressives’ war on tobacco and fatty foods, yet support jailing marijuana users.
Federal laws outlawing marijuana violate the Constitution, justify violations of civil liberties, and increase violence. By criminalizing nonviolent behavior voluntarily chosen by individuals, drug laws undermine the moral principles underlying a free society.
President Trump should fire Jeff Sessions and replace him with someone who respects the Constitution and individual liberty. Also, officials from states with legal medical or recreational marijuana should refuse to cooperate with those tasked with enforcing federal marijuana laws. If President Trump and state officials stand up for liberty, the people will join them in saying no to Jeff Sessions.
Thank you Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for legalizing this precious plant that has been criminalized by morons and self-serving pricks (Oil, plastic, stupid coppers, prisons, pesticides industries…)
Around 1910, the Mexican Revolution was starting to boil over, and many Mexicans immigrated to the U.S. to escape the conflict. This Mexican population had its own uses for cannabis, and they referred to it as “marihuana.” Not only did they use it for medicinal purposes, but they smoked it recreationally – a new concept for white Americans. U.S. politicians quickly jumped on the opportunity to label cannabis “marihuana” in order to give it a bad rep by making it sound more authentically Mexican at a time of extreme prejudice.
It worked. Southern states became worried about the dangers this drug would bring, and newspapers began calling Mexican cannabis use a “marijuana menace.”
During the 1920s, many anti-marijuana campaigns were conducted to raise awareness about the many harmful effects the drug caused. These campaigns included radical claims stating that marijuana turned users into killers and drug addicts.
The “war against marijuana” arguably began in 1930, where a new division in the Treasury Department was established — the Federal Bureau of Narcotics — and Harry J. Anslinger was named director. This, if anything, marked the beginning of the all-out war against marijuana.
Anslinger realized that opiates and cocaine would not be enough to build his new agency, so he turned towards marijuana and worked relentlessly to make it illegal on a federal level. Some anti-marijuana quotes from Anslinger’s agency read:
“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others.”
“…the primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races.”
This video has nothing to do with the above quote. I just like the song. Think of it as sherbet between courses?
Stupid law enforcement: The FBI is trying to hide the fact that most drug arrests in the pathetic states of Dumbmerica are against marijuana, which is becoming legal because people have seen through the lies. It does not matter what these imbeciles think, be them the local police force or the FBI, or the alcohol and prison industries, as the cat is out of the bag. Live with it doofuses.
“Added together, marijuana arrests made up 41.54% of the 1,572,579 drug busts in the country last year.
“That means, based on an extrapolation, that police arrested people for cannabis 653,249 times in the U.S. in 2016.
“That averages out to about one marijuana arrest every 48 seconds.
“According to the same calculation, there were 643,121 U.S. cannabis arrests in 2015.”
(ANTIMEDIA) — According to the latest FBI data, drug arrests in the United States increased from 2015 to 2016. Though the federal agency used to provide breakdowns on the details of these arrests in its annual “Crime in the United States” report — including which drugs were in question and whether the arrests were made over possession or sale — in its latest report, the FBI is withholding specifics.
On Monday, Tom Angell, a contributor at Forbes, wrote about the increase in drug arrests across the country, noting that while in 2015 there were 1,488,707 drug arrests (“the highest number of arrests” out of all offenses, according to the FBI), in 2016 the agency reported 1,572,579 arrests for drugs, a figure that again accounted for the highest number of arrests.
Angell notes that “That’s an average of one drug arrest every 20 seconds” and that “The total number is up roughly 5.6% from the 1,488,707 arrests for drug crimes in the country in 2015.”
According to the 2015 data, 83.9 percent of drug arrests were for possession, and 38.6 percent of those possession arrests were over cannabis, the highest of any drug.
Aside from the troubling increase in arrests from 2015 to 2016, however, is the fact that this year, the FBI did not include a table breaking down the types of drug arrests as it did in 2015. As Angell reported later on Monday, “due to a change in how the annual law enforcement numbers are publicized, it is now harder to determine how many people were busted for marijuana or other drugs specifically.”
Though the numbers are missing from the FBI’s public 2016 report, Angell was able to obtain data from the agency by contacting them directly.
Stephen G. Fischer Jr., the chief of multimedia productions for the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division, shared that, as Angell summarized:
“Marijuana possession busts comprised 37.36% of all reported drug arrests in the U.S. in 2016, and cannabis sales and manufacturing arrests accounted for another 4.18% of the total.”
These percentages are slightly down compared to 38.6 percent for possession of cannabis in 2015 and 4.6 for sale of that plant that year. Nevertheless, they remain high in a country that has largely rejected the war on weed, if not the war on drugs altogether, and where an increasing number of states are legalizing the plant.
Further, the number of cannabis-related arrests is still higher than 2015 because the total number of drug arrests increased in 2016. Angell explained:
“Added together, marijuana arrests made up 41.54% of the 1,572,579 drug busts in the country last year.
“That means, based on an extrapolation, that police arrested people for cannabis 653,249 times in the U.S. in 2016.
“That averages out to about one marijuana arrest every 48 seconds.
“According to the same calculation, there were 643,121 U.S. cannabis arrests in 2015.”
Still, he notes the caveat that not all 75 of law enforcement reported the specifics of arrests, so “the calculations could be thrown off by agencies that made particularly large or small numbers of arrests for marijuana as compared to other drugs, depending on which police forces are providing the breakdowns.” The available data accounts for about 75% of arrests.
Though the FBI is not entirely hiding the information, as they were willing to disclose it to Angell, they are certainly making it more difficult for the public to access the realities of the government’s ongoing war on drugs, chalking it up to “streamlining” data.
“The UCR Program streamlined the 2016 edition by reducing the number of tables from 81 to 29,” Fischer told Angell.
Regardless of the hard numbers, cops around the country are undeniably facing a growing backlash against their enforcement of increasingly archaic drug laws.
Every 48 seconds, the government ruins someone’s life for possessing cannabis. These five industries are the ones responsible for this policy.
In the land of the free, citizens found in possession of a plant — that grows wild on every continent except Antarctica — can and will be kidnapped, caged or killed. In fact, in just the short time it took you to click this article and read this first paragraph, someone was just arrested for cannabis.
According to the most recent FBI statistics available, an American citizen is kidnapped and caged for cannabis — on average — every 48 seconds.
An estimated 653,249 American citizens — who harmed no one — had their lives ruined in 2016 for possessing this plant, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s annual Crime In the United States (CIUS) report.
“Arresting and citing over half a million people a year for a substance that is objectively safer than alcohol is a travesty,” said Morgan Fox, director of communications for the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP). “Despite a steady shift in public opinion away from marijuana prohibition, and the growing number of states that are regulating marijuana like alcohol, marijuana consumers continue to be treated like criminals throughout the country. This is a shameful waste of resources and can create lifelong consequences for the people arrested.”
Arresting people for cannabis is good for business — police state and big pharma business, that is. If we look at who’s lobbying to keep cops kidnapping people for a plant, we see that it is money, and not morals, that motivates this issue.
The prison-industrial complex makes obscene amounts of money kidnapping otherwise innocent people and throwing them in a cage for possessing a plant. Big pharma is also scared to death of pot because it is a cheaper, safer, and often more effective solution to sicknesses than their chemical alternatives.
According to a report out of US News, lobbyists work hard to secure for police departments millions of dollars in federal grants towards eradicating weed. Pharmaceutical companies compensate leading anti-marijuana researchers in order to keep their customers on painkillers over cannabis, which is cheaper. The prison-industrial complex would like to keep making money on building more prisons to fill with non-violent grass-smokers.
It’s not just cops and big pharma either, legal drug distributors in the alcohol and tobacco industries need to keep cannabis illegal in order maintain their monopoly on ‘taking the edge off.’
According to the report, the alcohol and beer industries have also lobbied for years to keep marijuana illegal because they fear the competition that legalized weed would bring. Howard Wooldridge, an anti-drug war activist and retired cop told the online publication Republic Report: “Marijuana and alcohol compete right today as a product to take the edge off the day at six o’clock.”
Despite the myriad of evidence showing the harmful economic and societal impacts of arresting people for cannabis, cops, prisons, big pharma, and the alcohol and tobacco industries continue to push for illegal weed. As they lie about arresting people for a plant in your best interests, the police state is wreaking havoc on liberty, freedom, and the economy. It is deadly too.
While there’s never been a documented overdose from cannabis, if the CDC calculated the number of deaths inflicted by police while enforcing marijuana laws, that number would certainly be shocking and could even be deemed a risk to public health. Marijuana is, indeed, dangerous, but only because of what can happen to you if the police catch you with it — just ask the 653,249 people who had their lives ruined for it last year.
In the study, titled, “Going to pot? The impact of dispensary closures on crime,” researchers Tom Y. Chang from the USC Marshall School of Business, and Mireille Jacobson from The Paul Merage School of Business at UC Irvine, looked at what happens with the government forced medical marijuana dispensaries to close. What they found was immediately following a closure of a dispensary — crime rates went up.
“Contrary to popular wisdom, we found an immediate increase in crime around dispensaries ordered to close relative to those allowed to remain open,” Jacobson told Science Daily.
Also, in 2001, the Portuguese government decriminalized all drugs, and their crime rate dropped. 16 years later, drug use, crime, and overdoses have drastically declined in Portugal exposing the cruel reality of prohibition.
“Regulating marijuana for adults creates jobs, generates tax revenue, protects consumers, and takes money away from criminals,” Fox said on behalf of MPP. “It is time for the federal government and the rest of the states to stop ruining peoples’ lives and enact sensible marijuana policies.”
We agree.
The good news is that the tide is shifting. As MPP notes, there are currently eight states that regulate marijuana similarly to alcohol for adults, four of which voted to do so in November 2016. Marijuana possession is also legal for adults in the District of Columbia. Twenty-three states and D.C. considered legislation in 2017 to regulate marijuana, including in Vermont where the legislature approved such a measure before the governor vetoed it.
As more and more states refuse to kidnap and cage marijuana users, the drug war will continue to implode. We must be resilient in this fight.
If doing drugs bothers you, don’t do drugs. When you transition from holding an opinion — to using government violence to enforce your personal preference, you become the bad guy. Please, for all that is good, don’t be the bad guy and do your part to stay on the right side of history.
Eight states have legalized marijuana for recreational use, and of those, only Washington does not allow people to grow their own pot plants. But that could be about to change.The state’s marijuana regulatory agency, the State Liquor and Cannabis Board (LCB), has announced that it will consider allowing personal home grows. The impetus for the move comes from the state legislature, which passed a bill this year directing the agency to study options for allowing personal cultivation.
If there’s no home cultivation, it’s hard to call it legalization.
Green Haze marijuana plant
Photo Credit: Creative Commons/Max Pixel
Eight states have legalized marijuana for recreational use, and of those, only Washington does not allow people to grow their own pot plants. But that could be about to change.
The state’s marijuana regulatory agency, the State Liquor and Cannabis Board (LCB), has announced that it will consider allowing personal home grows. The impetus for the move comes from the state legislature, which passed a bill this year directing the agency to study options for allowing personal cultivation.
Currently, the only people who can grow their own marijuana in Washington are registered medical marijuana patients. But allowing home grows under the recreational marijuana law would potentially vastly increase the number of people able to grow their own supply.
While the state is moving toward allowing home cultivation, it is contemplating a more highly regulated approach than other legal states. In its presss release announcing an October 4 public hearing on the issue, the LCB laid out three options for moving forward:
Option 1: Tightly Regulated Recreational Marijuana Home Grows
Would allow up to four plants per household, but would require home growers to obtain a state permit and enter their plants with the state traceability system.
Option 2: Local Control of Recreational Marijuana Home Grows
Would allow up to four plants per household, but would require a local permit. Plants would not have to be entered in the state traceability system. Local authorities could limit home cultivation to fewer than four plants if they wished.
Option 3. Recreational Home Grows are Prohibited
That would be the status quo. Recreational marijuana consumers would be forced to rely on the state-regulated market to obtain their pot. Or the black market.
There is a fourth option, which the LCB didn’t offer up, but which is the case in the other legal pot states: Allowing people to grow their own small number of pot plants without the necessity of obtaining a permit from either the state or local authorities. After all, we’re talking about growing a plant in your house or yard here. When it comes to growing your own, the attitude of many Washington marijuana consumers is likely to be: “Permits? We don’t need no stinking permits!”
Phillip Smith is editor of the AlterNet Drug Reporter and author of the Drug War Chronicle.
Criminalizing human behavior is a medieval strategy that DOES NOT WORK. It merely divides us into labels. Let’s learn from the progressive countries that have dealt with this issue seriously and learn from it. All them people who want to inflict pain on others should suffer the same pain they are wishing for.
Right here lies another perfect and amazing example of how we can actively create the type of world we want to live in by raising awareness about issues in our society today that may require an upgrade. Oregon’s state legislature just cut penalties for drug possession in a bill that also aims to reduce racial profiling by law enforcement agencies.
Does it make sense that you should go to jail for carrying around these substances, some of which people are addicted to and cannot function without? Is the solution to put such people in jail for their illness? Or should we invest more time and funding into education programs and treatment facilities? It is worth noting that many of the people charged with possession are not even dealers or drug addicts; they just happen to use drugs recreationally and were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Do these people really deserve the harsh punishment of jail time and a criminal record? It is one thing to sell and traffic illegal drugs, another entirely to simply have them in your possession. These laws desperately need to be reevaluated and it’s wonderful to see Oregon leading the way in this modern upheaval of an old and failed system.
It wasn’t too long ago that marijuana was decriminalized in many states and across Canada. This has proved to be beneficial for communities, judicial systems, drug trafficking — even addiction. We have seen the benefits from this move in action, so it looks like Oregon is taking note, and acknowledging that taking substances does not make someone a criminal.
Have We Learned From Portugal?
One fine example of what happens when you decriminalize illegal drugs possession can be seen in Portugal, which decriminalized the use of all drugs in 2001. This includes marijuana, heroin, cocaine, meth — you name it. Portugal made the decision to treat use and possession (in small quantities) as a public health issue rather than a criminal issue.
Since passing these laws, Portugal now has one of the lowest instances of drug related deaths in Europe, a statistic that runs directly counter to the rhetoric of our anti-drug laws and the deeply misguided War on Drugs. Making these substances less illegal actually saves more lives in the end, as those suffering from drug abuse are met with a helping hand rather than a jail sentence, and this has been monumental in treating the issues that once plagued Portugal.
Portugal has proved that the decriminalization of drugs doesn’t come with the dire consequences that many predicted. The Transform Drug Policy Institute said in its analysis of Portugal’s drug laws, “The reality is that Portugal’s drug situation has improved significantly in several key areas. Most notably, HIV infections and drug-related deaths have decreased, while dramatic rise in use feared by some has failed to materialize. “
“Our citizens should know the urgent facts…but they don’t because our media serves imperial, not popular interests. They lie, deceive, connive and suppress what everyone needs to know, substituting managed news misinformation and rubbish for hard truths…”—Oliver Stone
Tales from the Conspiratum 