AlterNet | Trump Vows to Win War on Drugs, But Doesn't Mention Marijuana ... AlterNet It kind of feels like 1972 again. In his inaugural address to Congress Tuesday night, President Trump echoed the ghosts of Richard Nixon and Ronald ... |
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Trump Vows to Win War on Drugs, But Doesn't Mention Marijuana ... - AlterNet
If I like the record, why did I hate the show?
A boy I had a crush on several years ago, who also wrote about music, was pretty into the War on Drugs. It was during that sweet time when Kurt Vile was still in the band, a couple of years after the release of Wagonwheel Blues, which was critically lauded and total catnip for think pieces about authenticity and Americana's strong revivalist foothold in both psych and pop.
After we were done making out to the Walkmen's You & Me, he would set Wagonwheel Blues on his turntable and "Arms Like Boulders" would come on. Adam Granduciel and Kurt Vile would noodle, and Granduciel would sing about planets full of oil in the kind of spacey, Dylan-esque way that all music writers adored, and I would make out with this guy, genuinely enjoying myself.
Then a month or so later, he texted me.
"Hey, War on Drugs is coming to Hi-Dive [sic], want to go?"
I liked the record, I liked the dude, I said yes, and I went.
Like five lifetimes later, the show was overand I was left with one lingering question: If I like the record, why did I hate that?
What I Think Now: I totally pretended to like that show for that guy. That's part of the nuance. Because after that show, he was going on and on about how much he loved it and I wasn't self-assured enough to say what I really thought.
Which is that it was excessive. Look: Granduciel is talented, and the War on Drugs is a project that showcases his best skillscrafting introspective songs that don't sink into themselves and grooves that propel without losing steam, like some sort of perpetual motion machine.
But that man does not know when to stop a solo. I started to see, after standing for two hours staring blankly into the middle distance as the War on Drugs slowly morphed into a jam band before my eyes, that they need the limitations of a studio record to shine. Like many talented guitar players, if you give Granduciel an inch, he will play forever and ever, amen.
So, yeah, that's the problem. I like the War on Drugs. I do not like seeing the War on Drugs. And I trusted my own tastes so little that I saw them three more times, after their subsequent releases, and finally at the last show I turned to my friend and said, "I'm sleepy. I'm leaving."
It felt great. That weekend, I put on Slave Ambient and enjoyed it sitting down, sun coming in my window.
Self-awareness comes slowly, and it comes even more slowly for me. Much like a War on Drugs jam, it's a long journey to get to the point, but every part feels important. Unless you witness it livethen it's kind of a drag.
Was It Worth It: You can like something in some situations and not in others. You can not like something that everyone likes or says you're supposed to like. You can leave in the middle of a show if you're not enjoying yourself (just don't be a dick about it).
There is not just "I hate this" and "I love this," and a big part of me owning my own taste and asserting my own opinions was figuring out the gray area within them.
And never going to see the War on Drugs again.
Yes, it was worth it.
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Bands I Pretended to Like for Boys. Part Ten: The War on Drugs ... - TheStranger.com
MANILA Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said on Tuesday he would recall some police to fight his controversial war on drugs, nearly a month after suspending the entire force from all operations in the bloody narcotics crackdown.
In an about-face on his decision to remove the 160,000-member Philippine National Police (PNP) from his signature campaign, Duterte said the country was beset by security and law enforcement challenges and he needed more manpower to sustain the crackdown on drugs.
"So, I need more men. I have to call back the police again to do the job most of the time on drugs, not everyone," he told reporters.
Duterte has been scathing in his criticism of a police force he declared "corrupt to the core" after it was discovered that rogue drugs squad officers had kidnapped and killed a South Korean businessman at the PNP headquarters.
His decision to bring some police back into the campaign comes after a month of uncertainty about whether he would maintain the momentum of a merciless campaign that has defined his eight-month-old presidency, and has earned him international notoriety.
More than 7,700 people have been killed since his first day in office, some 2,555 in operations in which police said drug suspects resisted arrest.
Activists believe that extrajudicial killings have taken place during sting operations, and that many of the other killings were carried out secretly by police, or assassins working for them.
Authorities vigorously reject the allegations.
Since the Jan. 30 police suspension, the drug trade has come back out of the shadows, more than half a dozen drug users and dealers in some of Manila's toughest areas told Reuters.
'SOONER, THE BETTER'
PNP chief Ronald dela Rosa on Monday warned that gains in the drug war would be lost with police on the sidelines and "the sooner we return, the better".
The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), which has only 1,800 members, would lead the anti-drugs campaign, with the support of the military and PNP. Duterte said police would no longer conduct their own operations under his revised strategy.
The armed forces and PDEA signed an agreement on Tuesday to share intelligence and jointly go after "high value targets" in the narcotics business.
The military would provide firepower behind the PDEA in hostile situations, but troops would not be involved in street-level operations.
"It's meant to be PDEA-supervised, whether done by the military or the police. There should always be a PDEA ... who will be supervising everything," Duterte said.
Duterte has resolutely defended the campaign and lambasted anyone who speaks against it, including world leaders like then U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and former U.S. President Barack Obama. He has promised to humiliate anyone who is willing to debate him on the issue.
He said he had ordered dela Rosa to recruit young men for task forces who were "imbued with the fervor of patriotism" and not tainted by corruption.
He did not specify what task forces.
"I have to do it because I don't have enough men," Duterte added.
PNP spokesman Dionardo Carlos said he was not aware of a decision to re-deploy police for the drugs war.
"We have to await proper instructions and guidelines," he said. "We need to know where are we on the drug situation and where we left off."
Separately, the Senate announced on Tuesday it would hold an inquiry into allegations by a retired policeman that Duterte had operated a team of hit men during his 22 years as mayor of southern city of Davao. Duterte's aides have rejected that.
Former Davao police commanders and the Commission on Human Rights would also be questioned about their previous investigations into a so-called Davao death squad, according to Senator Panfilo Lacson, who will head the inquiry.
(Additional reporting by Enrico Dela Cruz; Editing by Robert Birsel)
MOSUL/BAGHDAD, Iraq U.S.-backed Iraqi forces on Tuesday battled their way to within firing range of Mosul's main government buildings, a major target in the offensive to dislodge Islamic State militants from their remaining stronghold in the western side of the city.
MOSCOW Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday a draft U.N. Security Council resolution put forward by Western powers to sanction Syria's government over the alleged use of chemical weapons was inappropriate.
GENEVA/KUALA LUMPUR South Korea called for "collective measures" to punish North Korea for using chemical weapons to kill the estranged half-brother of its leader Kim Jong Un, as Malaysia said on Tuesday it would charge two women with murder over the airport attack.
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Philippine president to bring police back into war on drugs - Reuters
MANILA, Philippines Citing lack of manpower in the anti-narcotics operations, President Rodrigo Duterte has decided to tap policemen again in the war against illegal drugs as he stressed that only the qualified ones would be allowed to join the campaign.
Duterte said he has ordered Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Ronald dela Rosa to recruit young men who are imbued with the fervor of patriotism to be members of task forces that would run after drug syndicates.
Every station should have one (task force) pero piling pili, yung walang kaso at walang history ng corruption (they will be selected thoroughly, they should have no cases and no history of corruption), the president told reporters yesterday in Malacaang.
I have to do it because kulang ako ng tao (I lack manpower), he added.
Duterte noted that security forces are also addressing the threats posed by the New Peoples Army and terrorist groups in Mindanao.
So kailangan ko ng tao (I need manpower). I have to call back the police again to do the job most of the time in the fight against drugs, the president said.
Asked if the anti-drug campaign Oplan Tokhang would be revived, Duterte replied: I will leave it to the police to decide. If thats the best way to do it, fine.
Duterte said the anti-drug operations involving policemen and military would be supervised by the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA).
There should always be a PDEA (representative), he said.
Duterte has ordered the Philippine National Police (PNP) to suspend the Oplan Tokhang following the kidnapping and murder of South Korean businessman Jee Ick-joo in the hands of some policemen
Witnesses said Jee was kidnapped by members of the PNP Anti-Illegal Drugs Group in Angeles, Pampanga on Oct. 18, 2016. The businessman was said to have been strangled to death inside Camp Crame. Jees body was cremated in a funeral parlor, his ashes flushed down a toilet, witnesses claimed.
After killing the businessman, the kidnappers demanded P5 million ransom from his wife.
Duterte has abolished the anti-drug units of PNP and has vowed to cleanse the police force of scalawags. The president admitted though that it might take time before the rogue policemen are replaced by decent ones.
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MANILA Foreign Affairs Secretary on Tuesday dismissed as just part of partisan politics all the criticisms against the Duterte government with regard to the war on drugs and the arrest of government critic Senator Leila de Lima.
Yasay said criticisms from Vice President Leni Robredo and her allies in the Senate and House of Representatives over the governments war on drugs and De Limas arrest should no longer come as a surprise since they belong to an opposing party.
You see, the vice-president is a partisan political opposition of the president, and if something happens to the president or the president is removed from office, she stands to benefit from it, Yasay said in an interview with CNN Internationals Christiane Amanpour.
There is a very strong partisan political undertone that goes behind this criticisms and I dont think it is fair for everyone to just simply say that because you are the vice president or you are a member of Congress, a senator trying to question this -- that they are saying the truth.
President Rodrigo Duterte has come under intense criticism because of his war on drugs, which has so far cost the lives of over 7,000 people.
Yasay said the government only takes responsibility for the killings of about 2,500 drug suspects slain under legitimate circumstances.
The government admits and confirms there are over 2,000 deaths resulting from legitimate operations wherein rules of engagement have been strictly followed, he said.
Nevertheless if there has been accusations or insinuations that the police did not uphold the due process required, we are immediately investigating these things.
Critics have said that De Limas arrest was brought about by her criticism against Dutertes campaign, as well the presidents long-standing grudge towards her for investigating him as a mayor over alleged death squad killings years ago.
Yasay, however, downplayed criticisms that De Limas arrest is a form of political repression.
There is something that one should understand about the arrest of Senator De Lima. Senator De Lima is a very powerful person. She is a senator and you see that our justice system works. Nobody is spared. If you violate the law, you will be arrested, he said.
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Yasay: Flak on war on drugs, De Lima arrest just 'partisan politics' - ABS-CBN News
Three unidentified assailants gunned down Peter Cruz in Barangay Manggahan, Pasig City late Tuesday evening. Fernando Sepe, Jr., ABS-CBN News
MANILA President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday announced that he will again use policemen in his controversial war on drugs amid reports that drug dealers are back on the streets, but he said not all policemen will participate in the renewed campaign.
I have ordered [PNP chief] Bato [dela Rosa] to recruit young men in the PNP who are imbued with fervor of patriotism to be the members only of the task forces. Every station should have one pero yung pili ng pili (but only select ones), iyung walang history of corruption (those who dont have a history of corruption), Duterte said.
I have to do it because kulang ako ng tao.
(I have to do it because I lack men.)
Duterte also said the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), which took over the campaign when the polices war on drugs was suspended, will continue to supervise anti-illegal drug operations.
The Philippine National Police (PNP) last month suspended its war on drugs after several cops were accused of kidnapping and then killing a Korean businessman right inside the PNP headquarters in Camp Crame in the guise of an anti-drug operation.
Duterte yesterday said, since the suspension of the polices war on drugs, there has been "a gain, a rise of drug activities by 20 percent.
Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Ronald Dela Rosa yesterday said the police force is willing to resume its campaign if Duterte will allow it. He claimed that drug traffickers were rejoicing over the suspension of the police campaign.
The longer na wala kami sa war on drugs, the situation is getting worse, the more na babalik yung problema. Sayang yung gains na nakuha natin from the first 7 months ng ating war on drugs. Nasasayangan ako e. So the sooner the better.
(The problem will worsen the longer we are not part of the war on drugs. I don't want the progress of the war on drugs for the first 7 months to go to waste.)
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Duterte orders return of police to war on drugs - ABS-CBN News
In The Odyssey, Homer refers to a substance which banishes all care, sorrow, and anger. Here, he is likely speaking of opium, a substance with the same active ingredient as the modern-day heroin. It seems that from Homers time to modern day America, psychoactive substances have fascinated us throughout all of human history. Accordingly, different societies across the eras have invented standards governing their usageranging from regulation, to spiritual justifications, to prohibition. In particular, the United States has distinguished itself from others in the scale and enforcement of efforts to curb public drug useextending a mere dislike to a full-on war.
People view drug use and abuse within different frameworks, with intensely social, political, medical, and historical implications. In particular, drugs are not only viewed within a schema of facts, but of moralityan ideology that views psychoactive substances as fundamentally wrong. Much of this stems from fears of substances seizing our autonomy: either while under the influence or while addicted.
In the United States, this moralization of drugs has been extended to create associations between certain drugs and certain groups of people. A New York Times article from 1905 cries about individuals selling cocaine promiscuously to negroesan attitude which continues to affect public perceptions of the black community today. According to Charles Whitebread, a former professor at the University of Southern California Law School, the one universal rule of U.S. drug policy is that prohibitions are always enacted by US, to govern the concept of THEM.
This social distinction is just one part of Americas narrative surrounding drug usage.Ultimately, these trends in perceptions are deeply rooted in a centuries-long cultural tradition that can be broadly divided into three distinct periods.
1607-1914: The Early Republic
In an interview with the HPR, Harvard Professor Jane Kamensky, an Early American historian, described Puritan New England as a society that believed deeply in order. Early America saw a conflict between the notions of American individual industry and dissention, and a nation deeply beset in stringent moral values. This conflict arose in Puritan perceptions of drug usage.
By far, Puritan New England was dominated by three drugs: coffee, tea, and rum. Here, Kamensky describes a distinction between coffee talk and tea talk. Coffee talk symbolized the space of ideas, and masculine discourse, while tea talk symbolized the space of effeminate gossip. Neither of these substances were moralized for their drug properties, or as psychoactive substances. Instead, tea in particular was moralized due to its association with the British Other. This made it more desirable, and raised question to its ethical status.
While alcohol was universally common, drunkenness was strictly associated with the lower classes of society. In The Alcoholic Republic, W.J. Rorabaugh describes a culture of heavy tolerance and moderate consumption of alcohol, reaching a peak of 7.1 gallons of alcohol by all individuals above 15 years old in 1830. He describes a society where many parents intended early exposure to alcohol to accustom their offspring to the taste of liquor, to encourage them to accept the idea of drinking small amounts, and thus to protect them from becoming drunkards. At this time, slaves likely consumed far less alcohol than the ruling classesyet culturally, the public associated public drunkenness precisely with this class. This neatly brings together both themes of the morality of drug use in the Americasthe loss of control bringing into question ones autonomous status, as well as the association of use with a non-powerful group in American society.
As the United States rapidly industrialized following the Civil War, drug use skyrocketed and the morality surrounding it followed. Industrialism meant enormous growth in tobacco and coffee, both of which had already been popular drugs in the United States, as well as new innovations in cocaine and morphine. At the same time, a stigma developed around the consumption of alcohol at work as efficiency and productivity became the hallmarks of American labor.
Early records of perceptions towards cocaine use seemed positive. A New York Times article from 1885 extolled the many blessings [that] will yet result from experimenting with cocaine. Coca Cola was first developed in 1886, branded as a method for recreational cocaine usehowever, by this point, tides had already shifted against the drug, with articles speaking about the cocaine habit and the racked and prostrated condition of cocaine users as early as 1887. As industrial cocaine production became associated with this loss of humanity, the nation turned against the drugand Coca Cola only saw a boom in sales when it rebranded itself as Delicious and Refreshing.
This rapid growth of varied drug use and chaos over their moral categorization, coupled with increasing migration, would lay the foundation for later criminalization policies.
1914-1971: The Beginnings of National Prohibition:
Universally, it appears that the prohibition of any drug has followed three steps. Cultural shifts begin with the association of the drug with a particular minority demographic. These proceed to widespread fears surrounding usage and its effects on society. Finally, a perception of a sharp increase in the drug use solidifies its status as illicit. Massive industrialization and immigration in the early 1900s followed this formula, culminating with the Harrison Narcotics Tax of 1914, which first regulated opium and cocaine at a national level. This was the first instance of drug prohibition in national policy but it would certainly not be the last.
This process started sixteen years after the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, when a Scientific American article in 1898 articulated that wherever the Chinese are found there will be the odor of opium. This racial stigmatization shifted public perception of opioids almost entirely from a casual acceptance to hate and eventually, criminalization. The image of the Chinaman seducing American women into prostitution in opium dens dominated majority perceptions towards the drug, factoring into future morphine and heroin policy.
Cocaine followed a similar trend. Although the drug was initially used by academics and medical practitioners between 1890 and 1920, it developed a heavy association with laborers, youth, and black Americans in urban society. Thomas Crothers, a contemporary observer who wrote widely about the effects of inebriety, described a phenomenon where persons of the tramp and low criminal classes who use this drug are increasing in many of the cities. This quickly developed into a national hysteria over the so-called cocaine-fiendan imagined cocaine-crazed violent predator, usually working in labor, and almost always black.
Marijuana prohibition followed a very comparable trajectory. Here, the concern revolved largely around Mexican immigrants in the Southwest. Fears about marijuana first arose during Alcohol Prohibition, when women and churches worried that individuals would simply substitute alcoholism with marijuana addiction. The idea that marijuana as a drug took away a users sense of control developed shortly afterwards and was most famously propagated by the movie Reefer Madness in 1936. The first federal prohibition of recreational cannabis came with the Marihuana Tax Act, in 1937, thus completing the major triad that continues to dominate U.S. drug policy today.
1971-present: The Drug War
Modern opinion is split on whether societal norms and values influence drug policy, or whether policy precedes change in public opinion. Truth be told, the answer is probably a mix of both as drug prohibition became increasingly strict at a national level, public perception pigeon-holed addicts into morally lower classes. Correspondingly, as public perception turned tides towards drug criminalization, policy shortly followed. These two mechanisms, especially the former, have become obvious in American history through the modern War on Drugs.
In 1971, President Nixon first declared the now-famous War on Drugs, calling drug abuse public enemy number one. In particular, however, this consisted not in a war on drugs themselvesbut a war on drug users, focusing efforts towards eradication, interdiction, and incarceration.
Socially, the trend ramped up with Nancy Reagans Just Say No campaign. This effort inaugurated the zero-tolerance principle for drug use and abuse, and set a goal to educate a new generation specifically on a grounded, prohibitionist, drug-morality. Many programs commenced by these traditions are still in place, such as the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program in Los Angeles, despite questionable efficacy.
Ironically, in a post-Civil Rights United States, as it became no longer acceptable to explicitly link drug usage with particular demographics, drugs have become a cultural stand-in to avoid explicitly talking about demographics. The heroin addict remains almost synonymous with black youth in urban povertyyet using this moniker places enough distance from racial connotations to maintain political correctness.
The most notable manifestation of this is in the widely unequal criminal sentencing for freebase cocaine (crack) and its powdered form. Chemically, these two drugs are almost identical, with very similar effects. Their primary difference is in price, resulting in a major disparity of use and punishment across different demographics. Until very recently, crack cocaine held penalties as much as 100 times as harsh as powder cocaineand crack stays associated with black neighborhoods. Although this was reduced to only 18 times as harsh, with the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, the racial connotation remains impossible to overlook.
In addition, previously noted fears about drug usage taking away autonomy continue to arise periodically. Spice, a blanket term for a number of synthetic substances that mimic the effects of marijuana, is an example of the continued adaptation of drugs to evade legislation. As a new variant of spice takes over the news cycle, public opinion radically shifts, leaving policymakers scrambling to patch up holes. While usage of the Big Three illegal drugs (cocaine, heroin, and marijuana) remains similar, drugs such as fentanyl and krokodil have become household names.In the same theme as the above analyses, these do not arise because of particular properties of the drugs themselvesbut because of properties of cultural perception.
In this way, two things are clear: the first is that drug policy relies on a variety of moral and sociopolitical patterns that are as old as the United States itself. The second is that regardless of any policy, drugs are here to stay. They become illegal and immoral when they are associated with a distinct voiceless Other that can be easily repressed by the majority, and when they raise question aboutindividuals moral autonomy. These trends and traditions stretch back to the very foundations on which the American republic stands and by understanding that, the possibility for comprehensive drug reform becomes a bit more possible.
Image Credit: U.S. Marshals Service Office of Public Affairs/Flickr
Link:
The Junkie and the Addict: The Moral War on Drugs - Harvard ... - Harvard Political Review
A drug user inhales "Shabu", or methamphetamine, at a drug den in Manila, Philippines February 13, 2017. Reuters
MANILA - Secretary to the Cabinet Leoncio Evasco Jr. clarified Monday that the Duterte administration's war on drugs has not been stopped but is a continuing campaign under a different law enforcement agency.
Evasco said the President merely transferred the responsibility from the Philippine National Police to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, but the same concept of the drug war remains. "I don't think there was a stoppage on this. It is just shifting from PNP to PDEA."
Over the weekend, there were calls from Senator Alan Peter Cayetano for President Duterte to re-launch the war on drugs, claiming that the drug trade has come back out of the shadows after Duterte halted anti-drug operations under the PNP's "Oplan Tokhang."
"Pag bumalik ang mga pusher, kasunod na n'yan ang patayan ng inosente, kasama na d'yan ang rape, ang nakawan. Kaya ngayong gabi, ako ay nakikiusap sa ating Pangulo at sa PNP: i-relaunch ninyo ang inyong anti-drug drive." Cayetano's said during the vigil-rally in support of the Duterte administration at the Quirino Grandstand in Luneta Saturday.
But Evasco said: "I don't think there is a need to re-launch that because the president just shifted the mandate from PNP to PDEA. It is now the task of PDEA to continue what have been done by PNP."
Evasco, however, said PDEA have yet to provide Malacanang a report on how the war on drugs have progressed after the transfer. He also said the issue has not been discussed in Cabinet meetings lately.
"I hope in the coming meetings this will be discussed," he said.
More than 7,000 people have been killed since Duterte was sworn in almost eight months ago, about 2,500 of whom were killed in official police anti-narcotics operations. Human rights groups believe many of the killings are extra-judicial executions committed as part of the war on drugs, and in cooperation with the police - a claim the Duterte administration has repeatedly denied.
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No need to relaunch war on drugs: Duterte aide - ABS-CBN News
Donald Trump arrives on stage with his family to speak to supporters during election night at the New York Hilton Midtown in New York on November 9, 2016 (AFP Photo/Timothy A. Clary)
The weeks since Trump took office with a pledge to make America wealthy/safe/proud/great again have been tumultuous ones. He has tested the nations checks and balances with a series of aggressive executive actions and abrupt policy shifts, on everything from the border wall, the structure of the National Security Council, immigration, attacks on the judiciary, and the selection of Cabinet appointees diametrically opposed to the mission of the agency they are intended to lead.
None of these moves are truly intended to increase the efficiency of national policy. Trump is, if nothing else, a master of branding and his policy moves have been largely symbolic; hes sending a message about his values and his vision for the United States.
But hang on, because there is more to come and, aside from jobs, theres still one big ticket item on his to-do list: drugs.
The threat posed by drugs was a consistent theme during the campaign and often lumped with immigration, globalization, and violent crime as part of a rising lawlessness that threatens the American people. Trump reiterated this theme in his apocalyptic inaugural address, pitting the forgotten men and women of our country against foreign enemies who drain jobs and wealth and replace them with poverty, crime, gangs, and drugsall under the watch of political elites who did nothing to stop the American carnage. Never mind that Trump is also something of a robber baron and never mind his myriad conflicts of interest, this style of rhetoric says: look therethat is the enemy, the other.
Students of Americas many drug wars have been watching these developments with real trepidation, because weve heard this message before. The drug war has always fed on social and political turmoil and functioned as a way to consolidate both political authority and a largely moral and intolerant brand of American identity. In short, its not a question of if Trump will declare war on drugs but when.
And, in fact, the opening shots have already been fired. Trump has promised a return to law and order to a gathering of police chiefs and sworn to be ruthless in taking the fight to the drug cartels. The day after he made these remarks, Trump welcomed Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as his new Attorney General and used the occasion to sign three new executive orders: instructing the Department of Justice to aggressively prosecute crimes against law enforcement officers, create a new Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety, and increase interagency efforts to combat international drug traffickers.
While Trumps talk of criminal cartels destroying the blood of our youth smacks of racial hygiene and fascism, the drug war has essentially always been understood in terms that link biology, morality, and identity. Like many of Trumps policies, the fight against drugs packs a big symbolic punch. Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, the presidents most closely associated with the war on drugs, both rendered the conflict in similar fashion and for similar reasons. Nixon described drug addiction as a problem which afflicts both the body and the soul of America, and Reagan, while urging Americans to Just Say No, called drug abuse a repudiation of everything America is.
The countrys struggle with drugs has a much longer history than most people realize, with roots that stretch well over 100 years into the past. From early U.S. concern over opium addiction in China and the colonial Philippines, the establishment of the first federal control laws, into the beginnings of global enforcement at mid-century, and throughout the presidencies of Nixon and Reagan, American drug policy has consistently turned on issues of symbolicrather than scientificimportance. Questions about the hazards and benefits of globalization, the role of the U.S. in the world, national security, nature vs. nurture, race and crime, the social contract, andmost importantlyAmerican identity have proven far more determinative than the pharmacology of drugs or the particulars of any given drug epidemic. Many of these tensions continue to define American political culture today.
With the drug problem historically framed in cultural and ideological terms, control and enforcement strategy have focused almost exclusively on punitive policing and supply-side solutions. Rather than rely on comparatively soft public health strategies to reduce demand, American policymakers have demonstrated a clear preference for going after bad guyslike foreign traffickers, street-level dealers, and deviant junkies. Despite its obvious practical shortcomings, this adversarial drug war framework prevails because it skirts internal responsibility for the drug problem; drugs are a scourge perpetrated against the American people by outside powers, rather than a domestic social problem tied to Americas own internal contradictions and predilections. And one of the consequences is that we overlooked the risk posed by the growth of the legal narcotics industry.
The American Society of Addiction Medicine estimates that in 2015the most recent year for which there is good dataaround two million Americans suffered from a substance abuse disorder involving opioids. Of those, nearly 600,000 were active heroin users, and four out of five new heroin users began with a prescription opioid. That same year, the number of deaths specifically attributed to heroin overdose (12,989) eclipsed the number attributed to gun violence (12,979). In short, the problem is growing and its causes have more to do with legal practice and industry than criminal trafficking.
According to data provided by the Center for Disease Control, the rates of opioid prescription and overdose have both quadrupled since the start of the millennium, and the influx of legal opioids has created new heroin markets throughout the country. Ironically, the problem is particularly concentrated among older, white, working class populations in areas like the Rust Belt, Appalachia and the Deep Souththe same areas that turned out in strength for Trump in November. Broadening the scope beyond opioids, the National Institute on Drug Abuse estimates that the collective abuse of alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs is a $700 billion a year problem.
The question is: what is Trump going to do about it?
In his most direct remarks on the campaign trail, Trump acknowledged the need for expanded treatment options, but he also promised a return to the punitive and supply-side strategies that have done demonstrably little to solve the drug problem, including the use of mandatory minimum sentencing and a general escalation of street-level enforcement. And, of course, he also promised a wall, telling his supporters, A wall will not only keep out dangerous cartels and criminals, but it will also keep out the drugs and heroin poisoning our youth. The actual efficacy or viability of the wall remains very much in doubt, even within Trumps own party. But thats also beside the point; the wallmuch like the Muslim/travel banis a gesture that signifies a besieged nation in need of a strongman to lead it.
Trumps willful conflation of illegal immigration and the drug problem is no real surprise. Trump, after all, first seized political relevancy by casting doubt on the citizenship of Barak Obama, and his great ally in the birtherism conspiracy was ex-DEA agent Joe Arpaio, who drew national attention by proclaiming himself Americas toughest sheriff and fulminating against illegal immigration as the source of all of Americas problems. (Arpaio is still at the birther thing, by the way.) The notion that Obama is not a U.S. citizen is a proven falsehood, but the rhetoric and cultural beliefs the conspiracy signaled clearly played with that segment of the electorate dismayed by the election of Americas first black president.
A major indicator of Trumps intentions comes from his selection of Sessions as Attorney General. This is a man who was deemed too racist to win a federal judgeship in 1986 and once joked that he thought the KKK was ok but for their pot use, so its unlikely that Sessions will prioritize a healthy respect for civil rights over Trumps calls for aggressive drug enforcement. Indeed, Sessions has reportedly been a determinative influence on Trumps hard-line positions and as White House Press Secretaryrecently indicatedis likely to pursue a confrontational approach with the twenty-nine states that have voted to legalize marijuana, setting up yet another potential constitutional crisis.
Its all but certain that Mexico will be a primary antagonist in any Trump drug war. When Trump declared his candidacy for office, he did so with the charge that Mexico actively exports drugs, crime, and rapists to the United States. Within days of entering the White House, he caused yet another controversy with joking/not-joking remarks about sending the U.S. military to deal with Mexicos bad hombres.
China, another campaign trail punching bag, will also play an important role on the foreign policy side. China has long been the worlds largest supplier of synthetic drugsincluding fentanyl, a powerful narcotic implicated in recent spikes in overdose rates. But China also seems to be cracking down on illicit production and is an area where the DEA has been making notable progress with quiet diplomacy instead of more confrontational tactics.
On the domestic front, the major policy decisions revolve around policing vs. treatment. Trump has already threatened to send the feds into Chicago to quell the citys gun violence, but its doubtful hes going to send the feds into places like Alabama, Tennessee, Ohio, West Virginia, and Hew Hampshirestates that have some of the highest densities of opiates and the highest rates of overdose.
The ostensible whitening of heroin is a real dilemma for the Trump administration. Its always been difficult for the authorities to parse the difference between dealer and user, and Trump is probably not going to wage drug war on his own voters. But expanding treatment options is going to be terribly difficult in the face of GOP plans to dismantle the Affordable Care Act, which extended new coverage for drug and alcohol disorders. It also remains to be seen if Trump is willing to confront Big Pharma in the same manner that he has rattled his Twitter account at General Motors and Boeing.
The biggest uncertainty looming over all of this, however, is figuring out how much is bluster and how much of Trumps tough talk signals actual changes in policy. The DEA has acquired wide-ranging law enforcement authority in its nearly 45-year history, both at home and abroad. Even as a mere rhetorical device shorn of any real policy shifts, the drug war is a source of power and its likely only a matter of time before Trump attempts to claim it. Well know more when the first report of the newly created Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety is published four months from now.
The most likely scenario is that Trump will mostly ignore the specifics of the opioid epidemic and stick with the supply-side enforcement tactics that appeal to his bombastic and adversarial style. To address demand is to admit weakness, and, in Trumps worldview (such as anyone can know it), the forgotten people need jobs, not coddling or rehab. Instead, Trump will use the drug issue to reinforce his basic theme of a blighted America that begs for decisive leadership. He will focus on urban gang violence (which has a limited connection to the opioid crisis), double-down on his confrontation with Mexico, and use legal pot and Chinas role as synthetic supplier as pawns in his gamesmanship to extract economic concessions from the states and foreign rivals.
Thats a best-case scenario. All bets are off if Trump embraces the mantle of drug warrior with the enthusiasm of Reagan. And all the while, the drug crisis and the injustices of the American police and legal system will almost certainly grow worse.
There is, however, one glimmer of hope. Trump will be the first to tell you that hes a great deal maker; now that weve seen the whitening of heroin perhaps he will seize the opportunity that lies before him and strike a grand bargain that moves national policy toward a more effective balance between law enforcement and the humane treatment of American addiction. But I wouldnt hold my breath.
Matthew R. Pembleton holds a Ph.D. in History from American University, where he is an adjunct professorial lecturer. His book on the history of the drug war,Containing Addiction: The Federal Bureau of Narcotics and the Origins of Americas Global Drug War, is forthcoming from UMass Press.
This article was originally published at History News Network
Originally posted here:
There's one last big-ticket item on Trump's agenda: A war on drugs - Raw Story
The one thing you dont expect in a documentary about the war on drugs is humour. This is an illicit and illegal trade with bitter gang wars, government crackdowns, betrayals and countless deaths, and yet Wildlands, a Ubisoft created documentary to accompany their upcoming Ghost Recon Wildlands game, has you laughing at several points.
Featuring lengthy interviews with several people who have been deeply involved with drugs on many levels, from trafficking to enforcing the cartels position, and, of course, the US governments attempts to fight back. It could almost be a Hollywood blockbuster, following the smugglers, enforcers, informants, DEA agents, and soldiers, and how their stories interlink and the drug trade feeds off itself. However, instead of a gritty crime drama, its a retrospective documentary on the rise and further rise of the cocaine trade.
Rusty Young acts as the narrator and interviewer throughout, with one of the key inspirations for the documentary being his bestselling book Marching Powder, which chronicles the story of Thomas McFadden. Born in Tanzania but raised in Liverpool, he found himself drawn into drug trafficking, smuggling heroin from Morocco into Europe. However, what makes his story so fascinating is that he found himself incarcerated in Bolivias San Pedro prison.
Thats not what youd expect, with San Pedro a million miles from the stereotypical British prison. Instead of blocks of cells patrolled by guards, this is effectively a small city in its own right, with prisoners having to pay to rent or buy cells, families moving in to live together, finding jobs within the prison, and so on. It sounds bizarrely idyllic, but underneath, theres still the danger, the corruption and the persistent drug trade. Rusty and Thomas actually met while he was still in prison, having created his own business within the walls giving tours to foreign tourists fascinated by this idiosyncratic place.
Its that experience and an almost instant connection that led to Rusty bribing guards in order to stay with Thomas for three months and write his story, and its their almost brotherly relationship thats the jumping off point for the rest of Wildlands.
From there, theres extended interviews with the renowned George Jung, the man who introduced the Medllin cartel to the potential of bringing cocaine into the US and made famous by the film Blow. Much of the rest of the film revolves around the rise and fall of this most famous and influential of organisations.
Though there are still moments of humour throughout the rest of the interviews, theyre undercut by the growing seriousness. This shift in tone is probably where the film is most successful, drawing you in with a surprisingly light tone that helps you want to understand some of these people, before showing you how it can all go south. One particular moment stands out for me, as Rusty calls up one of the few remaining members of the Medellin cartel to check theyre still up for meeting. As he speaks to Popeye, who was one of Pablo Escobars most trusted enforcers and confessed to the murder of over 300 people as he was arrested and sentenced to prison in Colombia, he asks if its OK that he brings a bodyguard with him. Popeye now leads a very different life, but it underscores the danger inherent in this world that Rusty is investigating.
The documentary raises some fascinating problems and poses interesting and challenging questions, both for you the viewer to consider, but also as Rusty talks to the eight people featured in the film. Perhaps the most profound element is the lack of answers. The interviews with those who fought against the drugs trade domestically and abroad, the DEA agents in the US and the Navy SEAL who served throughout South America, have no real solutions to what can be done about the ongoing problem, whether their convictions hold or they see that alternative methods are needed.
The US governments attempt to crack down both domestically and internationally via the War on Drugs might have succeeded in scoring huge drug busts and dismantling or severely weakening various drug cartels, but cutting one head off the hydra does little to stop the beast. Perhaps a better approach would be to try and shift the culture in South America away from seeing cocaine as an easy path to making money, or try to stop people trying and becoming addicted in North America and Europe? Whatever the case, theres no quick fix.
Going into the film, I had no idea how plausible a drug cartel state was, as depicted in Ghost Recon Wildlands. Certainly, the game sensationalises many things about this scenario, with the Santa Blanca cartel very brazenly in control of Bolivia, but theres serious suspicions that the current government of Bolivia is at the very least turning a blind eye to the drugs trade, if not actually supporting it in some ways. Certainly, Bolivian President Evo Morales has embraced the natural cocalero industry, from which cocaine is derived. Unfortunately, Rustys attempts to interview Morales ultimately failed.
Whether youre interested in Ghost Recon Wildlands or not, the Wildlands documentary is a fascinating look into the drugs trade on all levels, told in a compelling and engaging way. If anything, Id have liked the film to be a little longer, relaying even more of the stories, the highs and the lows of those ensnared in the War on Drugs.
Wildlands willbe available on Amazon Prime, iTunes, and Google Play from the 6thMarch.
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Engaging With The War On Drugs In Ubisoft's Wildlands Documentary - TheSixthAxis
MANILA Philippine police are ready to resume President Rodrigo Duterte's war on the drugs trade which had returned to the streets, the police chief said on Monday, a month after Duterte halted police operations, labeling the force "rotten to the core".
Ronald dela Rosa told reporters the sooner police returned to the fight better, otherwise gains made against drug traders could be lost.
"We are ready to go back to war if given orders by the president," dela Rosa told reporters. "The longer that we are out of the war on drugs, the situation is getting worse, problems will return. So, the sooner we return, the better."
Despite his denunciation of the police, Duterte told reporters he may allow them to resume anti-drug operations, saying there had been a rise of about 20 percent in drug sales on the streets since police were pulled back.
"I will leave it to the Philippine National Police to decide," he said. "What they have to do (is) to succeed."
Dela Rosa said he had spoken with governors, mayors and village officials who, he said, were clamoring for police to return to the anti-drugs campaign because drug peddlers and users were back on the streets.
Duterte ordered the police to stand down from the drugs war last month after declaring the force rotten to the core. Since then, the drugs trade has come back out of the shadows, more than half a dozen drug users and dealers in some of Manila's toughest areas told Reuters.
More than 8,000 people have been killed in the war on drugs since Duterte was sworn in almost eight months ago, about 2,500 of whom were killed in official police anti-narcotics operations.
Human rights groups believe many of the others were extra-judicial executions committed in cooperation with the police a claim the Duterte administration has vehemently denied.
Reporters and photographers working the crime beat on the night shift said "vigilante-style" killings of drug suspects had continued, but at a much slower pace after the suspension of police operations.
Duterte halted police operations at the end of January and transferred the role to the 1,800-member Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, supported by the army.
(Reporting by Manuel Mogato; Editing by Nick Macfie)
It is in Kuala Lumpur's "Little India" neighborhood, behind an unmarked door on the second floor of a rundown building, where a military equipment company called Glocom says it has its office.
JAKARTA A militant killed by police in Indonesia after detonating a small bomb in the city of Bandung on Monday was "possibly" part of a radical network sympathetic to Islamic State, police said.
PESHAWAR, Pakistan After having been declared dead several times in the past, a senior Taliban commander has been killed in an air strike in northern Afghanistan, officials of the militant group confirmed on Monday.
Originally posted here:
Philippine police say ready to return to war on drugs as dealers return - Reuters
Just when you thought the useless and wasteful drug-war philosophy of the past was slowly receding in the rear view, the Trump administration is pulling a U-turn.
The White House indicated last week that states like Maine that have legalized marijuana should expect greater enforcement of federal anti-pot laws, going against public sentiment, economic trends, and the good sense that anti-drug resources should be spent on solving the opioid crisis, not disrupting safe, established businesses following state law.
UNNECESSARY UNCERTAINTY
Its hard to know just what the administration has in store. The announcement last week, by White House press secretary Sean Spicer, came with no further details or policy changes, except to say that only recreational marijuana, not medical, would be targeted.
Going after recreational marijuana goes against a campaign pledge from Trump, but that doesnt mean much. He also said last year that he would protect transgender Americans, yet he recently rescinded federal direction on bathroom use for transgender students, citing state rights. (Apparently, states are free to discriminate, but not to legalize a largely harmless drug.)
It does, however, jibe with the views of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who once said that good people dont smoke marijuana and now oversees the Justice Department in a country where nearly half the people have tried it.
Sessions in his confirmation hearings would not commit to following the Obama administrations policy of leaving states alone as long as a solid regulatory structure was in place. Federal law is the law, Sessions has argued, and he will enforce it even when it conflicts with state law.
Of course, that conflict could be lessened, though not entire erased, if federal agencies and Congress took the sensible steps of reclassifying marijuana as a drug with accepted medical uses something on the books in 28 states now and rewriting financial rules to allow marijuana businesses that follow state law to use the banking system.
Instead, the Trump administration appears ready to antagonize those businesses; the real question is how. Spicers announcement has already injected great uncertainty into the industry, and actions such as raids or prosecutions of recreational marijuana businesses would further chill investment and scare off customers.
PUBLIC SIDES WITH POT
That would unnecessarily stunt an industry that is expected to produce more than 250,000 jobs and $24 billion in revenue by 2020, and send millions of productive and otherwise law-abiding Americans back to the black market, where their money is much more likely to end up in the hands of criminals who are actually dangerous.
States like Maine that have legalized marijuana should fight this kind of federal overreach. Unlike with the transgender case, state laws on marijuana are not discriminatory. They are a true example of the Jeffersonian concept of states as laboratories, and so far the experiments are working just look at the successes in Washington state and Colorado.
Federal resources would be much better spent helping stop the daily carnage from opioid use than dismantling an industry that has entered the mainstream.
Eight states, comprising 21 percent of the countrys population, have voted to legalize marijuana. A new poll from Quinnipiac University found 59 percent of Americans think pot should be legal nationwide, and 71 percent say the federal government should not enforce federal laws against states that have legalized pot.
As Maine state officials and legislators work to implement the new marijuana-legalization law here, they should not be deterred by the noise coming from the Trump administration. They should reassure with their outspoken support the business interests looking to invest in the industry, and they should remember that they have history and public opinion on their side.
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Our View: White House plan reignites wasteful war on drugs - Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel
MANILA, Philippines The Philippine National Police is itching to get back to the controversial war on drugs but the order of President Rodrigo Duterte to prioritize internal cleansing is preventing them to focus on the illegal trade, the nation's top cop said.
PNP Director General Ronald "Bato" Dela Rosa said at a press briefing at Camp Crame Monday that internal cleansing is a never-ending process and coexists with the PNP.
"As long as buhay ang PNP meron at meron magkakamali, mate-tempt na gumawa ng kalokohan," Dela Rosa explained.
"We are dealing with human resources, dynamic individuals, hindi natin ma-preempt lahat," he added.
If the drug efforts' suspension will indeed be lifted, Dela Rosa believes it will take an eternity before they can resume their operations, which they claimed to be a success since it was launched in July last year.
Despite claims of success, the government has yet to release numbers showing that the drug supply and demand have been curbed. The so-called drug war, moreover, has received worldwide criticism for thousands of deaths of suspected "drug personalities" since it was launched.
Headlines ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: 1
The PNP chief said the PNP is still awaiting Duterte' order of reinstatement, which will give them the authority to take action on reports of drug peddlers back on the streets.
Dela Rosa claimed that the situation is getting worse.
"Wala kaming magawa... sayang 'yung nakuha nating gains sa first seven months," he said.
Duterte halted the anti-illegal drug operations of PNP last month after a Korean businessman was discovered to have been killed inside police headquarters Camp Crame by cops who used the anti-narcotics campaign for illegal activities.
Victim Jee Ick-Joo was proven innocent after he was accused of being involved in the drug trade to justify his death.
The issue led to disbandment of anti-illegal drug group of the PNP.
Duterte ordered the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency to take the lead in the continued anti-narcotics efforts while the PNP focused on internal purging of errant cops.
Despite this, Dela Rosa vowed the PNP is now ready to be on the offensive again.
"Mahirap baka sabihan ni presidente pinapangunahan ko siya. Baka sabihin nya maghintay ka. The president naman is on top of the situation, alam niya 'yung nangyayari sa buong pilipinas," Dela Rosa said.
"We are ready to go back to war if given orders by the president," he added.
Excerpt from:
Thousands of people protested on Saturdayagainst Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's deadly war on drugs after the arrest of his most high-profile critic.
Duterte's political opponents and left-wing activists transformed a traditional celebration of a "People Power" uprising against dictatorship three decades ago in Manila into a protest march condemning his war on drugs.
The group warned thatDuterte's authoritarian rule could return the country to a dictatorship, demanding an end to the extrajudicial killings thathave claimed more than 7,700 lives in the past seven months.
The military-backed dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos was toppled in a bloodless "People Power" revolution 31 years ago to the day.
"We are taking the matter seriously. We are warning our people about the threat of rising fascism," Bonifacio Ilagan, who led one of the protests, told news agency AFP.
Protesters warned of a return to conditions under the dictator Ferdinand Marcos
Senator imprisoned
The protesters gathered outside the national police headquarters, where opposition figure Senator Leila de Lima was detained two days ago on charges that she took bribes from imprisoned drug traffickers.
"There is a president who is threatening to reimpose martial law and openly support the killings of thousands of people," de Lima said in a message from her detention cell a day after she was arrested.
"The grim truth: In the last seven months under Duterte, there were more deaths compared to the 14 years of martial law under the Marcos regime."
The former human rights commissioner said her arrest was an effort to silence her and an act of revenge for her decade-long efforts to expose Duterte as the leader of death squads during his time as mayor of the southern city of Davao.
"President Duterte is effectively expanding his drug war from the urban poor to the legislative branch of government," Phelim Kine, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.
Protester Ilagan, a playwright who suffered horrific torture over two years in a police prison under Marcos' martial rule in the 1970s, cited to AFP the "culture of impunity" engendered by Duterte's anti-drug crackdown. More rallies in support of de Lima were organized for later in the evening.
aw/tj (AFP, Reuters)
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-OpEd-
BOGOT Any Colombian observing Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs might remember our former president Csar Gaviria.
Gaviria, who governed in some of the worst days of our drug violence, is a lightweight compared to Duterte. The highly popular Filipino leader has no qualms about employing language that few presidents would use. He used expletives in describing former U.S. president, Barack Obama, and has said some nasty stuff about the Pope too. Its nice to see our Colombian leaders outdone in brutality for a change.
In spite of my animosity toward Gaviria's administration, I cannot place him on the same level as Duterte and his program. Gaviria's war on drugs did not include a brazen call to physically eliminate drug users and small-time dealers as Duterte did in his campaign with frightening results. Amnesty International estimates there are more than 1,000 extrajudicial killings a month in the Philippines.
Inevitably, when you give state agencies carte blanche to kill over and above the established, official targets (which is horrible enough), opportunistic violence proliferates. Recently Filipino police kidnapped, tortured and killed a Korean businessman; policemen had apparently sought to involve him in drug dealing in order to extort money from him.
Csar Gaviria in Mexico, in 2015 Photo: Ivan Stephens/El Universal/ZUMA
There is another way to view this. The Philippines has a different culture to Colombia and half its GDP per person. It has suffered lengthy periods of internal fighting and faces two significant insurgencies: one of Maoist guerrilla groups and the other Islamist (or an amalgam of radical Islamist groups). The government is talking to both.
Earlier this year when Duterte began formal dialogue with the Maoists, the first point of discussion was farming and land, much like in Colombia. But Duterte was prepared to take his reformist agenda much further than his Colombian counterparts have in their wildest moments of generosity. In the Philippines, the government is considering a rearrangement of the countryside as a key component of long-term national growth.
This suggests that the affairs of distant countries may not be as different as they seem from afar. Peacemaking does not need a dogmatic outlook but it needs basic understanding. This goes further in resolving, or at least improving the solutions to, our problems.
The sociologist Tzvetan Todorov, who recently died in Paris, understood this. He rejected the now prevalent idea that anything attractive must be right and true. For Todorov, heroes are not people who sacrifice their lives but those who can recover other people's fragile, passing humanity. I couldn't agree more.
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How Rodrigo Duterte's War On Drugs Looks In Colombia - Worldcrunch
MANILA A Philippine senator and staunch critic of President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs was in police custody on Friday following her high-profile arrest for drugs offences that she described as a vendetta that would fail to silence her.
Leila de Lima, who last year led a Senate probe into alleged extrajudicial killings during Duterte's anti-drugs campaign, said the arrest was payback for taking on a president who had acted like a dictator.
On Tuesday she called Duterte a "sociopathic serial killer" who had a "criminal mind".
"The truth will come out at the right time," de Lima told reporters outside the Senate office where she spent the night, moments before law enforcers marshaled her into a waiting van.
De Lima, her former driver and bodyguard and a former prison official were ordered arrested after a judge found merit in criminal charges filed by the justice ministry last week.
She faces two more drug-related charges in the same court and described the cases as "all lies".
Bail is not permitted under the charges and if found guilty, de Lima faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
House speaker Pantaleon Alvarez, a close ally of Duterte, described her arrest as a victory of the war against drugs, adding "no one is above the law, not even a senator".
But de Lima's supporters quickly came to her defense, with Vice President Leni Robredo describing the arrest as "political harassment".
Senator Paulo Benigno Aquino, a cousin of former president Benigno Aquino, called it "a concern for anyone who will dissent on any of the policies of this administration".
The criminal complaint alleged de Lima received 5 million pesos ($99,850) from a former prison official when she was justice minister between 2010 and 2016.
The allegations she was in cahoots with drugs gangs surfaced when she led a Senate investigation, which probed alleged summary executions during Duterte's bloody drugs war and a pattern of similar killings over the 22 years in which he was mayor of Davao City.
That investigation found no proof of wrongdoing by Duterte, who disparaged de Lima almost daily in televised speeches in which he made lurid allegations about her private life and even suggested she hang herself.
She filed a complaint with Supreme Court to try to muzzle the president.
At the heart of de Lima's campaign has been the 7,700 deaths since Duterte took office eight months ago, more than 2,500 in police operations. The cause of many of the other deaths remain in dispute and human rights groups believe many of them were extrajudicial killings.
De Lima was removed as head of her Senate probe by Duterte's allies and days later came under investigation herself in a congressional inquiry in which witnesses, several of them convicts, identified her as a key player in the narcotics trade.
Phelim Kine of the New York-based Human Rights Watch said Duterte had "effectively expanded his 'drug war' from the urban poor to the legislative branch" by arresting de Lima.
(Additional reporting by Manuel Mogato and Martin Petty; Editing by Nick Macfie)
WASHINGTON A proposal the Trump administration is considering to designate Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization has stalled over warnings from defense and intelligence officials that the move could backfire, according to officials familiar with the matter.
BEIRUT/ISTANBUL An Islamic State car bomb killed more than 50 people on Friday in a Syrian village held by rebels, a war monitor said, a day after the jihadist group was driven from its last stronghold in the area.
BERLIN Europe should impose punitive tariffs on imports from the United States if President Donald Trump acts to shield U.S. industries from foreign competitors, a senior ally of German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in a newspaper interview.
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Opponent of Duterte's drugs war arrested in Philippines on drug charges - Reuters
During his press conference on Thursday, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer was asked whether the Trump administration plans to crack down on states like Colorado and Washington that have legalized recreational marijuana.
Spicer signaled that the Trump administration will break with the Obama administrations policy of not enforcing federal law criminalizing marijuana in states that have taken a different approach.
There are two distinct issues heremedical marijuana and recreational marijuana, Spicer replied. Medical marijuanaIve said before that the president understands the pain and suffering that many people go through who are facing especially terminal diseases and the comfort that some of these drugs including medical marijuana can bring them.
But when the topic turned to recreational marijuana, Spicer conflated it with opioids and indicated the Trump administration is equally opposed to people using it.
When you see something like the opioid addiction crisis blossoming in some the states in the country, the last we should be doing is encouraging people, Spicer said. There is still a federal law that we need to abide by when it comes to recreational marijuana and other drugs of that nature. So, I think there is a big difference between medial marijuana which the states where its allowed have set forth a process to administer and regulate that usage, versus recreational marijuana and thats a very, very different subject.
In response to a follow-up question about whether the federal goverment [is] going to take some sort of action around this recreational marijuana in some of these states, Spicer said that while its a question for the Department of Justice, he does think you will see greater enforcement of it.
Spicers comments dont bode well for those who support relaxing marijuana laws. Attorney General Jeff Sessions is staunchly anti-marijuanahe said last year that good people dont smoke marijuana and called Obama-era drug policy reforms a tragic mistake.
His comments also represent a break from what Trump said during his campaign, when he said, in terms of marijuana and legalization, I think that should be a state issue, state by state.
But the Trump administrations inconsistent interpretation of which issues are states issues and which are federal was on display during other parts of Thursdays news conference.
In a statement sent to ThinkProgress, Marijuana Majority chairman Tom Angell cited a Quinnipiac University poll that was released Wednesday and shows 71 percent of Americans oppose efforts to enforce federal marijuana laws in states that have legalized it.
If the administration is looking for ways to become less popular, cracking down on voter-approved marijuana laws would be a great way to do it, Angell said. On the campaign trail, President Trump clearly and repeatedly pledged that he would leave decisions on cannabis policy to the states. With a clear and growing majority of the country now supporting legalization, reneging on his promises would be a political disaster and huge distraction from the rest of the presidents agenda.
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Trump administration signals new war on drugs, crackdown on marijuana use - ThinkProgress
Malacaang welcomed Thursday the issuance of an arrest order against Sen. Leila de Lima as a fulfillment of President Rodrigo Dutertes war on drugs.
The issuance of a warrant for the arrest of Senator De Lima is a major step forward in the administrations anti-drug war, presidential spokesperson Ernesto Abella said in a statement.
It is a fulfillment of the campaign promise of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte to rid Philippine society of drugs, crime and corruption, Abella added.
The Muntinlupa Regional Trial Court (RTC) issued on Thursday de Limas arrest warrant over charges of illegal drugs filed aginst her.
Abella said the arrest of de Lima demonstrates the Presidents strong resolve to fight pushers, peddlers and their protectors and that his government will not yield until the last pusher and trader are out of the streets victimizing the Filipino youth.
This we owe to the Filipino youth and the future generations for whom we build a nation worthy of Filipinos; and Filipinos worthy of the nation, he said.
De Lima is facing drug charges in connection with her alleged involvement in illegal drugs when she was still a justice secretary. /atm
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Palace: Arrest order vs De Lima a 'fulfillment' of war on drugs - Inquirer.net
Cambodia's war on drugs is in full swing, routinely grabbing headlines as ever-growing numbers of suspects more than 4,000 so far, most of them users swell the Kingdoms jails.
But behind the high-profile raids, the campaign is having an alarming, albeit hidden, side effect, observers say: With the crackdown multiplying risks for drug users, many are shunning health and substitution therapy services offered by NGOs and clinics, thereby increasing the likelihood they will overdose or contract and transmit HIV, AIDS, and tuberculosis.
Data collected by the Khmer HIV/AIDS NGO Alliance (KHANA), a national NGO specialising in HIV prevention, shows that during the first month of Cambodias drug crackdown, the organisation saw a 15 percent reduction in the number of drug users receiving harm reduction services across the board, from 425 people to 359.
These services include needle exchanges, condom and hygiene product distribution, counselling, access to antiretroviral treatment, and HIV education sessions. KHANA also provides transportation for recovering drug addicts to receive methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) at Phnom Penhs Khmer-Soviet Friendship Hospital.
Individual KHANA programs have been even harder hit than a 15 percent total drop would suggest. Participation in its needle-exchange program, for instance, decreased from 138 people to 75 a 46 percent drop.
The reason we supply them with needles is because if we are not supplying them, they continue to share needles, explained KHANAs executive director Chob Sok Chamreun. They inject every day, so to ensure they have enough, we supply them.
KHANA supplies needles at 11 locations, three times a week. However, since the crackdown began, many drug users fear being stopped by police while carrying evidence of their drug use.
Within a month of the crackdowns initiation in January, 21 out of 112 individuals receiving help from KHANA to access MMT stopped reporting for their treatments. Sok Chamreun believes they stopped coming because they feared that police would follow them.
Still, Sok Chamreun cannot be sure if the 21 people stopped MMT because they feared arrest or because they were actually arrested. We dont know where they are; we could not find them, he said.
If those people lost daily doses, it means that they go back to injection and can have very bad withdrawal.
To deal with withdrawal symptoms, he adds, some may ultimately overdose, and an overdose can kill them if they do not have Naloxone, an antidote for opioid overdoses.
Sok Chamreun is particularly concerned about his organisations clients who suffer from tuberculosis (TB) and HIV co-infection.
If those people have TB and stop treatment, that will lead to drug resistance he said. They have to take medicine for six months, but lets say within that period, they just start with one month and they stop receiving it this could lead to drug resistance, and it could weaken the health.
KHANA is still collecting data on the number of its TB-affected clients who have stopped receiving treatment. We dont know who is lost, Sok Chamreun said. We still want to see if these people are arrested or if they have gone somewhere [else].
In separate interviews this week, two drug users, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed Sok Chamreuns concerns about the crackdown dissuading addicts from seeking treatment, while voicing a general sense of hopelessness about their condition.
Now I dont care about any treatment. I live day-to-day with this, said one 32-year-old woman who, in addition to being addicted to heroin, suffers from HIV. The drug campaign has not changed my life because Im still addicted to drugs, she said.
I dont want to abandon it because it is difficult to stop; every day since the campaign, I always find a quiet place to inject, to escape from the police.
After the crackdown began, the woman spent one week in the Prey Speu detention centre after being caught in a drug raid. Sometimes I want to die, she said, but I still make an effort to live with this problem.
One 28-year-old man said that since the crackdown began in January, he has contended with two fears at once: arrest and heroin withdrawal. Every day since the beginning of the drug campaign I am afraid of arrest, he said, and when I see someone new, I always escape.
Last month, the man who is also HIV-positive was arrested and sent to the notorious Orgkas Khnom involuntary rehabilitation centre, where he remained for a week without access to heroin.
Despite fearing arrest, the man said that when it came to his addiction he could not come back. I have been addicted for 10 years, he said, and if I dont use each day, I get sick.
The man said that he once underwent MMT, but is now too lazy to take the medicine. Instead of making a trip to the clinic, he said he continued to buy needles or borrow someones to use.
Another reason providing essential health, hygiene, and addiction recovery treatment services for drug users has become exceedingly difficult during the crackdown has to do with the sudden mobility of drug traffickers.
What you generally have is dealers being quite static, in places where they can be reached easily, says David Harding, an independent drug expert with a decade of experience in Cambodia. To avoid heightened police attention, however, they move to less accessible places, they stay shorter periods of time.
Making drug users, particularly heroin addicts, hunt for their drugs makes life particularly difficult, and risks causing potentially dangerous variations in dosage and quality, says Harding.
Tik Vuthy, a field officer for Korsang an NGO that provides HIV testing, needle exchange and counselling to drug users said on Wednesday that his daily experiences reflect this analysis.
[Drug users] move around a lot more, they follow the dealers, Vuthy said. By the time we find out where they are, weve missed them.
As they move, he continued, the drug users find themselves further away from the services they need. We are trying to persuade them to receive methadone, Vuthy said. [To receive methadone] they must go to the clinic; we cant take the methadone to them.
For those drug users migrating to increasingly remote parts of Phnom Penh to buy drugs, going to receive methadone treatment can appear too costly.
Theres a lot of dropping out [of treatment], said Vuthy.
Multiple calls to the Interior Ministry and the National Police seeking comment for this story were not returned.
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MANILA The Philippine foreign minister on Thursday said he would tell a United Nations rights body that the killings in President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs were not state-sponsored.
More than 7,700 people have been killed since Duterte unleashed the drugs war in June, about 2,500 in what police say are shootouts during raids and sting operations.
Most of the rest are under investigation and activists believe many were extrajudicial killings. Police blame the killings on vigilante groups over which they have no control.
Perfecto Yasay said he would address the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council, comprised of 47 nations, during a session set to run from Monday until March 24.
"Our justice system does not tolerate violations of human rights, does not tolerate any state-sponsored extrajudicial killings," Yasay told reporters. "That's the truth."
Last month, Duterte dismantled police anti-drug units after a South Korean businessman was killed inside the national police headquarters, but vowed to forge ahead with his war on drugs until the last day of his term.
"Divisive fear-mongering" has become a dangerous force in the world, the secretary general of rights group Amnesty International, Salil Shetty, said in a statement this week.
He described leaders like Duterte, U.S. President Donald Trump, and Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan as "wielding a toxic agenda that hounds, scapegoats and dehumanizes entire groups of people".
(Reporting by Manuel Mogato; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
MEXICO CITY Mexico on Thursday expressed "worry and irritation" about U.S. policies to two of President Donald Trump's top envoys, giving a chilly reply to the new administration's hard line on immigration, trade and security.
OTTAWA Prime Minister Justin Trudeau came under increasing pressure on Thursday to deal with asylum seekers illegally crossing into Canada from the United States to avoid a crackdown by the administration of President Donald Trump.
MANILA A Philippine senator and staunch critic of President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs was in police custody on Friday following her high-profile arrest for drugs offences that she described as a vendetta that would fail to silence her.
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Philippines to defend Duterte's drug war at UN rights body - Reuters