[Spam] Re: [Vision2020] Drunks, drugs, and the empathy factor

[lfalen]

I love your posts and gererally agree with them. You are more articulate than I am.
-----Original message-----
From: "David M. Budge" dave at davebudge.com
Date: Tue, 22 Feb 2005 15:59:36 -0800
To: Joan Opyr auntiestablishment at hotmail.com
Subject: [Spam] Re: [Vision2020] Drunks, drugs, and the empathy factor

> Joan, Joan, Joan, you insufferable hyperbolist (now don't choke on your 
> snuff. I'm joking here.  I never met a hyperbolist I didn't like - you 
> can think of me as the Will Rogers of all things vitriolic and 
> vituperative.)
> 
> But, having said that, you said:
> 
> " I can see, however, that one very rich user escaped the consequences 
> of his actions because of his last name, his family fortune, and his 
> lucky, lucky connections.  I can see that a powerful white guy can snort 
> until he's forty and rise to the highest office in the land."
> 
> Proof? Have you been spending too much time reading Atrios or The 
> Democratic Underground?  Maybe you're right, maybe you're wrong. Is it 
> possible he was just a casual or infrequent user? At this point, as far 
> as I know, only Bush (well maybe a potential dealer or two) and his 
> maker have the definitive answer.
> 
> Then you continued:
> 
> "And I can see that he does not use this experience and the bully pulpit 
> he inherited to argue that users can be redeemed; he has not used it to 
> insist that drug treatment programs work better than incarceration; and, 
> finally, he has not used his experience and his power to call an end to 
> the wasteful, pointless, destructive War on Drugs"
> 
> So no level of political expediency is tolerated?  Did you give a pass, 
> at least with your vote, to John Kerry when he said he was against gay 
> marriage but that the states should decide it?  Do you deny a 
> politician's need for coalition building? Conversely, did you award any 
> credit to Dick Cheney when he disagreed with the president about gay 
> marriage and said "Freedom belongs to everyone." Does a politician's 
> zeitgeist completely affirm or discredit all other virtues? Do you deny 
> that a president needs to pick his fights as only one or two reforms 
> will ever become law?
> 
> Just askin'.
> 
> Secondly, I meticulously ran through Mark Solomon's list and I can't 
> seem to find the cuts in drug treatment programs you mentioned.  Perhaps 
> I missed it due to my moderate dyslexia (it's true... the reason that I 
> cannot proof my own work, spell, and I read at an agonizingly slow pace.)
> What I noted were the reductions I outlined in Safe Schools (Safe and 
> Drug Free Schools State Grants) and research for Alcohol Abuse 
> Reduction.  Correct me if I'm wrong. I got the budget info I used from 
> the ODCP web site.
> 
> Now I love Penn & Teller (libertarian brother's in arms and all) but, 
> I'll defer to the 15% figure I used from my history with the National 
> Mental Health Association.  It's true that AA does not track diddly.  
> Referring to AA as a faith based program however, is much like referring 
> to Unitarians as Christians (you know, Moses and the 10 suggestions.)  
> True, the construct of a higher power is the overriding tenet, but they 
> provide no definition of what a higher power is.  But hey, it's also 
> estimated that some 30 million people worldwide think the program 
> works.  Who am I to criticize?
> 
> I am however, completely against the whole faith based initiative.  It's 
> not that I am anywhere close to being an ideologue on the separation of 
> church and state, I just understand the well chronicled history of the 
> government "helping."  Sure enough it will soon become not an 
> "initiative", but another government run set of programs.  I'll let 
> charity do charity's work and leave governance up to the morons we put 
> in office.
> 
> Last, I  so enjoy that, on the issue of legalizing drugs, you have much 
> in common with William F. Buckley, Jr., George Will, Milton Friedman and 
> George Schultz (I've always admired his tattoo.) I truly hope that in 
> pointing this out I've not set off your gag reflex into an chronic 
> cadence resembling something like the last stanza of God Bless America.  
> If I did, I'm sorry... very sorry.
> 
> db
> 
> Joan Opyr wrote:
> 
> > Hello, Dave,
> >  
> > You won't get any argument from me re: the legalization of drugs.  
> > Let's legalize them, tax them, and start selling them out of the 
> > liquor store next door to Howard Hughes and the laundromat.  I would 
> > say that we could then dedicate the revenues raised to treatment, but 
> > we see how well that worked with the tobacco settlements.  The money 
> > went largely to balance bloated state budgets. 
> >  
> > I would add one caveat to your lecture, Dave (or possibly two).  We 
> > can trace the so-called War on Drugs back much further than Reagan.  
> > Nixon signed into law several bills that criminalized use, and he, in 
> > turn, was simply following in the footsteps of the late twenties', 
> > early thirties' crackdown on cocaine.  The War on Drugs has worked 
> > about as well as Prohibition.  A lot of users in jail; a lot of 
> > organized crime lords with billion dollar fortunes.  And still, crack, 
> > and coke, and heroin, and Ecstasy, and meth as far as the eye can 
> > see.  There's nothing you can't get right here in little Moscow, 
> > ID.  Hell, there's nothing you can't get in jail.
> >  
> > Now, as to my other caveat -- you declare that what Bush has or has 
> > not learned from his experience is beyond my ability to know.  With 
> > all due respect, Dave, I call bullshit.  Actions speak louder than 
> > words, and if you'll take a look at the Bush budget cuts that Mark 
> > Solomon posted to this list a week or so ago, you'll find that drug 
> > treatment programs are scheduled for a very nasty hit  Now, can I see 
> > inside Bush's heart?  No.  (That skill, it would seem, belongs to Bush 
> > alone.  Remember how he looked into Vladimir Putin's heart and saw 
> > that it was pure, sweet, and on the level?  Works well, doesn't it, 
> > this cardiac, Oval Office, X-Ray business?)  I can see, however, that 
> > one very rich user escaped the consequences of his actions because 
> > of his last name, his family fortune, and his lucky, lucky 
> > connections.  I can see that a powerful white guy can snort until he's 
> > forty and rise to the highest office in the land.  And I can see that 
> > he does not use this experience and the bully pulpit he inherited to 
> > argue that users can be redeemed; he has not used it to insist that 
> > drug treatment programs work better than incarceration; and, 
> > finally, he has not used his experience and his power to call an end 
> > to the wasteful, pointless, destructive War on Drugs.  I don't see any 
> > difference, in fact, between George W. Bush and Bill Clinton on this 
> > issue.  As Mr. Bush is both a reformed user and a born-again 
> > Christian, I think there ought to be a difference.  A big, 
> > compassionate (if not conservative) difference. 
> >  
> > Now, just an FYI that might be of general interest: Alcoholics 
> > Anonymous -- one of the first faith-based treatment programs -- 
> > doesn't have a 15% success rate.  No one knows for certain what their 
> > success rate is because they don't publish statistics.  An internal 
> > memo (acquired by none other than Penn & Teller for their HBO show, 
> > Bullshit) suggests that AA's success rate is about 5%, exactly the 
> > same rate as no treatment at all.  And yet this is the program that is 
> > most often mandated by the courts.  I think that's a problem  A big, 
> > faith-based initiative kind of problem.
> >  
> > Joan Opyr/Auntie Establishment
> >  
> > PS: Whatever is in Mr. Bush's heart, I'm just glad I'm not Laura.  My 
> > pretzel bill would be through the roof. 
> >
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