Drug WarRant

[DdC]

The Conservative Argument for Legalization
Drug WarRant by Pete Guither

Tracer Bullet over at RedState has an exceptionally good post on The many and sizeable benefits of "Drug" Legalization from a conservative viewpoint. This is someone who used to support the drug war, but has come around to viewing a rational common-sense balancing of the benefits versus the costs of the war, and found the costs to be just too high.

If you're a RedState member, this would be a good diary to recommend. I'd like to see more posts like this on both sides.

Government's first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives.
Ronald Reagan



National Review: AN END TO Marijuana Prohibition

"Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could."
- William F. Buckley Jr.

Perjury everywhere? By William Buckley

I am against Prohibition because it has set the cause of temperence back twenty years; because it has substituted an ineffective campaign of force for an effective campaign of education; because it has replaced comparatively uninjurious light wines and beers with the worst kind of hard liquor and bad liquor; because it has increased drinking not only among men but has extended drinking to women and even children.
-- William Randolph Hearst, initially a supporter of Prohibition,
explaining his change of mind in 1929.
From "Drink: A Social History of America" by Andrew Barr (1999), p. 239

Lost political causes By William Buckley
Write to William Buckley at Universal Press Syndicate: 4520 Main St., Kansas City, Mo. 64111.

The war on drugs corrupts our police
For example, in 1995, six Philadelphia police officers pleaded guilty to charges of planting illegal drugs on suspects, the theft of more than $100,000 and the falsification of reports. The investigations into the officers actions have led to the release of hundreds of defendants whose convictions were overturned by the appeal courts. Also in 1995, two other officers from Philadelphia received prison sentences of five to 10 years for framing young men. Since 1993, the city of Philadelphia has paid out approximately $27 million in more than 230 lawsuits alleging police misconduct.

America's Plague of Bad Cops

Cops on the Dole

"One way to make sure crime doesn't pay would be to let the government run it."
Ronald Reagan

Cop's View of the Drug War

Has the Drug War Created an Officer Liar's Club?

"Protecting the rights of even the least individual among us is basically the only excuse the government has for even existing."
Ronald Reagan

Code of Silence Must Come to an End

Bonus Payment To Informant Draws Criticism

CounterPunch Bookshop: White-Out
A book by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. tells the whole story from 1944 until the present of CIA complicity in the trade of illegal narcotics. The book also chastises the mainstream press for its shameful blindness to the problem.



Free Weeds The marijuana debate.

Conservatives pride themselves on resisting change, which is as it should be. But intelligent deference to tradition and stability can evolve into intellectual sloth and moral fanaticism, as when conservatives simply decline to look up from dogma because the effort to raise their heads and reconsider is too great. The laws aren't exactly indefensible, because practically nothing is, and the thunderers who tell us to stay the course can always find one man or woman who, having taken marijuana, moved on to severe mental disorder. But that argument, to quote myself, is on the order of saying that every rapist began by masturbating. General rules based on individual victims are unwise. And although there is a perfectly respectable case against using marijuana, the penalties imposed on those who reject that case, or who give way to weakness of resolution, are very difficult to defend. If all our laws were paradigmatic, imagine what we would do to anyone caught lighting a cigarette, or drinking a beer. Or — exulting in life in the paradigm — committing adultery. Send them all to Guantanamo?



Cops Against the Drugwar
The items posted here describe the growing disillusionment with the War on Drugs in the law enforcement community, the growing support for reform, and some of the ways in which the Drug War corrupts police forces and encourages a war mentality that is at odds with a police officer's intended role as an officer of the peace.



The Joseph McNamara Collection

"The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human." - Aldous Huxley

The Police State Cometh by Ron Paul



F.E.A.R.

November Coalition

"Stop throwing the Constitution in my face!
It’s just a goddamned piece of paper."
— G. W. Bush (Source: Capitol Hill Blue)

(FAMM Foundation)

Human Rights and the WoD

Narcotics police are an enormous, corrupt international bureaucracy ...
and now fund a coterie of researchers who provide them with 'scientific support' ...
fanatics who distort the legitimate research of others. ...

The anti-marijuana campaign is a cancerous tissue of lies, undermining law
enforcement, aggravating the drug problem, depriving the sick of needed help,
and suckering well-intentioned conservatives and countless frightened parents.
-- William F. Buckley, Commentary in The National Review, April 29, 1983, p. 495

Conservative Addiction Good, Liberal Addiction Bad!

The war on drugs has always served a political agenda. During the Red Scare in the early 1950s, Sen. Joseph McCarthy blamed Red China for peddling heroin to weaken the moral fiber of the United States and the Free World.

"Marihuana leads to pacifism and communist brainwashing"
Federal Bureau of Narcotics Chief Harry J. Anslinger, 1948

Sen. Joseph McCarthy: Unrepentant Junkie
Different researchers have found support for the proposition that McCarthy regularly used morphine, refused to quit and was eventually given an unlimited supply of the drug by the head of the federal government's drug war. A good discussion of the evidence is presented in John C. McWilliams' biography of Harry J. Anslinger, Commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics from 1930-1962.



TOMMY CHONG: Whatcha in for, man?

RUSH LIMBAUGH: Dealing in drugs and being an addict. I bought synthetic opiate painkillers illegally and became addicted to them.

CHONG: Really? Rush Limbaugh an addict? Wow!

LIMBAUGH: What are you in for?

CHONG: Selling glass.

LIMBAUGH: Grass?

CHONG: No, glass. With an 'l.'

Like everything funny, there is great truth to that little skit. Tommy Chong, at 65, is in prison for six months for selling marijuana bongs over the Internet. He shouldn't be in prison. Limbaugh is not going to serve a day in jail. He shouldn't, either.



Newt Gingrich's Support for Medical Marijuana
The following letter by Rep. Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House, in support of medical access to marijuana originally appeared in the March 19, 1982 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

Bush?Hypocrisy & Double Standards

U.S. law enforcement spends $7.5 to $10 billion annually enforcing marijuana laws.
According to the FBI, 720,000 Americans were arrested on marijuana charges in 2001
Keith Stroup, (NORML)

Defrauding America

U.S. prison population largest in world The Baltimore Sun
With a record-setting 2 million people now locked up in American jails and prisons, the United States has overtaken Russia and has a higher percentage of its citizens behind bars than any other country.

The Real Price of Prisons

In 2000, there were 1,579,566 drug arrests in the US. Of those,
46.5 percent -- 734,497 arrests -- were for marijuana.
There were 646,042 arrests for simple possession of marijuana in 2000.
drugwarfacts.org

Relax Your Muscles as Much as Possible

"Arbitrary and capricious" is legal language that was used by DEA Administrative Law Judge Francis Young in 1988 to conclude that DEA was obligated under the Controlled Substances Act to reschedule marijuana as a prescription medicine. DEA Chief Administrator Robert Bonner proceeded to arbitrarily and capriciously disregard Judge Young's well researched and reasoned decision, which the Act allowed him to do.

MAKING THE WALLS TRANSPARENT

"The amount of money and of legal energy being given to prosecute hundreds of thousands of Americans who are caught with a few ounces of marijuana in their jeans simply makes no sense - the kindest way to put it. A sterner way to put it is that it is an outrage, an imposition on basic civil liberties and on the reasonable expenditure of social energy." - William F. Buckley -



Conservative Case for Drug Legalization
When Bill Buckley came out for drug legalization and declared the "drug war" a failure, the issue of drug legalization ceased to be a left-right issue. Mr. Buckley wrote, "So what has the drug war done? It has made a mockery of an anti-drug law that is simply ignored by millions; it has induced violent felonies in pursuit of drug profits; and it is self-evidently powerless to do anything about the recent increase in marijuana use by reckless adolescents."

Mr. Buckley makes the conservative case against the drug war by evaluating "The practicality of a legal constriction, as for instance, what those states ought to do whose statute books continue to outlaw sodomy, which interdiction is unenforceable, making the law nothing more than print on paper."

He added, "I came to the conclusion that the drug war was not working, and that it would not work absent a change in the structure of the civil rights to which we cling as a valuable part of our patrimony." We need to calculate the cost to society by outlawing drugs and weigh it against its legalization.

May 10, 2005
The War on Pot Wrong drug, wrong war. by Rich Lowry
It used to be that drug warriors denied that marijuana was much of a focus for them, because they understandably liked people to think they were cracking down on genuinely dangerous, highly addictive drugs. No more. We are waging a war on pot, a substance less addictive and harmful than tobacco and alcohol, which presumably friends of Walters enjoy all the time with no fear of being forced to make a court appearance.

Liberal Drug Warriors! Conservative Pot-Coddlers! by Stuart Taylor Jr
The Supreme Court's decision to allow federal prosecution of medical-marijuana users was less about medical marijuana than about congressional power to override state law.

The Supreme Court's four more-liberal members voted to allow federal prosecution of medical-marijuana users (including cancer patients who grow small quantities at home to alleviate agonizing pain) even in the 11 states that have legalized medical marijuana. So did centrist Justice Anthony Kennedy and conservative Justice Antonin Scalia.

Marijuana and Me By Burt Prelutsky
Intellectual Conservative Politics and Philosophy
Unlike many of my fellow conservatives, when I discuss marijuana, I’ve had first hand experience with it. To begin with, I am certain that, overall, the stuff did me far less harm than the Marlboros I smoked and the vodka I drank in those days. Understand, I am not advocating its use. But I would argue that in a society where I was free to satisfy my cravings for nicotine, which kills thousands of Americans every year, and alcohol, which not only kills and maims thousands of others, but destroys careers, friendships and families, it is the height of absurdity and hypocrisy to make possession of pot illegal.

USA (Federal): In The News
Who Supports Marijuana Legalization?
Support rising; varies most by age and gender
The Gallup Poll; November 1, 2005
By Joseph Carroll, Gallup Poll Assistant Editor

Since the late 1960s, Gallup has periodically asked Americans whether the use of marijuana should be made legal in the United States. Although a majority of Americans have consistently opposed the idea of legalizing marijuana, public support has slowly increased over the years. In 1969, just 12% of Americans supported making marijuana legal, but by 1977, roughly one in four endorsed it. Support edged up to 31% in 2000, and now, about a third of Americans say marijuana should be legal.

Prohibitionists Duck Debate at Conservative Conference

True conservatives are for the legalization of marijuana



Murder in California By Dan Mindus, NRO 6/20/00

The Case of Peter McWilliams (1949-2000).

Ushering in outbreaks of hysteria, Peter McWilliams, best-selling author and medical- marijuana activist, died on Wednesday. Some — mostly libertarians — are freely tossing around the word "murder" to describe the federal government's role in the 50-year-old McWilliams' passing. "What the federal government did is nothing less than cold-blooded, premeditated murder," charged Steve Dasbach, the national director of the Libertarian Party.

Peter McWilliams R.I.P.

Eulogy - June 2000 By William F. Buckley, Jr.

Peter McWilliams is dead. Age? Fifty. Profession? Author, poet, publisher.

Particular focus of interest? The federal judge in California (George King) would decide in a few weeks how long a sentence to hand down, and whether to send McWilliams to prison or let him serve his sentence at home.

What was his offense? He collaborated in growing marijuana plants.

What was his defense? Well, the judge wouldn't allow him to plead his defense to the jury. If given a chance, the defense would have argued that under Proposition 215, passed into California constitutional law in 1996, infirm Californians who got medical relief from marijuana were permitted to use it. The judge also forbade any mention that McWilliams suffered from AIDS and cancer, and got relief from the marijuana.



Buckley Writes On McWilliams And Kubby Cases
MarijuanaNews.Com with Richard Cowan

Cannabis Shrinks Tumors: Government Knew in 74

Audubon Says Legalize It! by Ted Williams

Wallstreet's Spontaneous Abortionists

In an editorial in its May 1 issue, William F. Buckley, Jr.'s National Review commented on the case of Jimmy Montgomery, a paraplegic sentenced to 10 years in Oklahoma prisons for less than 2 ounces of marijuana. NR noted that former deputy drug czar John P. Walters criticized ABC News for reporting on the Montgomery case. Walters showed no concern for Montgomery but rather complained, "Apparently ABC couldn't find a grandmother on death row for carrying a roach clip..." NR observes that "something is seriously wrong with a drug policy that condones such treatment -- a point that the drug warriors tacitly acknowledge by changing the subject."
Continued...~olsen/NORML/WEEKLY/95-04-20.html

When Conservative Doctrines Collide
Medical Marijuana Meets Federalism

Fungus Eradications

DEA Rules Ban Edible Hemp Products.
If the DEAth would ban bird seed would they ban Hops for similar reasons?

Makers of Hemp Products to Fight DEA
... while Conservative red state Hops users sit by and watch.

Terminator Seeds

The Chemical Manipulation of Human Consciousness

Montanto Sucks

How To Grow Pot Plants That Don't Look Like Marijuana
Cannabis Underground Library Seven Rare Classics
Book #4 Supergrass Growers Guide pg86 & 87

Can Fungus Eradications distinguish between hops and hemp...
Will the rabid prohibitionists pushing genetic poisons just say oops?

Souder Fungus Déjà Vu!

Grafting Hops to Cannabis Pic

99 Percent Of All Marijuana Plants Eradicated In US Is Feral Hemp
Federal Data Reveals
(Statistics statistics statistics, thats what makes the WoD go round.)

Spraying Ditchweed Could Devastate Midwest Game Bird Populations

Why do you think they call it dope?

Ganja/hemp lnfolinx


Hemp Products not grown by Conservative US farmers.

ATTENTION "CONSERVATIVE" CANADIANS!!!

Do not allow yourselves to be fooled by the misguided or self-serving and completely illogical rhetoric of marijuana prohibitionists!!!

Anyone who preaches that they are morally opposed to the use or legalization of Cannabis, or who argues in favour of increased penalization for drug users or Cannabis gardeners, is absolutely confused, illogical and shamefully WRONG.

It is immoral and counter-productive to criminalize Cannabis growing or consumption. It is immoral to imprison people for private, victimless, and often beneficial behaviour and choices.

It is immoral to allow rights to be trampled, lives to be destroyed and ended, violence and greed and hate to proliferate while restricting access to God-given medicinal plants, arbitrarily discriminating between God's gifts.

It is hugely immoral to enforce, support or increase a prohibition that causes far more harm than good. It is immoral to create and maintain a black market that gives control of billions-of-dollar industries to criminals because of illogical hysteria.

It is morally WRONG and reprehensible to force drugs into schools and into the hands and veins of children by giving control over to criminals.

It is unfathomably immoral to wage a misguided and counter-productive war, for such arbitrary and ridiculous reasons, against our own sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, parents and grandparents (especially those struggling with serious illness).

It is SHAMEFUL.

Conservative people not blinded by ignorance and propaganda must realize how wrong Cannabis (and other drug) prohibition is - and how much damage these prohibitions cause. If it isn't simply obvious to you, there's still no excuse - consult the Canadian Senate, the Fraser Institute, and Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) for clear and concise 'conservative' explanation of why drug prohibition is senseless.

'Conservatives' everywhere - Can you please see that prohibition IS our drug problem!?