[Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
lfalen
lfalen at turbonet.com
Mon Mar 2 11:10:05 PST 2009
The war on drugs needs a new approach. There are a lot of things that could be tried. Some of these may be to at least partially legalize them( maybe some sort of prescription as a solution). Instead of bombing the opium fields maybe we should buy the crop. I am not sure this is viable, but something to consider. There is undoubtedly many other things that could be considered. Lets explore all avenues.
Roger
-----Original message-----
From: Sunil Ramalingam sunilramalingam at hotmail.com
Date: Sun, 01 Mar 2009 18:04:21 -0800
To: vision 2020 vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
>
> Donovan,
>
> I disagree.
>
> Our drug laws stand as a monument to our official inability to recognize a simple truth about people: That we (not all us us, but enough) like to use substances that affect our consciousness. Some religions ban this, many states do, but people still want to do it.
>
> We are spending a ridiculous amount of money fighting human nature, and it isn't working. Because it's illegal it's more expensive, and there's enough money in it to make people take enormous risks.
>
> It's long been time to take a different approach. Our current one is a failure.
>
> Sunil
>
> Date: Sun, 1 Mar 2009 16:44:15 -0800
> From: donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: sunilramalingam at hotmail.com
>
> Sunil,
>
> I agree with you that we need to help people with their problems and not use drugs as a solution, I think you are wrong on the supply side.
>
> The fact that the drug dealers are having to smuggle the cocaine over the boarder, is very indicative that the American people have rejected this product. We have spent billions on stopping it, and it is illegal in every state and county in the country. That seems like a pretty overwhelming rejection of the drug. Less than one percent of the population uses it.
>
> The demand was created by "pushers" illegally as well, and the illegal and dangerous addictiveness of the product is what also keeps the demand. We didn't create the demand, the demand was created for us.
>
> Best Regards,
>
> Donovan
>
>
> --- On Sun, 3/1/09, Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com>
> wrote:
> From: Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: "vision 2020" <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> Date: Sunday, March 1, 2009, 8:48 AM
>
>
>
>
> Donovan,
>
> I think your premise is wrong. No one is forcing drugs on Americans. WE have created the demand. It is a DEMAND problem, not a supply problem.
>
> Sunil
>
> Date: Sat, 28 Feb 2009 22:06:05 -0800
> From: donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com; sunilramalingam at hotmail.com
>
> Sunil,
>
> I took your question in a broader context.
>
> If the US was forcing cocaine into the a South America and creating violence and death in their streets, yes, they would have the right to destroy the crops in the US, or at least try to.
>
> Best
> Regards,
>
> Donovan
>
> --- On Sat, 2/28/09, Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com> wrote:
> From: Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: "vision 2020" <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> Date: Saturday, February 28, 2009, 3:07 PM
>
>
>
>
> Yes, Donovan, I missed the event when Central and South Americans attacked the biggest things in New York.
>
> 9/11, you say? My, that's one big cover-up if they were involved.
>
> At any rate, my question remains the same. Do our actions give our victims the right to bomb us? If no, why not?
>
> Sunil
>
> Date: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 23:47:50 -0800
> From: donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com; sunilramalingam at hotmail.com
>
> Sunil
>
> They do blow "things" up here. In fact, they took out the two biggest things in the biggest city. Perhaps you missed that
> whole 9/11 thingy.
>
> Best Regards,
>
> Donovan
>
> --- On Fri, 2/27/09, Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com> wrote:
> From: Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: "vision 2020" <vision2020 at moscow.com>
> Date: Friday, February 27, 2009, 6:28 PM
>
>
>
>
> Donovan,
>
> Do the people we bomb have the right to try to blow up things here? If not, why?
>
> Sunil
>
> Date: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 18:07:14 -0800
> From: donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com; nickgier at roadrunner.com
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
>
> What Nick doesn't realize is that it isn't the government's responsibility to keep people off drugs. That is the responsibility of the individual. Only you can decide not to use drugs and take responsibility for your behavior and decisions to use or not use drugs, and what you put in your body.
>
> The government has made it clear to
> anyone who will listen from 5 years old to 105 years old, DON'T USE DRUGS. That is all they can do. They provide information to people for free, and they offer free drug counseling, and help with getting off drug addiction.
>
> I use to drink heavily, and smoke up to three packs of cigarettes a day, and I will not talk about anything else I did because this is a public forum. But it was me, and me alone, that had the power to decide to use and stop using products abusive to my body.
>
> People think it is
> the responsibility of the government to do things for you. It is not. If people want to use drugs, they will. If they want to get off drugs, they will.
>
> I as a taxpayer can only do so much, and refuse to take blame for the personal decisions that people make with full knowledge of their actions and behaviors.
>
> The Government didn't fail with drugs, only people that decided not to get off drugs fail. Only people that refuse to take personal responsibility are the ones that fail.
>
> And who really gives a damn if bombing cocaine fields in South America makes other nations mad. These people are doing wrong, and the US has every right to protect themselves from people trying to do harm to our citizens.
>
> Best Regards,
> Donovan
>
>
>
> --- On Fri, 2/27/09, nickgier at roadrunner.com <nickgier at roadrunner.com> wrote:
> From: nickgier at roadrunner.com
> <nickgier at roadrunner.com>
> Subject: [Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> Date: Friday, February 27, 2009, 8:51 AM
>
> Good Morning Visionaries:
>
> This is my radio commentary/column for this week. I had Ted Moffett and a
> friend who's an expert in this area look this over before I polished off the
> rough draft.
>
> Ted suggested that I add the abuse of pharmaceuticals but the long version was
> already approaching 2,000 words. Besides Ted has already posted some of the
> material here on the vision. Thanks, Ted, for your research which is the best on
> the Vision on all the topics you cover.
>
> I just saw "Nixon/Frost" at the Kenworthy and I had to admit that I
> began to empathize with the most despised of all presidents, but perhaps that
> was because of the superb acting of Frank
> Langella.
>
> The group Law
>
> Enforcement
> Against Prohibition (LEAP)has an excellent video at
> <www.leap.cc/cms/index.php?name=Content&pid=28>.
>
> Nick Gier
>
> DRUG POLICY FAILURES FROM NIXON TO BUSH
>
> By Nick Gier
>
> Every one of the bastards that are out for legalizing marijuana is Jewish.
> What the Christ is the matter with the Jews, Bob?
> --Richard M. Nixon to Robert Haldeman
>
> Nixon is the first post-war president to declare war on drugs. He was
> determined to enforce a policy that placed marijuana in the same category as
> heroin. In the early days of Nixon's war, a person caught with any amount of
> marijuana could be sentenced to seven years in prison.
>
> In 1971 Nixon appointed Pennsylvania Gov. Ray Shafer to chair the National
> Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse, which unexpectedly recommended that pot
> possession be decriminalized. Always coarse and obscene, Nixon lashed out
> at
> members of the
> Commission
> calling them
> "bastards" and
> "Jews."
>
> Since the day Nixon rejected the recommendations of the Shafer Commission,
> fifteen million Americans have been arrested for marijuana charges (88 percent
> for possession only), but pot dealing and smoking continue unabated. Since 1980
> the number of drug offenders incarcerated by states increased from 6 percent to
> 21 percent and those in federal prisons went from 25 to 57 percent. Sadly, 80
> percent of all those in prison for drug offenses are either Latinos or African
> Americans.
>
> Paramilitary SWAT teams in U.S. cities have been overly aggressive against
> suspected drug dealers. The libertarian CATO Institute has reported that these
> units have entered the homes of 170 innocents and killed 43. The CATO website
> also lists 23 nonviolent offenders and 25 police officers killed.
>
> Last year the U.S. spent $69 billion interfering in the lives of
> North
> and
> South
> Americans, supporting
> military activities and crop eradication that have
> alienated millions of people south of the border.
>
> In 2007 one of the first acts of Mexican President Felipe Calderon was to use
> the army to crack down on Mexico's three major drug cartels. Calderon used
> the army because local and regional police and many office holders had already
> been bought off by the cartels. The results of Mexico's military solution
> to drug smuggling have been disastrous. In the past two years an estimated
> 8,790 people have been killed, including 800 soldiers and police officers.
>
> Mexico is the transshipment point for 90 percent of the cocaine coming to the
> U.S. The main source of this drug is Columbia, which has been the focus of U.S.
> efforts of eradication and interdiction. Since 2000 the U.S. has poured $6
> billion dollars into Columbia, but cocaine production has still increased
> 4
> percent
> during that
> time.
>
> Large
> acreages of coca have been destroyed; the big cartels have been broken
> up; left-wing guerrillas are in retreat; and the streets of Bogata are safer.
> But the coca farmers have simply switched to smaller plots closer to the jungle
> and right-wing paramilitary units are still involved in cocaine production and
> smuggling.
>
> Nixon's war on drugs have turned entire nations against us. Evo Morales, a
> former coca grower, is now Bolivia's president. At recent speech at the UN,
> Morales held up a coca leaf and spoke about a World Health Organization (WHO)
> study that concluded that the ingestion of coca was not harmful and that it
> might even have some beneficial effects. When I was in Peru in 2002, my guide
> distributed coca leaves to our group as a remedy for altitude sickness.
>
> In 1989 I chaired the Borah Symposium on the topic "Cocaine and
> Conflict" and our
> keynote speaker was Ethan
>
> Nadelman. Now the head of
> the
> Drug Policy Institute, he is a leading spokesman for drug legalization, which
> means legal regulation, not total free use (except of marijuana) of hard drugs.
>
>
> Proponents of legal regulation contend that removing the illegal trade and
> criminal gangs will have the same positive effect as the ending of Prohibition
> in 1933. A $250-350 billion business would become a source for much needed tax
> revenue that can be used to rebuild communities and rehabilitate those relative
> few who have been addicted to drugs.
>
> A 2007 Zogby Poll asked the following question of 1028 people: "If hard
> drugs such as heroin or cocaine were legalized, would you be likely to use
> them." Only 6 answered in the affirmative.
> There are over 250 shops in the Netherlands where one can buy marijuana
> legally, but only 16 percent of the adult population has even tried
> cannibals,
> while 33 percent of
> Americans
> have. One commentator
> quipped that the Dutch have
> made smoking pot "uncool."
>
> Reading the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) website, one would think that
> liberalizing drug laws in Europe has been a complete failure. In England doctors
> used to prescribe heroin to addicts under controlled conditions and their
> numbers stabilized at 2,000, but since that program was abolished in 1970 the
> number has risen to 300,000. Similar programs in Germany, Spain, Switzerland,
> and the Netherlands have proved effective.
>
> One of the most effective organizations for legal regulation of drugs is Law
> Enforcement against Prohibition (LEAP). Since its founding in 2002, LEAP's
> membership, former police officers, DEA agents, and city officials, has grown to
> 5,000. These men and women have seen first hand how Nixon's war on drugs
> has devastated their communities and made
> criminals out of ordinary citizens.
>
>
> As long as the
> U.S. has the
> highest drug use rate in the industrialized world,
> this demand will drive the criminal drug trade and will continue to destabilize
> all the countries south of the border. We should immediately un-declare the wars
> on drugs and terror. Police surveillance and investigation should replace
> paramilitary over-kill. We should decriminalize the use of marijuana and we
> should try the policy of legal regulation of all other drugs and see if it
> works.
>
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> =======================================================
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> =======================================================
> List services made available by First Step Internet,
> serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
> http://www.fsr.net
> mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
> =======================================================
>
> =======================================================
> List services made available by First Step Internet,
> serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
> http://www.fsr.net
> mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
> =======================================================
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