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Barbados introduces plan to allow visitors to work remotely there for a year – Yahoo Money

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Barbados wants to help fix your COVID-19 cabin fever by offering a change of scenery for a year.

The Caribbean island is considering allowing visitors to stay for up to 12 months, extending the previous limit for U.S. passport holders without a visa by six months.

Barbados Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley announced the 12-month Barbados Welcome Stamp earlier this month that would allow persons to come and work from here overseas, digitally so, so that persons dont need to remain in the countries in which they are, Mottley said in a press conference.

Mottley noted that working remotely doesn't mean youhave to physically work near your office, making the case that living elsewhere or even abroad is possible for some occupations that simply require a reliable internet connection to accomplish work.

She continued: The government is committed to working with you on the promotion of new concepts like the 12-month Barbados Welcome Stamp, being able to open our borders to persons traveling and making it as hospitable as ever for all of us, and making it available for Barbadians from every walk of life to believe that for special occasions, or just for so, that they can come out and be a part of this wonderful exercise.

Read more: Coronavirus and travel: What you need to know as states reopen

Work-from-home is the new normal for many office jobs since the pandemic, with big-name companies like Facebook and Twitter leading the trend towards working from home as a permanent arrangement. Economists predict that in a post-COVID world companies will have as many as 74% of their workforces go remote.

And the change offers employees, especially those who were once beholden to large cities with expensive living costs, to live where its cheaper.

The country has 98 confirmed COVID-19 cases, according to the U.S. Embassy in Barbados, the Eastern Caribbean, and the OECS.

Story continues

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has designated Barbados its highest degree of Level 3 - Travel Health Notice, meaning there is widespread ongoing transmission without restriction on entry to the United States and to avoid non-essential travel.

Earlier this month, Barbados started to relax and lift certain restrictions. The country no longer abides by a curfew, social gatherings for up to 500 people can now take place, and three feet instead of the U.S.s requisite six feet is sufficient for social distancing.

To ensure that international visitors dont bring COVID-19 with them, the government set forth strict guidelines for entry.

Upon arrival, you will have a mandatory health assessment that may entail a temperature check and brief interview by a government official. Those under the age of five are exempt from testing.

If you arrive in Barbados with a negative COVID-19 test from an accredited lab or clinic that was administered within 72 hours prior to travel, you can be considered for fast-tracking through immigration.

If you dont have a COVID-19 test, you can still arrive in the country and get tested at the airport free of charge. Testing will also take place at certain hotels for a fee of $150 USD.

Read more: Coronavirus and travel: Here are the states where travelers must self-quarantine

Test results typically come back within 24 hours, and during that time visitors are permitted to stay in a designated holding hotel or temporary government housing free of charge.

After your test comes back negative, youre free to carry on with your vacation or extended stay. On the other hand, if your test results are positive, you wont be given the option to travel home. Instead, youll be transported to an alternative accommodation for isolation and treatment. Only after your recovery will you be allowed to resume your time in Barbados or head home.

Being an island nation, air travel is the easiest form of accessibility.

Commercial flights to Grantley Adams International Airport (BGI), the countrys main international gateway, will resume beginning July 12.

When planning your travel, be aware that face masks are required to be worn while in the airport. Consult the CDC for guidelines and safety measures while traveling.

It sounds like wherever you want to, according to Mottley.

Extended-stay visitors can find accommodations in villas, condominiums, hotel rooms, and rental houses. There will also be workspaces available if you desire a work-life separation.

Emphasizing the remote in remote working is a great idea in theory, except if you dont have a strong internet connection.

Mottley addressed the concern: In terms of broadband, we have two major telecommunications companies, and at the same time we are looking to see how we can continue to boost our national television station and move it from being a broadcasting entity to digital services.

The country officially opens its borders to international visitors on July 12, 2020.

Stephanie is a reporter for Yahoo Money andCashay, a new personal finance website. Follow her on Twitter@SJAsymkos.

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Barbados introduces plan to allow visitors to work remotely there for a year - Yahoo Money

Meme – Wikipedia

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Not to be confused with Mime.This article is about the term "meme" in general. For the usage of the term on the internet (or a trend that spreads quickly), see Internet meme. For other uses, see Meme (disambiguation).

Thought or idea that can be shared, in analogy to a gene

A meme ( MEEM[1][2][3]) is an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme.[4] A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols, or practices, that can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena with a mimicked theme. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes in that they self-replicate, mutate, and respond to selective pressures.[5]

Proponents theorize that memes are a viral phenomenon that may evolve by natural selection in a manner analogous to that of biological evolution.[citation needed][who?] Memes do this through the processes of variation, mutation, competition, and inheritance, each of which influences a meme's reproductive success. Memes spread through the behavior that they generate in their hosts. Memes that propagate less prolifically may become extinct, while others may survive, spread, and (for better or for worse) mutate. Memes that replicate most effectively enjoy more success, and some may replicate effectively even when they prove to be detrimental to the welfare of their hosts.[6]

A field of study called memetics[7] arose in the 1990s to explore the concepts and transmission of memes in terms of an evolutionary model. Criticism from a variety of fronts has challenged the notion that academic study can examine memes empirically. However, developments in neuroimaging may make empirical study possible.[8] Some commentators in the social sciences question the idea that one can meaningfully categorize culture in terms of discrete units, and are especially critical of the biological nature of the theory's underpinnings.[9] Others have argued that this use of the term is the result of a misunderstanding of the original proposal.[10]

The word meme is a neologism coined by Richard Dawkins.[11] It originated from Dawkins's 1976 book The Selfish Gene. Dawkins's own position is somewhat ambiguous: he welcomed N. K. Humphrey's suggestion that "memes should be considered as living structures, not just metaphorically"[12] and proposed to regard memes as "physically residing in the brain".[13] Later, he argued that his original intentions, presumably before his approval of Humphrey's opinion, had been simpler.[14]

The word meme is a shortening (modeled on gene) of mimeme (from Ancient Greek pronounced[mmma] mmma, "imitated thing", from mimeisthai, "to imitate", from mimos, "mime")[15] coined by British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene (1976)[11][16] as a concept for discussion of evolutionary principles in explaining the spread of ideas and cultural phenomena. Examples of memes given in the book included melodies, catchphrases, fashion, and the technology of building arches.[17] Kenneth Pike had in 1954 coined the related terms emic and etic, generalizing the linguistic units of phoneme, morpheme, grapheme, lexeme, and tagmeme (as set out by Leonard Bloomfield), distinguishing insider and outside views of communicative behavior.[18]

The word meme originated with Richard Dawkins' 1976 book The Selfish Gene. Dawkins cites as inspiration the work of geneticist L. L. Cavalli-Sforza, anthropologist F. T. Cloak[19] and ethologist J. M. Cullen.[20] Dawkins wrote that evolution depended not on the particular chemical basis of genetics, but only on the existence of a self-replicating unit of transmissionin the case of biological evolution, the gene. For Dawkins, the meme exemplified another self-replicating unit with potential significance in explaining human behavior and cultural evolution. Although Dawkins invented the term 'meme' and developed meme theory, the possibility that ideas were subject to the same pressures of evolution as were biological attributes was discussed in Darwin's time. T. H. Huxley claimed that 'The struggle for existence holds as much in the intellectual as in the physical world. A theory is a species of thinking, and its right to exist is coextensive with its power of resisting extinction by its rivals.'[21]

Dawkins used the term to refer to any cultural entity that an observer might consider a replicator. He hypothesized that one could view many cultural entities as replicators, and pointed to melodies, fashions and learned skills as examples. Memes generally replicate through exposure to humans, who have evolved as efficient copiers of information and behavior. Because humans do not always copy memes perfectly, and because they may refine, combine or otherwise modify them with other memes to create new memes, they can change over time. Dawkins likened the process by which memes survive and change through the evolution of culture to the natural selection of genes in biological evolution.[17]

Dawkins defined the meme as a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation and replication, but later definitions would vary. The lack of a consistent, rigorous, and precise understanding of what typically makes up one unit of cultural transmission remains a problem in debates about memetics.[23] In contrast, the concept of genetics gained concrete evidence with the discovery of the biological functions of DNA. Meme transmission requires a physical medium, such as photons, sound waves, touch, taste, or smell because memes can be transmitted only through the senses.

Dawkins noted that in a society with culture a person need not have descendants to remain influential in the actions of individuals thousands of years after their death:

But if you contribute to the world's culture, if you have a good idea...it may live on, intact, long after your genes have dissolved in the common pool. Socrates may or may not have a gene or two alive in the world today, as G.C. Williams has remarked, but who cares? The meme-complexes of Socrates, Leonardo, Copernicus and Marconi are still going strong.[24]

Although Dawkins invented the term meme, he has not claimed that the idea was entirely novel,[25] and there have been other expressions for similar ideas in the past.[26] In 1904, Richard Semon published Die Mneme (which appeared in English in 1924 as The Mneme). The term mneme was also used in Maurice Maeterlinck's The Life of the White Ant (1926), with some parallels to Dawkins's concept.[26]

Memes, analogously to genes, vary in their aptitude to replicate; successful memes remain and spread, whereas unfit ones stall and are forgotten. Thus memes that prove more effective at replicating and surviving are selected in the meme pool.

Memes first need retention. The longer a meme stays in its hosts, the higher its chances of propagation are. When a host uses a meme, the meme's life is extended.[27] The reuse of the neural space hosting a certain meme's copy to host different memes is the greatest threat to that meme's copy.[28]

A meme which increases the longevity of its hosts will generally survive longer. On the contrary, a meme which shortens the longevity of its hosts will tend to disappear faster. However, as hosts are mortal, retention is not sufficient to perpetuate a meme in the long term; memes also need transmission.

Life-forms can transmit information both vertically (from parent to child, via replication of genes) and horizontally (through viruses and other means).Memes can replicate vertically or horizontally within a single biological generation. They may also lie dormant for long periods of time.

Memes reproduce by copying from a nervous system to another one, either by communication or imitation. Imitation often involves the copying of an observed behavior of another individual. Communication may be direct or indirect, where memes transmit from one individual to another through a copy recorded in an inanimate source, such as a book or a musical score. Adam McNamara has suggested that memes can be thereby classified as either internal or external memes (i-memes or e-memes).[8]

Some commentators have likened the transmission of memes to the spread of contagions.[29] Social contagions such as fads, hysteria, copycat crime, and copycat suicide exemplify memes seen as the contagious imitation of ideas. Observers distinguish the contagious imitation of memes from instinctively contagious phenomena such as yawning and laughing, which they consider innate (rather than socially learned) behaviors.[30]

Aaron Lynch described seven general patterns of meme transmission, or "thought contagion":[31]

Dawkins initially defined meme as a noun that "conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation".[17] John S. Wilkins retained the notion of meme as a kernel of cultural imitation while emphasizing the meme's evolutionary aspect, defining the meme as "the least unit of sociocultural information relative to a selection process that has favorable or unfavorable selection bias that exceeds its endogenous tendency to change".[32] The meme as a unit provides a convenient means of discussing "a piece of thought copied from person to person", regardless of whether that thought contains others inside it, or forms part of a larger meme. A meme could consist of a single word, or a meme could consist of the entire speech in which that word first occurred. This forms an analogy to the idea of a gene as a single unit of self-replicating information found on the self-replicating chromosome.

While the identification of memes as "units" conveys their nature to replicate as discrete, indivisible entities, it does not imply that thoughts somehow become quantized or that "atomic" ideas exist that cannot be dissected into smaller pieces. A meme has no given size. Susan Blackmore writes that melodies from Beethoven's symphonies are commonly used to illustrate the difficulty involved in delimiting memes as discrete units. She notes that while the first four notes of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony (listen(helpinfo)) form a meme widely replicated as an independent unit, one can regard the entire symphony as a single meme as well.[23]

The inability to pin an idea or cultural feature to quantifiable key units is widely acknowledged as a problem for memetics. It has been argued however that the traces of memetic processing can be quantified utilizing neuroimaging techniques which measure changes in the connectivity profiles between brain regions."[8] Blackmore meets such criticism by stating that memes compare with genes in this respect: that while a gene has no particular size, nor can we ascribe every phenotypic feature directly to a particular gene, it has value because it encapsulates that key unit of inherited expression subject to evolutionary pressures. To illustrate, she notes evolution selects for the gene for features such as eye color; it does not select for the individual nucleotide in a strand of DNA. Memes play a comparable role in understanding the evolution of imitated behaviors.[23]

The 1981 book Genes, Mind, and Culture: The Coevolutionary Process by Charles J. Lumsden and E. O. Wilson proposed the theory that genes and culture co-evolve, and that the fundamental biological units of culture must correspond to neuronal networks that function as nodes of semantic memory. They coined their own word, "culturgen", which did not catch on. Coauthor Wilson later acknowledged the term meme as the best label for the fundamental unit of cultural inheritance in his 1998 book Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, which elaborates upon the fundamental role of memes in unifying the natural and social sciences.[33]

Dawkins noted the three conditions that must exist for evolution to occur:[34]

Dawkins emphasizes that the process of evolution naturally occurs whenever these conditions co-exist, and that evolution does not apply only to organic elements such as genes. He regards memes as also having the properties necessary for evolution, and thus sees meme evolution as not simply analogous to genetic evolution, but as a real phenomenon subject to the laws of natural selection. Dawkins noted that as various ideas pass from one generation to the next, they may either enhance or detract from the survival of the people who obtain those ideas, or influence the survival of the ideas themselves. For example, a certain culture may develop unique designs and methods of tool-making that give it a competitive advantage over another culture. Each tool-design thus acts somewhat similarly to a biological gene in that some populations have it and others do not, and the meme's function directly affects the presence of the design in future generations. In keeping with the thesis that in evolution one can regard organisms simply as suitable "hosts" for reproducing genes, Dawkins argues that one can view people as "hosts" for replicating memes. Consequently, a successful meme may or may not need to provide any benefit to its host.[34]

Unlike genetic evolution, memetic evolution can show both Darwinian and Lamarckian traits. Cultural memes will have the characteristic of Lamarckian inheritance when a host aspires to replicate the given meme through inference rather than by exactly copying it. Take for example the case of the transmission of a simple skill such as hammering a nail, a skill that a learner imitates from watching a demonstration without necessarily imitating every discrete movement modeled by the teacher in the demonstration, stroke for stroke.[35] Susan Blackmore distinguishes the difference between the two modes of inheritance in the evolution of memes, characterizing the Darwinian mode as "copying the instructions" and the Lamarckian as "copying the product."[23]

Clusters of memes, or memeplexes (also known as meme complexes or as memecomplexes), such as cultural or political doctrines and systems, may also play a part in the acceptance of new memes. Memeplexes comprise groups of memes that replicate together and coadapt.[23] Memes that fit within a successful memeplex may gain acceptance by "piggybacking" on the success of the memeplex.As an example, John D. Gottsch discusses the transmission, mutation and selection of religious memeplexes and the theistic memes contained.[36] Theistic memes discussed include the "prohibition of aberrant sexual practices such as incest, adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, castration, and religious prostitution", which may have increased vertical transmission of the parent religious memeplex. Similar memes are thereby included in the majority of religious memeplexes, and harden over time; they become an "inviolable canon" or set of dogmas, eventually finding their way into secular law. This could also be referred to as the propagation of a taboo.

The discipline of memetics, which dates from the mid-1980s, provides an approach to evolutionary models of cultural information transfer based on the concept of the meme. Memeticists have proposed that just as memes function analogously to genes, memetics functions analogously to genetics. Memetics attempts to apply conventional scientific methods (such as those used in population genetics and epidemiology) to explain existing patterns and transmission of cultural ideas.

Principal criticisms of memetics include the claim that memetics ignores established advances in other fields of cultural study, such as sociology, cultural anthropology, cognitive psychology, and social psychology. Questions remain whether or not the meme concept counts as a validly disprovable scientific theory. This view regards memetics as a theory in its infancy: a protoscience to proponents, or a pseudoscience to some detractors.

An objection to the study of the evolution of memes in genetic terms (although not to the existence of memes) involves a perceived gap in the gene/meme analogy: the cumulative evolution of genes depends on biological selection-pressures neither too great nor too small in relation to mutation-rates. There seems no reason to think that the same balance will exist in the selection pressures on memes.[37]

Luis Benitez-Bribiesca M.D., a critic of memetics, calls the theory a "pseudoscientific dogma" and "a dangerous idea that poses a threat to the serious study of consciousness and cultural evolution". As a factual criticism, Benitez-Bribiesca points to the lack of a "code script" for memes (analogous to the DNA of genes), and to the excessive instability of the meme mutation mechanism (that of an idea going from one brain to another), which would lead to a low replication accuracy and a high mutation rate, rendering the evolutionary process chaotic.[38]

British political philosopher John Gray has characterized Dawkins's memetic theory of religion as "nonsense" and "not even a theory... the latest in a succession of ill-judged Darwinian metaphors", comparable to Intelligent Design in its value as a science.[39]

Another critique comes from semiotic theorists such as Deacon[40] and Kull.[41] This view regards the concept of "meme" as a primitivized concept of "sign". The meme is thus described in memetics as a sign lacking a triadic nature. Semioticians can regard a meme as a "degenerate" sign, which includes only its ability of being copied. Accordingly, in the broadest sense, the objects of copying are memes, whereas the objects of translation and interpretation are signs.[clarification needed]

Fracchia and Lewontin regard memetics as reductionist and inadequate.[42] Evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr disapproved of Dawkins's gene-based view and usage of the term "meme", asserting it to be an "unnecessary synonym" for "concept", reasoning that concepts are not restricted to an individual or a generation, may persist for long periods of time, and may evolve.[43]

Opinions differ as to how best to apply the concept of memes within a "proper" disciplinary framework. One view sees memes as providing a useful philosophical perspective with which to examine cultural evolution. Proponents of this view (such as Susan Blackmore and Daniel Dennett) argue that considering cultural developments from a meme's-eye viewas if memes themselves respond to pressure to maximise their own replication and survivalcan lead to useful insights and yield valuable predictions into how culture develops over time. Others such as Bruce Edmonds and Robert Aunger have focused on the need to provide an empirical grounding for memetics to become a useful and respected scientific discipline.[44][45]

A third approach, described by Joseph Poulshock, as "radical memetics" seeks to place memes at the centre of a materialistic theory of mind and of personal identity.[46]

Prominent researchers in evolutionary psychology and anthropology, including Scott Atran, Dan Sperber, Pascal Boyer, John Tooby and others, argue the possibility of incompatibility between modularity of mind and memetics.[citation needed] In their view, minds structure certain communicable aspects of the ideas produced, and these communicable aspects generally trigger or elicit ideas in other minds through inference (to relatively rich structures generated from often low-fidelity input) and not high-fidelity replication or imitation. Atran discusses communication involving religious beliefs as a case in point. In one set of experiments he asked religious people to write down on a piece of paper the meanings of the Ten Commandments. Despite the subjects' own expectations of consensus, interpretations of the commandments showed wide ranges of variation, with little evidence of consensus. In another experiment, subjects with autism and subjects without autism interpreted ideological and religious sayings (for example, "Let a thousand flowers bloom" or "To everything there is a season"). People with autism showed a significant tendency to closely paraphrase and repeat content from the original statement (for example: "Don't cut flowers before they bloom"). Controls tended to infer a wider range of cultural meanings with little replicated content (for example: "Go with the flow" or "Everyone should have equal opportunity"). Only the subjects with autismwho lack the degree of inferential capacity normally associated with aspects of theory of mindcame close to functioning as "meme machines".[47]

In his book The Robot's Rebellion, Stanovich uses the memes and memeplex concepts to describe a program of cognitive reform that he refers to as a "rebellion". Specifically, Stanovich argues that the use of memes as a descriptor for cultural units is beneficial because it serves to emphasize transmission and acquisition properties that parallel the study of epidemiology. These properties make salient the sometimes parasitic nature of acquired memes, and as a result individuals should be motivated to reflectively acquire memes using what he calls a "Neurathian bootstrap" process.[48]

Although social scientists such as Max Weber sought to understand and explain religion in terms of a cultural attribute, Richard Dawkins called for a re-analysis of religion in terms of the evolution of self-replicating ideas apart from any resulting biological advantages they might bestow.

As an enthusiastic Darwinian, I have been dissatisfied with explanations that my fellow-enthusiasts have offered for human behaviour. They have tried to look for 'biological advantages' in various attributes of human civilization. For instance, tribal religion has been seen as a mechanism for solidifying group identity, valuable for a pack-hunting species whose individuals rely on cooperation to catch large and fast prey. Frequently the evolutionary preconception in terms of which such theories are framed is implicitly group-selectionist, but it is possible to rephrase the theories in terms of orthodox gene selection.

He argued that the role of key replicator in cultural evolution belongs not to genes, but to memes replicating thought from person to person by means of imitation. These replicators respond to selective pressures that may or may not affect biological reproduction or survival.[17]

In her book The Meme Machine, Susan Blackmore regards religions as particularly tenacious memes. Many of the features common to the most widely practiced religions provide built-in advantages in an evolutionary context, she writes. For example, religions that preach of the value of faith over evidence from everyday experience or reason inoculate societies against many of the most basic tools people commonly use to evaluate their ideas. By linking altruism with religious affiliation, religious memes can proliferate more quickly because people perceive that they can reap societal as well as personal rewards. The longevity of religious memes improves with their documentation in revered religious texts.[23]

Aaron Lynch attributed the robustness of religious memes in human culture to the fact that such memes incorporate multiple modes of meme transmission. Religious memes pass down the generations from parent to child and across a single generation through the meme-exchange of proselytism. Most people will hold the religion taught them by their parents throughout their life. Many religions feature adversarial elements, punishing apostasy, for instance, or demonizing infidels. In Thought Contagion Lynch identifies the memes of transmission in Christianity as especially powerful in scope. Believers view the conversion of non-believers both as a religious duty and as an act of altruism. The promise of heaven to believers and threat of hell to non-believers provide a strong incentive for members to retain their belief. Lynch asserts that belief in the Crucifixion of Jesus in Christianity amplifies each of its other replication advantages through the indebtedness believers have to their Savior for sacrifice on the cross. The image of the crucifixion recurs in religious sacraments, and the proliferation of symbols of the cross in homes and churches potently reinforces the wide array of Christian memes.[31]

Although religious memes have proliferated in human cultures, the modern scientific community has been relatively resistant to religious belief. Robertson (2007) [49] reasoned that if evolution is accelerated in conditions of propagative difficulty,[50] then we would expect to encounter variations of religious memes, established in general populations, addressed to scientific communities. Using a memetic approach, Robertson deconstructed two attempts to privilege religiously held spirituality in scientific discourse. Advantages of a memetic approach as compared to more traditional "modernization" and "supply side" theses in understanding the evolution and propagation of religion were explored.

In Cultural Software: A Theory of Ideology, Jack Balkin argued that memetic processes can explain many of the most familiar features of ideological thought. His theory of "cultural software" maintained that memes form narratives, social networks, metaphoric and metonymic models, and a variety of different mental structures. Balkin maintains that the same structures used to generate ideas about free speech or free markets also serve to generate racistic beliefs. To Balkin, whether memes become harmful or maladaptive depends on the environmental context in which they exist rather than in any special source or manner to their origination. Balkin describes racist beliefs as "fantasy" memes that become harmful or unjust "ideologies" when diverse peoples come together, as through trade or competition.[51]

In A Theory of Architecture, Nikos Salingaros speaks of memes as "freely propagating clusters of information" which can be beneficial or harmful. He contrasts memes to patterns and true knowledge, characterizing memes as "greatly simplified versions of patterns" and as "unreasoned matching to some visual or mnemonic prototype".[52] Taking reference to Dawkins, Salingaros emphasizes that they can be transmitted due to their own communicative properties, that "the simpler they are, the faster they can proliferate", and that the most successful memes "come with a great psychological appeal".[53]

Architectural memes, according to Salingaros, can have destructive power. "Images portrayed in architectural magazines representing buildings that could not possibly accommodate everyday uses become fixed in our memory, so we reproduce them unconsciously."[54] He lists various architectural memes that circulated since the 1920s and which, in his view, have led to contemporary architecture becoming quite decoupled from human needs. They lack connection and meaning, thereby preventing "the creation of true connections necessary to our understanding of the world". He sees them as no different from antipatterns in software designas solutions that are false but are re-utilized nonetheless.[55]

An "Internet meme" is a concept that spreads rapidly from person to person via the Internet, largely through Internet-based E-mailing, blogs, forums, imageboards like 4chan, social networking sites like Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter, instant messaging, social news sites or thread sites like Reddit, and video hosting services like YouTube and Twitch.[56]

In 2013, Richard Dawkins characterized an Internet meme as one deliberately altered by human creativity, distinguished from Dawkins's original idea involving mutation "by random change and a form of Darwinian selection".[57]

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Meme - Wikipedia

Memetics | Psychology Wiki | Fandom

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Biological:Behavioural genetics Evolutionary psychology Neuroanatomy Neurochemistry Neuroendocrinology Neuroscience Psychoneuroimmunology Physiological Psychology Psychopharmacology(Index, Outline)

Memetics is an approach to evolutionary models of information transfer based on the concept of the meme.

The term comes from a transliteration of a Greek word and was used in 1904 by the German evolutionary biologist Richard Semon in his work Die Mnemische Empfindungen in ihren Beziehungen zu den Originalenempfindungen, translated into English in 1921 as The Mneme.

In his book The Selfish Gene (1976), the ethologist Richard Dawkins coined the slightly different term "meme" to describe a unit of human cultural evolution analogous to the gene, arguing that replication also happens in culture, albeit in a different sense. In his book, Dawkins contended that the meme is a unit of information residing in the brain and is the mutating replicator in human cultural evolution. It is a pattern that can influence its surroundings and can propagate. This created great debate among sociologists, biologists, and scientists of other disciplines, because Dawkins himself did not provide a sufficient explanation of how the replication of units of information in the brain controls human behavior and ultimately culture, since the principal topic of the book was genetics. Dawkins apparently did not intend to present a comprehensive theory of memetics in The Selfish Gene, but rather coined the term meme in a speculative spirit. Accordingly, the term "unit of information" came to be defined in different ways by many scientists.

The modern memetics movement dates from the mid 1980s (a January 1983 Metamagical Themas column by Douglas Hofstadter in Scientific American was influential). The study differs from mainstream cultural evolutionary theory in that its practitioners frequently come from outside of the fields of anthropology and sociology, and are often not academics. The massive popular impact of Dawkins' The Selfish Gene has undoubtedly been an important factor in drawing in people of disparate intellectual backgrounds. Another crucial stimulus was the publication in 1992 of Consciousness Explained by Tufts University philosopher Daniel Dennett, which incorporated the meme concept into an influential theory of the mind. In his 1993 essay Viruses of the Mind, Richard Dawkins used memetics to explain the phenomenon of religious belief and the various characteristics of organised religions.

However, the foundation of memetics in full modern incarnation originates in the publication in 1996, of two books by authors outside of the academic mainstream: Virus of the Mind: The New Science of the Meme by former Microsoft executive turned motivational speaker and professional poker player, Richard Brodie, and Thought Contagion: How Belief Spreads Through Society by Aaron Lynch, a mathematician and philosopher who worked for many years as an engineer at Fermilab. Lynch conceived his theory totally independently of any contact with academics in the cultural evolutionary sphere, and apparently was not even aware of Dawkins' The Selfish Gene until his book was very close to publication.

Around the same time as the publication of the books by Lynch and Brodie, a new e-journal appeared on the web, hosted by the Centre for Policy Modelling at Manchester Metropolitan University Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission. (There had been a short-lived paper memetics publication starting in 1990, the Journal of Ideas edited by Elan Moritz. [1]) The e-journal soon became the central point for publication and debate within the nascent memetics community. In 1999, Susan Blackmore, a psychologist at the University of the West of England, published The Meme Machine, which more fully worked out the ideas of Dennett, Lynch and Brodie and attempted to compare and contrast them with various approaches from the cultural evolutionary mainstream, as well as providing novel, and controversial, memetic-based theories for the evolution of language and the human sense of individual selfhood.

The memetics movement split almost immediately into those who wanted to stick to Dawkins' definition of a meme as "a unit of information in the brain", and those who wanted to redefine it as observable cultural artefacts and behaviours. These two schools became known as the "internalists" and the "externalists". Prominent internalists included both Lynch and Brodie; the most vocal externalists included Derek Gatherer, a geneticist from Liverpool John Moores University and William Benzon, a writer on cultural evolution and music. The main rationale for externalism was that internal brain entities are not observable, and memetics cannot advance as a science, especially a quantitative science, unless it moves its emphasis onto the directly quantifiable aspects of culture. Internalists countered with various arguments: that brain states will eventually be directly observable with advanced technology, that most cultural anthropologists agree that culture is about beliefs and not artefacts, or that artefacts cannot be replicators in the same sense as mental entities (or DNA) are replicators. The debate became so heated that a 1998 Symposium on Memetics, organised as part of the 15th International Conference on Cybernetics, passed a motion calling for an end to definitional debates.

The most advanced statement of the internalist school came in 2002 with the publication of The Electric Meme, by Robert Aunger, an anthropologist from the University of Cambridge. Aunger also organised a conference in Cambridge in 1999, at which prominent sociologists and anthropologists were able to give their assessment of the progress made in memetics to that date. This resulted in the publication of Darwinizing Culture: The Status of Memetics as a Science, edited by Aunger and with a foreward by Dennett, in 2000.

In 2005, Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission ceased publication and published a set of 'obituaries' for memetics. This was not intended to suggest that there can be no further work on memetics, but that the exciting childhood of memetics, which began in 1996, is finally drawing to a close, and that memetics will have to survive or become extinct in terms of the results it can generate for the field of cultural evolution. Memetics as a social, Internet-fueled popular scientific movement is now probably over. Many of the original proponents have moved away from it. Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett have both expressed some reservations as to its applicability, Susan Blackmore has left the University of the West of England to become a freelance science writer and now concentrates more on the field of consciousness and cognitive science. Derek Gatherer found the academic world of the north of England to be unsympathetic to his ideas, and gave up to work as a computer programmer in the pharmaceutical industry, although he still publishes the odd memetics article from time to time. Richard Brodie is now climbing the world professional poker rankings. Aaron Lynch disowned the memetics community and the words "meme" and "memetics" (without disowning the ideas in his book).

Susan Blackmore (2002) re-stated the meme definition as whatever is copied from one person to another person, whether habits, skills, songs, stories, or any other kind of information. Further she said that memes, like genes, are replicators. That is, they are information that is copied with variation and selection. Because only some of the variants survive, memes (and hence human cultures) evolve. Memes are copied by imitation, teaching and other methods, and they compete for space in our memories and for the chance to be copied again. Large groups of memes that are copied and passed on together are called co-adapted meme complexes, or memeplexes. In her definition, thus, the way that a meme replicates is through imitation. This requires brain capacity to generally imitate a model or selectively imitate the model. Since the process of social learning varies from one person to another, the imitation process cannot be said to be completely imitated. The sameness of an idea may be expressed with different memes supporting it. This is to say that the mutation rate in memetic evolution is extremely high, and mutations are even possible within each and every interaction of the imitation process. It becomes very interesting when we see that a social system composed of a complex network of microinteractions exists, but at the macro level an order emerges to create culture.

Dawkins responds in A Devil's Chaplain that there are actually two different types of memetic processes. The first is a type of cultural idea, action, or expression, which does have high variance; for instance, a student of his who had inherited some of the mannerisms of Wittgenstein. However, he also describes a self-correcting meme, highly resistant to mutation. As an example of this, he gives origami patterns in elementary schoolsexcept in rare cases, the meme is either passed on in the exact sequence of instructions, or (in the case of a forgetful child) terminates. This type of meme tends not to evolve, and to experience profound mutations in the rare event that it does. Some memeticists, however, see this as more of a continuum of meme strength, rather than two types of memes.

Another definition, given by Hokky Situngkir, tried to offer a more rigorous formalism for the meme, memeplexes, and the deme, seeing the meme as a cultural unit in a cultural complex system. It is based on the Darwinian genetic algorithm with some modifications to account for the different patterns of evolution seen in genes and memes. In the method of memetics as the way to see culture as a complex adaptive system, he describes a way to see memetics as an alternative methodology of cultural evolution. However, there are as many possible definitions that are credited to the word "meme". For example, in the sense of computer simulation the term memetic programming is used to define a particular computational viewpoint.

Memetics can be simply understood as a method for scientific analysis of cultural evolution. However, proponents of memetics as described in the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission believe that 'memetics' has the potential to be an important and promising analysis of culture using the framework of evolutionary concepts. Keith Henson who wrote Memetics and the Modular-Mind (Analog Aug. 1987) [2] makes the case that memetics needs to incorporate Evolutionary psychology to understand the psychological traits of a meme's host. [3] This is especially true of time varying host traits, such as those leading to wars.

The application of memetics to a difficult complex social system problem, environmental sustainability, has recently been attempted at thwink.org. Using meme types and memetic infection in several stock and flow simulation models, Jack Harich has demonstrated several interesting phenomenon that are best, and perhaps only, explained by memes. One model, The Dueling Loops of the Political Powerplace, argues that the fundamental reason corruption is the norm in politics is due to an inherent structural advantage of one feedback loop pitted against another. Another model, The Memetic Evolution of Solutions to Difficult Problems, uses memes, the evolutionary algorithm, and the scientific method to show how complex solutions evolve over time and how that process can be improved. The insights gained from these models are being used to engineer memetic solution elements to the sustainability problem.

In Selfish Sounds and Linguistic Evolution (2004, Cambridge University Press), Austrian linguist Nikolaus Ritt has attempted to operationalise memetic concepts and use them for the explanation of long term sound changes and change conspiracies in early English. It is argued that a generalised Darwinian framework for handling cultural change can provide explanations where established, speaker centered approaches fail to do so. The book makes comparatively concrete suggestions about the possible material structure of memes, and provides two empirically rather rich case studies.

Memeoid is a neologism for people who have been taken over by a meme to the extent that that their own survival becomes inconsequential. Examples include kamikazes, suicide bombers and cult members who commit mass suicide. Compare with Zombie

The term was apparently coined by H. Keith Henson in "Memes, L5 and the Religion of the Space Colonies," L5 News, 1985 pp 5-8, [4] and referenced in Richard Dawkins' book The Selfish Gene, 2nd ed., page 330. ISBN 0-19-286092-5.

Memotype is the actual information-content of a meme.

A meme-complex (sometimes abbreviated memeplex, sometimes miss-pronounced/spelled Memoplex) is a collection or grouping of memes that have evolved into a mutually supportive or symbiotic relationship. Simply put, a meme-complex is a set of ideas that reinforce each other. Meme-complexes are roughly analogous to the symbiotic collection of individual genes that make up the genetic codes of biological organisms. An example of a Memeplex would be a religion.

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Memetics | Psychology Wiki | Fandom

Bullhead City, AZ to close beaches on weekends through September amid COVID-19 – VVNG.com

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

BULLHEAD CITY, AZ Bullhead City Mayor Tom Brady issued a proclamation on July 7, 2020, closing down all City beaches and boat launches on weekends.

The proclamation declares that all City beaches, boat launches and associated parks will be closed for the remainder of the summer on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays to slow the spread of COVID-19. The parks will be open to the public Monday-Thursday.

Closed Friday, Saturday and Sunday:

Today I am issuing an order to close the beaches and boat launches in Bullhead City parks from Friday through Sunday of each week through Labor Day weekend. This decision, along with the decision regarding the wearing of face coverings, has been an extremely difficult one to make, and it is done with a full understanding of the repercussions to our citizens and our business community.Throughout this entire pandemic, I, as well as the city manager and police chief, have been involved in countless daily meetings and briefings with the top medical professionals, health care administrators, first responders and the governors office. Our top priority in every decision has been the ability of our medical community and first responders to safely deliver all the resources necessary to those who need treatment from this disease. This includes hospital beds, ventilators, personal protective equipment, testing, and adequate staffing to name just a few. Until recently, the information we received locally was that we were prepared and our number of confirmed cases was low.Now we are being told that hospitals elsewhere in Arizona are being overrun and that they are transferring them to rural hospitals that still have capacity. That hasnt happened yet in Bullhead City, but our number of positive cases is spiking and our hospital admissions are climbing enough that it is time to take further actions.Initially we resisted the mandatory face covering order and strongly encouraged our citizens and businesses to voluntarily comply. That didnt work and with the numbers rising dramatically, I was forced into the hard decision of making them mandatory in all indoor public spaces.I had hoped that since we control only a few areas of the Colorado River shoreline, we could keep them open by reducing the numbers of visitors allowed to an acceptable level for social distancing. However, last weekend our out-of-towners figured out a way to thwart our plan, and they crowded our beaches to socially unacceptable levels. In trying to control large crowds moving forward, I now realize our limitations and believe that no matter what the City does, non-compliance and overcrowding will continue to occur, which is not acceptable in trying to stem the spread of this virus. As such, under a new proclamation with further details, I am closing city controlled beaches and boat launches and associated parking lots on Fridays through Sundays.Together we will get through this pandemic, but it requires each of us to do our part in stopping the spread. Lets all pray that it ends quickly with no more suffering or fatalities.

(Bullhead City Parks and Recreation news release)

Bullhead City, AZ to close beaches on weekends through September amid COVID-19 - VVNG.com

Beaches remain closed for investigation after teen killed by shark on NSW Mid North Coast – ABC News

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Beaches in the Clarence Valley along the NSW Mid North Coast remain closed after a fatal great white shark attack yesterday.

Surf Life Saving NSW said drones and jet skis would patrol the waters to assist a Department of Primary Industry investigations.

It has advised people in the region not to enter the water until further notice.

Mani Hart-Deville, a 15-year-old student from Minnie Water, died after being attacked at Wooli Beach on Saturday afternoon.

He was helped to shore by several surfers and was treated for a serious leg injury but died at the scene.

He had suffered a bite to the upper left thigh.

A family friend who did not want to be named said Mani had lived in Minnie Water all his life, loved the ocean, was into art and made several of his own surfboards.

A statement from the Clarence Valley Council said it was a sad loss for the community.

"Minnie Water is a small, close-knit village and the communities of Minnie Water and Wooli will be hurting," it said.

"We will be doing all we can to support the community through the shock and grief."

It said the beach was not patrolled this time of year but all beaches in the council area would remain closed.

Attempts will be made to locate the shark over the coming days, it said.

The NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) confirmed it was a great white shark based on photographs from the scene.

Coffs-Clarence Police District Chief Inspector Joanne Reid said police would work with the Department of Primary Industries to identify the shark.

"They'll be setting drumlines out off the coast in an attempt to capture or release any sharks that may be in the area," she said.

"It's also important to note now during the school holidays that all beaches in the Clarence Valley will be closed and we'll reassess that on a day-by-day basis."

Mani was surfing at Wilsons Headland at Wooli Beach near Grafton yesterday when he was attacked just before 2:30pm.

His school posted several helpline phone numbers as support for the teen's fellow students.

"One of our Year 10 students died suddenly and tragically," the school statement said.

"Our thoughts and heartfelt sympathy are with the student's family and friends."

Beachgoers are being urged to follow advice from Surf Live Saving NSW and check the DPI's website and SharkSmart app.

Wooli woman Helen Dobra said the victim of the attack was a friend of her son's.

"It was a really traumatic scene, my heart's still really pumping," she said yesterday.

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Beaches remain closed for investigation after teen killed by shark on NSW Mid North Coast - ABC News

Several beaches deemed unsafe as Toronto staggers into another blazingly hot weekend – Toronto Star

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Significant flooding in Toronto earlier this week means that three of the citys beaches are currently unsafe to swim.

As of Friday afternoon, Marie Curtis Park East Beach, Sunnyside Beach and Hanlans Point have all been deemed unsafe for swimming due to increased levels of E. coli. After major rainfalls, conditions are ripe for bacteria.

So whats happening to our waterways when it rains? According to Roberto Quinlan, an associate professor of biology at York University, major rain events in urban areas lead to a big pulse of debris and nutrients into the waterways.

These nutrients fuel bacterial growth, which in turn lead to water conditions that arent safe for swimming, Quinlan said. In some cases, after a heavy rainfall the sewage system becomes overwhelmed and you just get to release the raw sewage directly into Torontos waterways.

Thats a big health concern especially for those hoping to swim and cool off in the lake this weekend. Unless there is increased capacity for storm runoff, were going to see more of these type of events where youre going to have sewage overflows into waterways, Quinlan said.

Beaches could be closed more often due to poor water quality as extreme storms become more frequent. With temperatures rising, conditions will be ripe for blue-green algae, which is highly toxic to humans and animals alike. (Algae) are expected to bloom more frequently in warmer water temperatures, even if you dont change the amount of nutrients that goes into water, Quinlan explained.

So even if we do a really good job of keeping the water quality the same as it always is, just because of temperature increases alone, we would expect to see more frequent cyanobacteria blooms in the future.

Miriam Diamond, a professor of environment science with the University of Toronto, said that Ontarios developed shoreline means more waste heading to the lake after major rainfalls. Were dirty. We drive cars, we have pets that poop, we create a lot of waste. It collects on the street, and especially when it hasnt rained a lot ... it gets flushed into the lake.

While the lake can clean itself to some extent, it cant when theres too much rain, she said. Normally, animal feces would usually sink into the forest floor something that isnt as possible in an urban environment.

We have some trees, but there are vast swaths of lawns that are terrible at taking up these kinds of contaminants. That means that waste that would typically break down into the soil is flushed down into the late especially when theres a storm surge, Diamond said.

Both Diamond and Quinlan urged Torontonians that are hoping to take a dip this weekend to check for water advisories before they go.

People should be looking out for signs and either the OK or not OK to go into the water, Diamond said.

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Toronto Public Health updates lake water conditions every 24 hours following E. coli samples. Swimmers should check their local beach before heading out.

In an email, Torontos associate medical office of health Vinita Dubey said that while the health department is still encouraging folks to get outside during the weather, we are still advising to avoid public gatherings and large crowds where physical distancing cannot be maintained, including beaches, due to COVID-19.

Bacteria Closes Several Beaches And Ponds In Barnstable – CBS Boston

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

BARNSTABLE (CBS) Marstons Mills residents are upset toxic algae is invading their ponds again this summer.

Delia and her husband bought their home because it sits on Long Pond. Its now closed to swimming because of cyanobacteria.

Its kind of sad because there are a lot of young couples in the neighborhood who bring their children down here to play in the water because its easier than taking them to the ocean obviously. Its safer, said Delia.

Long Pond is one of several closed in the town of Barnstable. Others are on the warning list.

So were monitoring ponds with permanent beaches and ones that are in trouble for Cyanobacteria, Town of Barnstables Coastal Health Resource Coordinator Karen Malkus-Benjamin said.

Cyanobacteria blooms are also called blue-green algae. They can produce harmful toxins and cause serious illness to humans and pets.

A regular person, if they were exposed to maybe a small amount, might feel nauseous or might be dizzy. It could vary, Malkus-Benjamin said.

Two ocean beaches in Barnstable are also closed to swimmers because of another type of bacteria, possibly caused by wastewater. Veterans Beach and Ropes Beach failed sample tests.

Its really disappointing because its a very picturesque area, and, you know, from time to time, youd like to maybe just put your feet in here, said Nancy Pelland, of Barnstable.

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Bacteria Closes Several Beaches And Ponds In Barnstable - CBS Boston

Myrtle Beach hotels restructure operations, adopt new cleaning procedures – WBTW

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. (WBTW) COVID-19 has brought challenges to the hotel industry, leading people to ask: Is it safe to stay at a hotel during the coronavirus pandemic?

Some Myrtle Beach hotels have restructured operations and adopted new cleaning procedures amid COVID-19.

Check-ins will likely look different at first glance. Plexiglass barriers minimize face-to-face exposure and metal key fobs eliminate touch on common contact surfaces.

Downtown Myrtle Beachs Westgate Resort is one of the large hotel chains turning to new policies during COVID-19 to limit guest-employee contact.

We have pretty much re-imagined the entire guest experience, Westgate Resort General Manager Carlos Brador said.

New technology is also playing a role in helping guests navigate a new and safer experience.

From the guest checking in with a QR code where you dont have to touch anyone elses pen you can check-in through the application from your phone, Brador said.

As guests enter the lobby they can use a mobile device to scan a QR code that will prompt them to check-in. They can provide their credit card, virtually sign, and there is simply no contact with the front desk.

Its all a part of hotels working harder and smarter. Daily housekeeping, bellhops, luggage service, and beach chair rentals are among the list of services put on pause.

We are no longer providing daily housekeeping services yet, Brador said. If a guest requires service we ask them to vacate the unit and then we will go in and clean the property.

Hotel experts say the major touch points in any hotel are doorways, handles, kitchen surfaces, bedding, bathrooms, switches, electronics, furniture, and temperature controls. Fitness centers and elevators are also among the list of high contact surfaces being cleaned every half hour to hour.

There are a lot of good coming out of this such as the applications and measures being taken, I think some will remain after its all said and done, Brador said.

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Myrtle Beach hotels restructure operations, adopt new cleaning procedures - WBTW

Teens arrested in connection with Kenai beach-party assault caught on video – Anchorage Daily News

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Kenai police have made several arrests in connection with a beach-party assault on a teenager Monday night that was captured on video.

The Kenai Police Department announced late Thursday officers had arrested a 15-year-old boy from Kenai on Wednesday for fourth-degree assault and transported him to Kenai Youth Detention Facility. They arrested a 17-year-old boy from Kenai on the same charge Thursday and took him to the facility. Neither was identified.

Police said Elijah Royal-Reyna, 19, of Kenai on Thursday was issued a summons to appear in court on the fourth-degree assault charge.

The investigation into the incident is ongoing, police say.

A video of the assault surfaced on social media. The victims grandfather, former Soldotna mayor Tom Bearup, posted a 52-second clip showing the incident on his Facebook page Wednesday.

His grandson, who is not being identified, just turned 18, Bearup said. He was invited to the party by what he thought were friends, Bearup said Friday. He was socializing with other people, and then they came and jumped him from the back. Its sickening.

The video shows the teenager being thrown to the ground in front of a bonfire as a group surrounds him. One begins hitting him repeatedly in the head. He can be heard asking What did I do? as another voice says, The head, get the head. Other boys pummel him before a female voice urges them to stop, saying, I think thats good. I think thats good. ... Hes hurt. Hes hurt.

The teen is recovering from bruising to his face, head and body, relatives say. He was treated at a hospital and released, Bearum said.

Police on Wednesday issued a statement saying they were looking into the incident after receiving multiple calls and inquiries from people who saw the video posted online. They asked witnesses to contact them.

[Because of a high volume of comments requiring moderation, we are temporarily disabling comments on many of our articles so editors can focus on the coronavirus crisis and other coverage. We invite you to write a letter to the editor or reach out directly if youd like to communicate with us about a particular article. Thanks.]

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Teens arrested in connection with Kenai beach-party assault caught on video - Anchorage Daily News

The Autoweek Dispatch: Fernando Alonso Returns to Renault; Next-Gen Mercedes S-Class Is Jammed with Tech – Autoweek

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

We made it through the first big racing weekend and bam! Here comes another one! And Monday is a huge day, with Ford finally launching the Bronco. Be sure to check us out Monday, July 13, at 8 p.m. Meanwhile, heres what else is happening in the car world:

Isobel Dando, managing director of Pivotal, Jaguar-Land Rovers just-announced subscription service, explaining why JLR is launching such a feature curiously at the same time Mercedes-Benz is getting rid of its service. Which automaker has the right strategy?

Did you watch Formula 1s 2020 season opener in Austria? Youll recall its the first of eight-straight European races as F1 tries to put together some semblance of a season.

Depending on your viewpoint it was an exciting race with gobs of interesting plot twists and intrigue, differing team strategies, dashed hopes and dreams coming true. Or on the other hand you might have thought it was a snoozefest that put people to sleep around the world, with Mercedes Valtteri Bottas having such a huge lead all day the announcers had little to report with no choice but to go crazy when there was a pass for eighth place or a 16th-place car went out with some sort of malfunction.

One thing thats indisputable is the attrition rate was sky-high. There were only 11 cars running at the end. To get the straight story our Joe Saward, one of just a handful of F1 journalists credentialed at the moment, poked around the garage area and talked to team principals, F1 officials and race engineers and wrote a fascinating piece about why so many cars dropped out. One factor: The Red Bull Rings high altitude makes a cars air-dependent systems work harder. To find out the rest of the story check out Sawards piece here. F1 is back at the Ring this weekend.

In one of motorsports worst-kept secrets Fernando Alonso is returning to Renault, the team that helped bring him two F1 World Championships. He previously drove for the outfit from 2003-06 and again in 2008-09. The move makes Alonso the first driver in F1 history to drive three separate stints for the same team. Hes replacing Daniel Ricciardo, who is moving to McLaren. Alonsos Renault teammate is up-and-comer Esteban Ocon.

Seven-time NASCAR Cup champ Jimmie Johnson has twice tested negative for COVID-19 so can race Sunday (7/12) at Kentucky Speedway. Johnson missed the Brickyard 400 last Sunday, snapping his streak of 663 straight starts dating back to 2002.

A bunch of racing entities are approved for loans under the Paycheck Protection Program. The U.S. Small Business Administration released its list of PPP loan data on the U.S. Department of the Treasury website; the SBA administers the loans. Our list only shows approved entities, not necessarily those who accepted the money.

This weeks In The Car With features industry standout and Aston Martin U.S. boss Laura Schwab. Schwab spoke to our Mark Vaughn and appropriately both were in Astons, Vaughns a red V8 Vantage coupe and Schwabs a DB11 Volante. Through the magic of the web they each dialed up Skype, put their smartphones on the dash and chatted away. Check out new episodes of In The Car With every Wednesday on autoweek.com or on our YouTube page. (You are subscriber, right?) We hope youll join us for the ride!

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Toyota Gazoo Racing is adding to its list of spare parts for vintage-Toyota enthusiasts. After starting with A70/A80 Supra parts last May, GR is adding the spectacular 2000GT. The lithe 2000GT was launched in 1967 and stayed on sale until 1970. Only 337 were built. Initially Gazoo is offering transmission- and differential-related parts.

Mercedes-Benzs next-gen S-Class, due in September, looks like it could be the most tech-heavy luxury car on the market. Why? Believe it or not the dang thing has five screens (not a typo!) inside. The center display is almost 13 inches (diagonally) and features Benzs second-generation MBUX (Mercedes-Benz User Experience) infotainment system. In addition to the center screen theres another screen where the gauges would be, and the passengers in the back get three screens of their ownthey all use the MBUX system, too. Oh, and the head-up display uses augmented reality when navigating; for example, using eye tracking, arrows could be projected onto the road lane. Crazy!

When not conducting interviews from inside an Aston former California Assistant Treasurer-turned-West Coast Editor Mark Vaughn has been tooling around LA in the beautiful Polestar 1, the $150K-plus hybrid from Volvos in-house tuner. Vaughns opinion is that while the car is indeed a stunner it could use some help in the dynamics department.

Taking a page from Vaughns playbook, Patrick Carone did some time out east in Ferraris F8 Spider. Turns out its Carones first trip out of Manhattan since COVID-19 walloped the city a few months ago. In fact its he and his wifes first time venturing more than a couple blocks from their apartment. What a way to bust out of lockdown!

If youre like me you can spend hours watching cars scream around racetracksI could watch supercars fly around the Nrburgring all day. We just posted the boys from the Comrades YouTube channel taking a McLaren Senna out to a public day on the 13-mile legend, flicking around hapless slower cars like they were literally parked. It even starts drizzling halfway through the lap. Check it out, its good fun.

The 117th Autoweek Podcast is sort of a racing special, with our F1 writer Joe Saward checking in from Europe to join Wesley Wren, Mike Pryson and Robin Warner to tell listeners about his time at the Austrian Grand Prix. The gang analyzes the race, the troubles the teams faced and what its like to attend an F1 race during a global pandemic. Later in the show Warner interviews Porsche sports car driver Nick Tandy. Tune in here, on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher or wherever podcasts are played.

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As always were on the case this weekend, monitoring and reporting on automakers and sanctioning bodies latest happenings. Well continually update the site of courseyoull know whats happening when we do. Check back often!

Thanks for reading Autoweek and please stay safe.

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The Autoweek Dispatch: Fernando Alonso Returns to Renault; Next-Gen Mercedes S-Class Is Jammed with Tech - Autoweek

Access to Clear Creek in Golden blocked again this weekend – 9News.com KUSA

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

The city still has concerns about how to open it safely with restrictions on crowd size due to the coronavirus.

GOLDEN, Colo. Access to Clear Creek within the City of Golden will remain closed this weekend, but city staff members are looking into ways to safely reopen it in the future. Until they can do that, the city the will keep it closed.

Last week, the city announced that the area would be closed ahead of the 4th of July weekend in an effort to prevent large gatherings, which are prohibited under guidelines related to the coronavirus pandemic.

The decision to close it was made after large crowds were observed during prior weekends. Temporary fencing is being used to close access to the creek.

Last weekend, some residential streets were blocked off; the city said that will not be the case this weekend. The downtown area is open for business, but the streets have been narrowed slightly to allow for expanded seating at restaurants and shopping.

"Crowding along Clear Creek is the biggest problem spot weve seen, which is why it is the focus of these decisions, Golden City Manager Jason Slowinski said last week. We understand closing off access to the creek wont solve all the problems we face with protecting ourselves and others against the spread of the virus. But it may help keep our city from becoming a hot spot.

On Thursday night, Golden City Council unanimously passed an emergency ordinance which expands current mask requirements to include indoor and outdoor areas of the city. The new rule goes into effect Friday.

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Access to Clear Creek in Golden blocked again this weekend - 9News.com KUSA

War on drugs – Wikipedia

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Led by the U.S. federal government

The war on drugs is a global campaign,[6] led by the U.S. federal government, of drug prohibition, military aid, and military intervention, with the aim being the reduction of the illegal drug trade in the United States.[7][8][9][10] The initiative includes a set of drug policies that are intended to discourage the production, distribution, and consumption of psychoactive drugs that the participating governments and the UN have made illegal. The term was popularized by the media shortly after a press conference given on June 18, 1971, by President Richard Nixonthe day after publication of a special message from President Nixon to the Congress on Drug Abuse Prevention and Controlduring which he declared drug abuse "public enemy number one". That message to the Congress included text about devoting more federal resources to the "prevention of new addicts, and the rehabilitation of those who are addicted", but that part did not receive the same public attention as the term "war on drugs".[11][12][13] However, two years prior to this, Nixon had formally declared a "war on drugs" that would be directed toward eradication, interdiction, and incarceration.[14] Today, the Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates for an end to the War on Drugs, estimates that the United States spends $51 billion annually on these initiatives.[15]

On May 13, 2009, Gil Kerlikowskethe Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP)signaled that the Obama administration did not plan to significantly alter drug enforcement policy, but also that the administration would not use the term "War on Drugs", because Kerlikowske considers the term to be "counter-productive".[16] ONDCP's view is that "drug addiction is a disease that can be successfully prevented and treated... making drugs more available will make it harder to keep our communities healthy and safe".[17]

In June 2011, the Global Commission on Drug Policy released a critical report on the War on Drugs, declaring: "The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world. Fifty years after the initiation of the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, and years after President Nixon launched the US government's war on drugs, fundamental reforms in national and global drug control policies are urgently needed."[18] The report was criticized by organizations that oppose a general legalization of drugs.[17]

Morphine was first isolated[specify] in 1805, and hypodermic syringes were first constructed in 1851. This was particularly significant during the American Civil War, when wounded soldiers were treated with morphine. This led to widespread morphine addiction among veterans of the war.[19]

Until 1912, products such as heroin were sold over-the-counter in a form of cough syrup. Doctors also prescribed heroin for irritable babies, bronchitis, insomnia, "nervous conditions," hysteria, menstrual cramps, and "vapors", leading to mass addiction. In addition, laudanum, an opioid, was a common part of the home medicine cabinet.[20][21]

In fiction, Conan Doyle portrayed the hero, Sherlock Holmes, as a cocaine addict.[22]

Citizens[specify] did not reach a consensus on dealing with the long-term effects of hard drug usage until towards the end of the 19th century.[citation needed]

The first U.S. law that restricted the distribution and use of certain drugs was the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914. The first local laws came as early as 1860.[23] In 1919, the United States passed the 18th Amendment, prohibiting the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol, with exceptions for religious and medical use. In 1920, the United States passed the National Prohibition Act (Volstead Act), enacted to carry out the provisions in law of the 18th Amendment.

During World War I many soldiers were treated with morphine and became addicts.[19]

The Federal Bureau of Narcotics was established in the United States Department of the Treasury by an act of June 14, 1930 (46 Stat. 585).[24] In 1933, the federal prohibition for alcohol was repealed by passage of the 21st Amendment. In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt publicly supported the adoption of the Uniform State Narcotic Drug Act. The New York Times used the headline "Roosevelt Asks Narcotic War Aid".[25][26]

In 1937, the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 was passed. Several scholars have claimed that the goal was to destroy the hemp industry,[27][28][29] largely as an effort of businessmen Andrew Mellon, Randolph Hearst, and the Du Pont family.[27][29] These scholars argue that with the invention of the decorticator, hemp became a very cheap substitute for the paper pulp that was used in the newspaper industry.[27][30] These scholars believe that Hearst felt[dubious discuss] that this was a threat to his extensive timber holdings. Mellon, United States Secretary of the Treasury and the wealthiest man in America, had invested heavily in the DuPont's new synthetic fiber, nylon, and considered[dubious discuss] its success to depend on its replacement of the traditional resource, hemp.[27][31][32][33][34][35][36][37] However, there were circumstances that contradict these claims. One reason for doubts about those claims is that the new decorticators did not perform fully satisfactorily in commercial production.[38] Production of fiber from hemp, requiring harvest, transport and processing, was a labor-intensive process. Technological developments decreased the labor required but not sufficiently to eliminate this disadvantage.[39][40]

On October 27, 1970, Congress passed the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, which, among other things, categorized controlled substances based on their medicinal use and potential for addiction.[41] In 1971, two congressmen released a report on the growing heroin epidemic among U.S. servicemen in Vietnam; ten to fifteen percent of the servicemen were addicted to heroin, and President Nixon declared drug abuse to be "public enemy number one".[41][42]

Although Nixon declared "drug abuse" to be public enemy number one in 1971,[43] the policies that his administration implemented as part of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 were a continuation of drug prohibition policies in the U.S., which started in 1914.[41][44]

The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

In 1973, the Drug Enforcement Administration was created to replace the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs.[41]

The Nixon Administration also repealed the federal 210-year mandatory minimum sentences for possession of marijuana and started federal demand reduction programs and drug-treatment programs. Robert DuPont, the "Drug czar" in the Nixon Administration, stated it would be more accurate to say that Nixon ended, rather than launched, the "war on drugs". DuPont also argued that it was the proponents of drug legalization that popularized the term "war on drugs".[17][unreliable source?]

The presidency of Ronald Reagan saw an expansion in the federal focus of preventing drug abuse and for prosecuting offenders. In the first term of the presidency Ronald Reagan signed the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, which expanded penalties towards possession of cannabis, established a federal system of mandatory minimum sentences, and established procedures for civil asset forfeiture.[50] From 1980 to 1984 the federal annual budget of the FBI's drug enforcement units went from 8 million to 95 million.[51][52]

In 1982, Vice President George H. W. Bush and his aides began pushing for the involvement of the CIA and U.S. military in drug interdiction efforts.[53]

The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) was originally established by the National Narcotics Leadership Act of 1988,[54][55] which mandated a national anti-drug media campaign for youth, which would later become the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign.[56] The director of ONDCP is commonly known as the Drug czar,[41] and it was first implemented in 1989 under President George H. W. Bush,[57] and raised to cabinet-level status by Bill Clinton in 1993.[58] These activities were subsequently funded by the Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act of 1998.[59][60] The Drug-Free Media Campaign Act of 1998 codified the campaign at 21U.S.C.1708.[61]

An international group called the Global Commission on Drug Policy released a report on June 2, 2011, stating that "The war on drugs has failed."[citation needed] The commissioned was made up of 22 self-appointed members including a number of prominent international politicians and writers. U.S. Surgeon General Regina Benjamin also released the first ever National Prevention Strategy.[62]

On May 21, 2012, the U.S. Government published an updated version of its drug policy.[63] The director of ONDCP stated simultaneously that this policy is somewhat different from the "War on Drugs":

At the same meeting was a declaration signed by the representatives of Italy, the Russian Federation, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States in line with this:"Our approach must be a balanced one, combining effective enforcement to restrict the supply of drugs, with efforts to reduce demand and build recovery; supporting people to live a life free of addiction."[65]

In March 2016 the International Narcotics Control Board stated that the International Drug Control treaties do not mandate a "war on drugs".[66]

According to Human Rights Watch, the War on Drugs caused soaring arrest rates that disproportionately targeted African Americans due to various factors.[68] John Ehrlichman, an aide to Nixon, said that Nixon used the war on drugs to criminalize and disrupt black and hippie communities and their leaders.[69]

The present state of incarceration in the U.S. as a result of the war on drugs arrived in several stages. By 1971, different steps on drugs had been implemented for more than 50 years (since 1914, 1937 etc.) with only a very small increase of inmates per 100,000 citizens. During the first 9 years after Nixon coined the expression "War on Drugs", statistics showed only a minor increase in the total number of imprisoned.[citation needed]

After 1980, the situation began to change. In the 1980s, while the number of arrests for all crimes had risen by 28%, the number of arrests for drug offenses rose 126%.[70] The result of increased demand was the development of privatization and the for-profit prison industry.[71] The US Department of Justice, reporting on the effects of state initiatives, has stated that, from 1990 through 2000, "the increasing number of drug offenses accounted for 27% of the total growth among black inmates, 7% of the total growth among Hispanic inmates, and 15% of the growth among white inmates." In addition to prison or jail, the United States provides for the deportation of many non-citizens convicted of drug offenses.[72]

In 1994, the New England Journal of Medicine reported that the "War on Drugs" resulted in the incarceration of one million Americans each year.[73] In 2008, the Washington Post reported that of 1.5 million Americans arrested each year for drug offenses, half a million would be incarcerated.[74] In addition, one in five black Americans would spend time behind bars due to drug laws.[74]

Federal and state policies also impose collateral consequences on those convicted of drug offenses, such as denial of public benefits or licenses, that are not applicable to those convicted of other types of crime.[75] In particular, the passage of the 1990 SolomonLautenberg amendment led many states to impose mandatory driver's license suspensions (of at least 6 months) for persons committing any type of drug offense including offenses that were unrelated to driving.[76][77] Approximately 191,000 licenses were suspended in this manner in 2016 according to a Prison Policy Initiative report.[78]

In 1986, the U.S. Congress passed laws that created a 100 to 1 sentencing disparity for the trafficking or possession of crack when compared to penalties for trafficking of powder cocaine,[79][80][81][82] which had been widely criticized as discriminatory against minorities, mostly blacks, who were more likely to use crack than powder cocaine.[83] This 100:1 ratio had been required under federal law since 1986.[84] Persons convicted in federal court of possession of 5grams of crack cocaine received a minimum mandatory sentence of 5 years in federal prison. On the other hand, possession of 500grams of powder cocaine carries the same sentence.[80][81] In 2010, the Fair Sentencing Act cut the sentencing disparity to 18:1.[83]

According to Human Rights Watch, crime statistics show thatin the United States in 1999compared to non-minorities, African Americans were far more likely to be arrested for drug crimes, and received much stiffer penalties and sentences.[85]

Statistics from 1998 show that there were wide racial disparities in arrests, prosecutions, sentencing and deaths. African-American drug users made up for 35% of drug arrests, 55% of convictions, and 74% of people sent to prison for drug possession crimes.[80] Nationwide African-Americans were sent to state prisons for drug offenses 13 times more often than other races,[86] even though they only supposedly comprised 13% of regular drug users.[80]

Anti-drug legislation over time has also displayed an apparent racial bias. University of Minnesota Professor and social justice author Michael Tonry writes, "The War on Drugs foreseeably and unnecessarily blighted the lives of hundreds and thousands of young disadvantaged black Americans and undermined decades of effort to improve the life chances of members of the urban black underclass."[87]

In 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson decided that the government needed to make an effort to curtail the social unrest that blanketed the country at the time. He decided to focus his efforts on illegal drug use, an approach which was in line with expert opinion on the subject at the time. In the 1960s, it was believed that at least half of the crime in the U.S. was drug related, and this number grew as high as 90 percent in the next decade.[88] He created the Reorganization Plan of 1968 which merged the Bureau of Narcotics and the Bureau of Drug Abuse to form the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs within the Department of Justice.[89] The belief during this time about drug use was summarized by journalist Max Lerner in his work America as a Civilization (1957):

As a case in point we may take the known fact of the prevalence of reefer and dope addiction in Negro areas. This is essentially explained in terms of poverty, slum living, and broken families, yet it would be easy to show the lack of drug addiction among other ethnic groups where the same conditions apply.[90]

Richard Nixon became president in 1969, and did not back away from the anti-drug precedent set by Johnson. Nixon began orchestrating drug raids nationwide to improve his "watchdog" reputation. Lois B. Defleur, a social historian who studied drug arrests during this period in Chicago, stated that, "police administrators indicated they were making the kind of arrests the public wanted". Additionally, some of Nixon's newly created drug enforcement agencies would resort to illegal practices to make arrests as they tried to meet public demand for arrest numbers. From 1972 to 1973, the Office of Drug Abuse and Law Enforcement performed 6,000 drug arrests in 18 months, the majority of the arrested black.[91]

The next two presidents, Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, responded with programs that were essentially a continuation of their predecessors. Shortly after Ronald Reagan became president in 1981, he delivered a speech on the topic. Reagan announced, "We're taking down the surrender flag that has flown over so many drug efforts; we're running up a battle flag."[92]

Then, driven by the 1986 cocaine overdose of black basketball star Len Bias,[dubious discuss] Reagan was able to pass the Anti-Drug Abuse Act through Congress. This legislation appropriated an additional $1.7 billion to fund the War on Drugs. More importantly, it established 29 new, mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses. In the entire history of the country up until that point, the legal system had only seen 55 minimum sentences in total.[93] A major stipulation of the new sentencing rules included different mandatory minimums for powder and crack cocaine. At the time of the bill, there was public debate as to the difference in potency and effect of powder cocaine, generally used by whites, and crack cocaine, generally used by blacks, with many believing that "crack" was substantially more powerful and addictive. Crack and powder cocaine are closely related chemicals, crack being a smokeable, freebase form of powdered cocaine hydrochloride which produces a shorter, more intense high while using less of the drug. This method is more cost effective, and therefore more prevalent on the inner-city streets, while powder cocaine remains more popular in white suburbia. The Reagan administration began shoring public opinion against "crack", encouraging DEA official Robert Putnam to play up the harmful effects of the drug. Stories of "crack whores" and "crack babies" became commonplace; by 1986, Time had declared "crack" the issue of the year.[94] Riding the wave of public fervor, Reagan established much harsher sentencing for crack cocaine, handing down stiffer felony penalties for much smaller amounts of the drug.[95]

Reagan protg and former Vice-President George H. W. Bush was next to occupy the oval office, and the drug policy under his watch held true to his political background. Bush maintained the hard line drawn by his predecessor and former boss, increasing narcotics regulation when the first National Drug Control Strategy was issued by the Office of National Drug Control in 1989.[96]

The next three presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama continued this trend, maintaining the War on Drugs as they inherited it upon taking office.[97] During this time of passivity by the federal government, it was the states that initiated controversial legislation in the War on Drugs. Racial bias manifested itself in the states through such controversial policies as the "stop and frisk" police practices in New York city and the "three strikes" felony laws began in California in 1994.[98]

In August 2010, President Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act into law that dramatically reduced the 100-to-1 sentencing disparity between powder and crack cocaine, which disproportionately affected minorities.[99]

Commonly used illegal drugs include heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, and, marijuana.

Heroin is an opiate that is highly addictive. If caught selling or possessing heroin, a perpetrator can be charged with a felony and face twofour years in prison and could be fined to a maximum of $20,000.[100]

Crystal meth is composed of methamphetamine hydrochloride. It is marketed as either a white powder or in a solid (rock) form. The possession of crystal meth can result in a punishment varying from a fine to a jail sentence. As with other drug crimes, sentencing length may increase depending on the amount of the drug found in the possession of the defendant.[101][102]

Cocaine possession is illegal across the U.S. The penalties for possession vary by state, or if charges are federal.[101][102]

Marijuana is the most popular illegal drug worldwide. The punishment for possession of it is less than for the possession of cocaine or heroin. In some U.S. states, the drug is legal. Approximately half of all adult Americans have tried marijuana.[103]

Some scholars have claimed that the phrase "War on Drugs" is propaganda cloaking an extension of earlier military or paramilitary operations.[10] Others have argued that large amounts of "drug war" foreign aid money, training, and equipment actually goes to fighting leftist insurgencies and is often provided to groups who themselves are involved in large-scale narco-trafficking, such as corrupt members of the Colombian military.[9]

From 1963 to the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, marijuana usage became common among U.S. soldiers in non-combat situations. Some servicemen also used heroin. Many of the servicemen ended the heroin use after returning to the United States but came home addicted. In 1971, the U.S. military conducted a study of drug use among American servicemen and women. It found that daily usage rates for drugs on a worldwide basis were as low as two percent.[104] However, in the spring of 1971, two congressmen released an alarming report alleging that 15% of the servicemen in Vietnam were addicted to heroin. Marijuana use was also common in Vietnam. Soldiers who used drugs had more disciplinary problems. The frequent drug use had become an issue for the commanders in Vietnam; in 1971 it was estimated that 30,000 servicemen were addicted to drugs, most of them to heroin.[12]

From 1971 on, therefore, returning servicemen were required to take a mandatory heroin test. Servicemen who tested positive upon returning from Vietnam were not allowed to return home until they had passed the test with a negative result. The program also offered a treatment for heroin addicts.[105]

Elliot Borin's article "The U.S. Military Needs its Speed"published in Wired on February 10, 2003reports:

But the Defense Department, which distributed millions of amphetamine tablets to troops during World War II, Vietnam and the Gulf War, soldiers on, insisting that they are not only harmless but beneficial.

In a news conference held in connection with Schmidt and Umbach's Article 32 hearing, Dr. Pete Demitry, an Air Force physician and a pilot, claimed that the "Air Force has used (Dexedrine) safely for 60 years" with "no known speed-related mishaps."

The need for speed, Demitry added "is a life-and-death issue for our military."[106]

One of the first anti-drug efforts in the realm of foreign policy was President Nixon's Operation Intercept, announced in September 1969, targeted at reducing the amount of cannabis entering the United States from Mexico. The effort began with an intense inspection crackdown that resulted in an almost shutdown of cross-border traffic.[107] Because the burden on border crossings was controversial in border states, the effort only lasted twenty days.[108]

On December 20, 1989, the United States invaded Panama as part of Operation Just Cause, which involved 25,000 American troops. Gen. Manuel Noriega, head of the government of Panama, had been giving military assistance to Contra groups in Nicaragua at the request of the U.S. which, in exchange, tolerated his drug trafficking activities, which they had known about since the 1960s.[109][110] When the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) tried to indict Noriega in 1971, the CIA prevented them from doing so.[109] The CIA, which was then directed by future president George H. W. Bush, provided Noriega with hundreds of thousands of dollars per year as payment for his work in Latin America.[109] When CIA pilot Eugene Hasenfus was shot down over Nicaragua by the Sandinistas, documents aboard the plane revealed many of the CIA's activities in Latin America, and the CIA's connections with Noriega became a public relations "liability" for the U.S. government, which finally allowed the DEA to indict him for drug trafficking, after decades of tolerating his drug operations.[109] Operation Just Cause, whose purpose was to capture Noriega and overthrow his government; Noriega found temporary asylum in the Papal Nuncio, and surrendered to U.S. soldiers on January 3, 1990.[111] He was sentenced by a court in Miami to 45 years in prison.[109]

As part of its Plan Colombia program, the United States government currently provides hundreds of millions of dollars per year of military aid, training, and equipment to Colombia,[112] to fight left-wing guerrillas such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC-EP), which has been accused of being involved in drug trafficking.[113]

Private U.S. corporations have signed contracts to carry out anti-drug activities as part of Plan Colombia. DynCorp, the largest private company involved, was among those contracted by the State Department, while others signed contracts with the Defense Department.[114]

Colombian military personnel have received extensive counterinsurgency training from U.S. military and law enforcement agencies, including the School of Americas (SOA). Author Grace Livingstone has stated that more Colombian SOA graduates have been implicated in human rights abuses than currently known SOA graduates from any other country. All of the commanders of the brigades highlighted in a 2001 Human Rights Watch report on Colombia were graduates of the SOA, including the III brigade in Valle del Cauca, where the 2001 Alto Naya Massacre occurred. US-trained officers have been accused of being directly or indirectly involved in many atrocities during the 1990s, including the Massacre of Trujillo and the 1997 Mapiripn Massacre.

In 2000, the Clinton administration initially waived all but one of the human rights conditions attached to Plan Colombia, considering such aid as crucial to national security at the time.[115]

The efforts of U.S. and Colombian governments have been criticized for focusing on fighting leftist guerrillas in southern regions without applying enough pressure on right-wing paramilitaries and continuing drug smuggling operations in the north of the country.[116][117] Human Rights Watch, congressional committees and other entities have documented the existence of connections between members of the Colombian military and the AUC, which the U.S. government has listed as a terrorist group, and that Colombian military personnel have committed human rights abuses which would make them ineligible for U.S. aid under current laws.[citation needed]

In 2010, the Washington Office on Latin America concluded that both Plan Colombia and the Colombian government's security strategy "came at a high cost in lives and resources, only did part of the job, are yielding diminishing returns and have left important institutions weaker."[118]

A 2014 report by the RAND Corporation, which was issued to analyze viable strategies for the Mexican drug war considering successes experienced in Colombia, noted:

Between 1999 and 2002, the United States gave Colombia $2.04 billion in aid, 81 percent of which was for military purposes, placing Colombia just below Israel and Egypt among the largest recipients of U.S. military assistance. Colombia increased its defense spending from 3.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2000 to 4.19 percent in 2005. Overall, the results were extremely positive. Greater spending on infrastructure and social programs helped the Colombian government increase its political legitimacy, while improved security forces were better able to consolidate control over large swaths of the country previously overrun by insurgents and drug cartels.

It also notes that, "Plan Colombia has been widely hailed as a success, and some analysts believe that, by 2010, Colombian security forces had finally gained the upper hand once and for all."[119]

The Mrida Initiative is a security cooperation between the United States and the government of Mexico and the countries of Central America. It was approved on June 30, 2008, and its stated aim is combating the threats of drug trafficking and transnational crime. The Mrida Initiative appropriated $1.4 billion in a three-year commitment (20082010) to the Mexican government for military and law enforcement training and equipment, as well as technical advice and training to strengthen the national justice systems. The Mrida Initiative targeted many very important government officials, but it failed to address the thousands of Central Americans who had to flee their countries due to the danger they faced everyday because of the war on drugs. There is still not any type of plan that addresses these people. No weapons are included in the plan.[120][121]

The United States regularly sponsors the spraying of large amounts of herbicides such as glyphosate over the jungles of Central and South America as part of its drug eradication programs. Environmental consequences resulting from aerial fumigation have been criticized as detrimental to some of the world's most fragile ecosystems;[122] the same aerial fumigation practices are further credited with causing health problems in local populations.[123]

In 2012, the U.S. sent DEA agents to Honduras to assist security forces in counternarcotics operations. Honduras has been a major stop for drug traffickers, who use small planes and landing strips hidden throughout the country to transport drugs. The U.S. government made agreements with several Latin American countries to share intelligence and resources to counter the drug trade. DEA agents, working with other U.S. agencies such as the State Department, the CBP, and Joint Task Force-Bravo, assisted Honduras troops in conducting raids on traffickers' sites of operation.[124]

The War on Drugs has been a highly contentious issue since its inception. A poll on October 2, 2008, found that three in four Americans believed that the War On Drugs was failing.[125]

In 2014, a Pew Research Center poll found more than six in ten Americans state that state governments moving away from mandatory prison terms for drug law violations is a good thing, while three out of ten Americans say these policy changes are a bad thing. This a substantial shift from the same poll questions since 2001.[126] In 2014 a Pew Research Center poll found that 67 percent of Americans feel that a movement towards treatment for drugs like cocaine and heroin is better versus the 26 percent who feel that prosecution is the better route.[127]

In 2018, a Rasmussen Report poll found that less than 10 percent of Americans think that the War on Drugs is being won and that 75 percent found that Americans believe that America is not winning the War on Drugs.[128]

Mexican citizens, unlike American citizens, support the current measures their government were taking against drug cartels in the War on Drugs. A Pew Research Center poll in 2010 found that 80 percent supported the current use of the army in the War on Drugs to combat drug traffickers with about 55 percent saying that they have been making progress in the war.[129] A year later in 2011 a Pew Research Center poll uncovered that 71 percent of Mexicans find that "illegal drugs are a very big problem in their country". 77 percent of Mexicans also found that drug cartels and the violence associated with them are as well a big challenge for Mexico. The poll also found that the percentages believing that illegal drugs and violence related to the cartel were higher in the North with 87 percent for illegal drug use and 94 percent cartel related violence being a problem. This compared to the other locations: South, Mexico City and the greater area of Mexico City, and Central Mexico which are all about 18 percent or lower than the North on Illegal drug use being a problem for the country. These perspective areas are also lower than the North by 19 percent or more on the issue of drug cartel related violence being an issue for the country.[130]

In 2013 a Pew Research Center poll found that 74 percent of Mexican citizens would support the training of their police and military, the poll also found that another 55 percent would support the supplying of weapons and financial aid. Though the poll indicates a support of U.S. aid, 59 percent were against troops on the ground by the U.S. military.[131] Also in 2013 Pew Research Center found in a poll that 56 percent of Mexican citizens believe that the United States and Mexico are both to blame for drug violence in Mexico. In that same poll 20 percent believe that the United States is solely to blame and 17 percent believe that Mexico is solely to blame.[132]

At a meeting in Guatemala in 2012, three former presidents from Guatemala, Mexico and Colombia said that the war on drugs had failed and that they would propose a discussion on alternatives, including decriminalization, at the Summit of the Americas in April of that year.[133] Guatemalan President Otto Prez Molina said that the war on drugs was exacting too high a price on the lives of Central Americans and that it was time to "end the taboo on discussing decriminalization".[134] At the summit, the government of Colombia pushed for the most far-reaching change to drugs policy since the war on narcotics was declared by Nixon four decades prior, citing the catastrophic effects it had had in Colombia.[135]

Several critics have compared the wholesale incarceration of the dissenting minority of drug users to the wholesale incarceration of other minorities in history. Psychiatrist Thomas Szasz, for example, wrote in 1997 "Over the past thirty years, we have replaced the medical-political persecution of illegal sex users ('perverts' and 'psychopaths') with the even more ferocious medical-political persecution of illegal drug users."[136]

Penalties for drug crimes among American youth almost always involve permanent or semi-permanent removal from opportunities for education, strip them of voting rights, and later involve creation of criminal records which make employment more difficult.[137] Thus, some authors maintain that the War on Drugs has resulted in the creation of a permanent underclass of people who have few educational or job opportunities, often as a result of being punished for drug offenses which in turn have resulted from attempts to earn a living in spite of having no education or job opportunities.[137]

According to a 2008 study published by Harvard economist Jeffrey A. Miron, the annual savings on enforcement and incarceration costs from the legalization of drugs would amount to roughly $41.3 billion, with $25.7 billion being saved among the states and over $15.6 billion accrued for the federal government. Miron further estimated at least $46.7 billion in tax revenue based on rates comparable to those on tobacco and alcohol ($8.7 billion from marijuana, $32.6 billion from cocaine and heroin, remainder from other drugs).[138]

Low taxation in Central American countries has been credited with weakening the region's response in dealing with drug traffickers. Many cartels, especially Los Zetas have taken advantage of the limited resources of these nations. 2010 tax revenue in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, composed just 13.53% of GDP. As a comparison, in Chile and the U.S., taxes were 18.6% and 26.9% of GDP respectively. However, direct taxes on income are very hard to enforce and in some cases tax evasion is seen as a national pastime.[139]

The status of coca and coca growers has become an intense political issue in several countries, including Colombia and particularly Bolivia, where the president, Evo Morales, a former coca growers' union leader, has promised to legalise the traditional cultivation and use of coca.[140] Indeed, legalization efforts have yielded some successes under the Morales administration when combined with aggressive and targeted eradication efforts. The country saw a 1213% decline in coca cultivation[140] in 2011 under Morales, who has used coca growers' federations to ensure compliance with the law rather than providing a primary role for security forces.[140]

The coca eradication policy has been criticised for its negative impact on the livelihood of coca growers in South America. In many areas of South America the coca leaf has traditionally been chewed and used in tea and for religious, medicinal and nutritional purposes by locals.[141] For this reason many insist that the illegality of traditional coca cultivation is unjust. In many areas the U.S. government and military has forced the eradication of coca without providing for any meaningful alternative crop for farmers, and has additionally destroyed many of their food or market crops, leaving them starving and destitute.[141]

The CIA, DEA, State Department, and several other U.S. government agencies have been alleged to have relations with various groups which are involved in drug trafficking.

Senator John Kerry's 1988 U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations report on Contra drug links concludes that members of the U.S. State Department "who provided support for the Contras are involved in drug trafficking... and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly receive financial and material assistance from drug traffickers."[142] The report further states that "the Contra drug links include... payments to drug traffickers by the U.S. State Department of funds authorized by the Congress for humanitarian assistance to the Contras, in some cases after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges, in others while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies."

In 1996, journalist Gary Webb published reports in the San Jose Mercury News, and later in his book Dark Alliance, claiming that: "For the better part of a decade, a San Francisco Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to the Crips and Bloods street gangs of Los Angeles and funneled millions in drug profits to a Latin American guerrilla army run by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency." This drug ring "opened the first pipeline between Colombia's cocaine cartels and the black neighborhoods of Los Angeles" and, as a result, "The cocaine that flooded in helped spark a crack explosion in urban America."[143]

Webb's premise regarding the U.S. Government connection was initially attacked at the time by the media. The series remains controversial. The series resulted in three federal investigations (i.e. by the CIA, Department of Justice, and the House Intelligence Committee) into the claims of "Dark Alliance". The reports rejected the series' main claims but were critical of some CIA and law enforcement actions. The CIA report found no evidence that "any past or present employee of CIA, or anyone acting on behalf of CIA, had any direct or indirect dealing" with Ross, Blandn, or Meneses or that any of the other figures mentioned in "Dark Alliance" were ever employed by or associated with or contacted by the agency.[144] The Department of Justice report stated that "We did not find that he [Blandn] had any ties to the CIA, that the CIA intervened in his case in any way, or that any connections to the Contras affected his treatment."[145] The House Committee report examined the support that Meneses and Blandn gave to the local Contra organization in San Francisco and the Contras in general, the report concluded that it was "not sufficient to finance the organization" and did not consist of "millions," contrary to the claims of the "Dark Alliance" series. This support "was not directed by anyone within the Contra movement who had an association with the CIA," and the Committee found "no evidence that the CIA or the Intelligence Community was aware of these individuals support."[146]

According to Rodney Campbell, an editorial assistant to Nelson Rockefeller, during World War II, the United States Navy, concerned that strikes and labor disputes in U.S. eastern shipping ports would disrupt wartime logistics, released the mobster Lucky Luciano from prison, and collaborated with him to help the mafia take control of those ports. Labor union members were terrorized and murdered by mafia members as a means of preventing labor unrest and ensuring smooth shipping of supplies to Europe.[147]

According to Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, in order to prevent Communist party members from being elected in Italy following World War II, the CIA worked closely with the Sicilian Mafia, protecting them and assisting in their worldwide heroin smuggling operations. The mafia was in conflict with leftist groups and was involved in assassinating, torturing, and beating leftist political organizers.[148]

In 1986, the US Defense Department funded a two-year study by the RAND Corporation, which found that the use of the armed forces to interdict drugs coming into the United States would have little or no effect on cocaine traffic and might, in fact, raise the profits of cocaine cartels and manufacturers. The 175-page study, "Sealing the Borders: The Effects of Increased Military Participation in Drug Interdiction", was prepared by seven researchers, mathematicians and economists at the National Defense Research Institute, a branch of the RAND, and was released in 1988. The study noted that seven prior studies in the past nine years, including one by the Center for Naval Research and the Office of Technology Assessment, had come to similar conclusions. Interdiction efforts, using current armed forces resources, would have almost no effect on cocaine importation into the United States, the report concluded.[150]

During the early-to-mid-1990s, the Clinton administration ordered and funded a major cocaine policy study, again by RAND. The Rand Drug Policy Research Center study concluded that $3 billion should be switched from federal and local law enforcement to treatment. The report said that treatment is the cheapest way to cut drug use, stating that drug treatment is twenty-three times more effective than the supply-side "war on drugs".[151]

The National Research Council Committee on Data and Research for Policy on Illegal Drugs published its findings in 2001 on the efficacy of the drug war. The NRC Committee found that existing studies on efforts to address drug usage and smuggling, from U.S. military operations to eradicate coca fields in Colombia, to domestic drug treatment centers, have all been inconclusive, if the programs have been evaluated at all: "The existing drug-use monitoring systems are strikingly inadequate to support the full range of policy decisions that the nation must make.... It is unconscionable for this country to continue to carry out a public policy of this magnitude and cost without any way of knowing whether and to what extent it is having the desired effect."[152] The study, though not ignored by the press, was ignored by top-level policymakers, leading Committee Chair Charles Manski to conclude, as one observer notes, that "the drug war has no interest in its own results".[153]

In mid-1995, the US government tried to reduce the supply of methamphetamine precursors to disrupt the market of this drug. According to a 2009 study, this effort was successful, but its effects were largely temporary.[154]

During alcohol prohibition, the period from 1920 to 1933, alcohol use initially fell but began to increase as early as 1922. It has been extrapolated that even if prohibition had not been repealed in 1933, alcohol consumption would have quickly surpassed pre-prohibition levels.[155] One argument against the War on Drugs is that it uses similar measures as Prohibition and is no more effective.

In the six years from 2000 to 2006, the U.S. spent $4.7 billion on Plan Colombia, an effort to eradicate coca production in Colombia. The main result of this effort was to shift coca production into more remote areas and force other forms of adaptation. The overall acreage cultivated for coca in Colombia at the end of the six years was found to be the same, after the U.S. Drug Czar's office announced a change in measuring methodology in 2005 and included new areas in its surveys.[156] Cultivation in the neighboring countries of Peru and Bolivia increased, some would describe this effect like squeezing a balloon.[157]

Richard Davenport-Hines, in his book The Pursuit of Oblivion,[158] criticized the efficacy of the War on Drugs by pointing out that

1015% of illicit heroin and 30% of illicit cocaine is intercepted. Drug traffickers have gross profit margins of up to 300%. At least 75% of illicit drug shipments would have to be intercepted before the traffickers' profits were hurt.

Alberto Fujimori, president of Peru from 1990 to 2000, described U.S. foreign drug policy as "failed" on grounds that

for 10 years, there has been a considerable sum invested by the Peruvian government and another sum on the part of the American government, and this has not led to a reduction in the supply of coca leaf offered for sale. Rather, in the 10 years from 1980 to 1990, it grew 10-fold.[159]

At least 500 economists, including Nobel Laureates Milton Friedman,[160] George Akerlof and Vernon L. Smith, have noted that reducing the supply of marijuana without reducing the demand causes the price, and hence the profits of marijuana sellers, to go up, according to the laws of supply and demand.[161] The increased profits encourage the producers to produce more drugs despite the risks, providing a theoretical explanation for why attacks on drug supply have failed to have any lasting effect. The aforementioned economists published an open letter to President George W. Bush stating "We urge...the country to commence an open and honest debate about marijuana prohibition... At a minimum, this debate will force advocates of current policy to show that prohibition has benefits sufficient to justify the cost to taxpayers, foregone tax revenues and numerous ancillary consequences that result from marijuana prohibition."

The declaration from the World Forum Against Drugs, 2008 state that a balanced policy of drug abuse prevention, education,treatment, law enforcement, research, and supply reduction provides the most effective platform to reduce drug abuse and its associated harms and call on governments to consider demand reduction as one of their first priorities in the fight against drug abuse.[162]

Despite over $7 billion spent annually towards arresting[163] and prosecuting nearly 800,000 people across the country for marijuana offenses in 2005[citation needed] (FBI Uniform Crime Reports), the federally funded Monitoring the Future Survey reports about 85% of high school seniors find marijuana "easy to obtain". That figure has remained virtually unchanged since 1975, never dropping below 82.7% in three decades of national surveys.[164] The Drug Enforcement Administration states that the number of users of marijuana in the U.S. declined between 2000 and 2005 even with many states passing new medical marijuana laws making access easier,[165] though usage rates remain higher than they were in the 1990s according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health.[166]

ONDCP stated in April 2011 that there has been a 46 percent drop in cocaine use among young adults over the past five years, and a 65 percent drop in the rate of people testing positive for cocaine in the workplace since 2006.[167] At the same time, a 2007 study found that up to 35% of college undergraduates used stimulants not prescribed to them.[168]

A 2013 study found that prices of heroin, cocaine and cannabis had decreased from 1990 to 2007, but the purity of these drugs had increased during the same time.[169]

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War on drugs - Wikipedia

War on Drugs | History & Mass Incarceration | Britannica

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

War on Drugs, the effort in the United States since the 1970s to combat illegal drug use by greatly increasing penalties, enforcement, and incarceration for drug offenders.

The War on Drugs began in June 1971 when U.S. Pres. Richard Nixon declared drug abuse to be public enemy number one and increased federal funding for drug-control agencies and drug-treatment efforts. In 1973 the Drug Enforcement Administration was created out of the merger of the Office for Drug Abuse Law Enforcement, the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, and the Office of Narcotics Intelligence to consolidate federal efforts to control drug abuse.

The War on Drugs was a relatively small component of federal law-enforcement efforts until the presidency of Ronald Reagan, which began in 1981. Reagan greatly expanded the reach of the drug war and his focus on criminal punishment over treatment led to a massive increase in incarcerations for nonviolent drug offenses, from 50,000 in 1980 to 400,000 in 1997. In 1984 his wife, Nancy, spearheaded another facet of the War on Drugs with her Just Say No campaign, which was a privately funded effort to educate schoolchildren on the dangers of drug use. The expansion of the War on Drugs was in many ways driven by increased media coverage ofand resulting public nervousness overthe crack epidemic that arose in the early 1980s. This heightened concern over illicit drug use helped drive political support for Reagans hard-line stance on drugs. The U.S. Congress passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, which allocated $1.7 billion to the War on Drugs and established a series of mandatory minimum prison sentences for various drug offenses. A notable feature of mandatory minimums was the massive gap between the amounts of crack and of powder cocaine that resulted in the same minimum sentence: possession of five grams of crack led to an automatic five-year sentence while it took the possession of 500 grams of powder cocaine to trigger that sentence. Since approximately 80% of crack users were African American, mandatory minimums led to an unequal increase of incarceration rates for nonviolent black drug offenders, as well as claims that the War on Drugs was a racist institution.

Concerns over the effectiveness of the War on Drugs and increased awareness of the racial disparity of the punishments meted out by it led to decreased public support of the most draconian aspects of the drug war during the early 21st century. Consequently, reforms were enacted during that time, such as the legalization of recreational marijuana in an increasing number of states and the passage of the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 that reduced the discrepancy of crack-to-powder possession thresholds for minimum sentences from 100-to-1 to 18-to-1. Prison reform legislation enacted in 2018 further reduced the sentences for some crack cocainerelated convictions. While the War on Drugs is still technically being waged, it is done at a much less intense level than it was during its peak in the 1980s.

War on Drugs – Timeline in America, Definition & Facts …

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Contents

The War on Drugs is a phrase used to refer to a government-led initiative that aims to stop illegal drug use, distribution and trade by dramatically increasing prison sentences for both drug dealers and users. The movement started in the 1970s and is still evolving today. Over the years, people have had mixed reactions to the campaign, ranging from full-on support to claims that it has racist and political objectives.

Drug use for medicinal and recreational purposes has been happening in the United States since the countrys inception. In the 1890s, the popular Sears and Roebuck catalogue included an offer for a syringe and small amount of cocaine for $1.50. (At that time, cocaine use had not yet been outlawed.)

In some states, laws to ban or regulate drugs were passed in the 1800s, and the first congressional act to levy taxes on morphine and opium took place in 1890.

The Smoking Opium Exclusion Act in 1909 banned the possession, importation and use of opium for smoking. However, opium could still be used as a medication. This was the first federal law to ban the non-medical use of a substance, although many states and counties had banned alcohol sales previously.

In 1914, Congress passed the Harrison Act, which regulated and taxed the production, importation, and distribution of opiates and cocaine.

Alcohol prohibition laws quickly followed. In 1919, the 18th Amendment was ratified, banning the manufacture, transportation or sale of intoxicating liquors, ushering in the Prohibition Era. The same year, Congress passed the National Prohibition Act (also known as the Volstead Act), which provided guidelines on how to federally enforce Prohibition.

Prohibition lasted until December, 1933, when the 21st Amendment was ratified, overturning the 18th.

In 1937, the MarihuanaTax Act was passed. This federal law placed a tax on the sale of cannabis, hemp, or marijuana.

The Act was introduced by Rep. Robert L. Doughton of North Carolina and was drafted by Harry Anslinger. While the law didnt criminalize the possession or use of marijuana, it included hefty penalties if taxes werent paid, including a fine of up to $2000 and five years in prison.

President Richard M. Nixon signed the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) into law in 1970. This statute calls for the regulation of certain drugs and substances.

The CSA outlines five schedules used to classify drugs based on their medical application and potential for abuse.

Schedule 1 drugs are considered the most dangerous, as they pose a very high risk for addiction with little evidence of medical benefits. Marijuana, LSD, heroin, MDMA (ecstasy) and other drugs are included on the list of Schedule 1 drugs.

The substances considered least likely to be addictive, such as cough medications with small amounts of codeine, fall into the Schedule 5 category.

In June 1971, Nixon officially declared a War on Drugs, stating that drug abuse was public enemy number one.

A rise in recreational drug use in the 1960s likely led to President Nixons focus on targeting some types of substance abuse.As part of the War on Drugs initiative, Nixon increased federal funding for drug-control agencies and proposed strict measures, such as mandatory prison sentencing, for drug crimes. He also announced the creation of the Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention (SAODAP), which was headed by Dr. Jerome Jaffe.

Nixon went on to create the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in 1973. This agency is a special police force committed to targeting illegal drug use and smuggling in the United States.

At the start, the DEA was given 1,470 special agents and a budget of less than $75 million. Today, the agency has nearly 5,000 agents and a budget of $2.03 billion.

During a 1994 interview, President Nixons domestic policy chief, John Ehrlichman, provided inside information suggesting that the War on Drugs campaign had ulterior motives, which mainly involved helping Nixon keep his job.

In the interview, conducted by journalist Dan Baum and published in Harper magazine, Ehrlichman explained that the Nixon campaign had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. His comments led many to question Nixons intentions in advocating for drug reform and whether racism played a role.

Ehrlichman was quoted as saying: We knew we couldnt make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course, we did.

In the mid-1970s, the War on Drugs took a slight hiatus. Between 1973 and 1977, eleven states decriminalized marijuana possession.

Jimmy Carter became president in 1977 after running on a political campaign to decriminalize marijuana. During his first year in office, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to decriminalize up to one ounce of marijuana.

In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan reinforced and expanded many of Nixons War on Drugs policies. In 1984, his wife Nancy Reagan launched the Just Say No campaign, which was intended to highlight the dangers of drug use.

President Reagans refocus on drugs and the passing of severe penalties for drug-related crimes in Congress and state legislatures led to a massive increase in incarcerations for nonviolent drug crimes.

In 1986, Congress passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act, which established mandatory minimum prison sentences for certain drug offenses. This law was later heavily criticized as having racist ramifications because it allocated longer prison sentences for offenses involving the same amount of crack cocaine (used more often by black Americans) as powder cocaine (used more often by white Americans).Five grams of crack triggered an automatic five-year sentence, while it took 500 grams of powder cocaine to merit the same sentence.

Critics also pointed to data showing that people of color were targeted and arrested on suspicion of drug use at higher rates than whites. Overall, the policies led to a rapid rise in incarcerations for nonviolent drug offenses, from 50,000 in 1980 to 400,000 in 1997. In 2014,nearly half of the 186,000 people serving time in federal prisons in the United States had been incarcerated on drug-related charges, according to theFederal Bureau of Prisons.

Public support for the war on drugs has waned in recent decades. Some Americans and policymakers feel the campaign has been ineffective or has led to racial divide. Between 2009 and 2013, some 40 states took steps to soften their drug laws, lowering penalties and shortening mandatory minimum sentences, according to the Pew Research Center.

In 2010, Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act (FSA), which reduced the discrepancy between crack and powder cocaine offenses from 100:1 to 18:1.

The recent legalization of marijuana in several states and the District of Columbia has also led to a more tolerant political view on recreational drug use.

Technically, the War on Drugs is still being fought, but with less intensity and publicity than in its early years.

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War on Drugs - Timeline in America, Definition & Facts ...

Key Facts About the War on Drugs – ThoughtCo

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

What Is the "War on Drugs?"

The "War on Drugs" is a general term used to refer to the federal government's attempts to end the import, manufacture, sale, and use of illegal drugs. It's a colloquial term that does not refer in any meaningful way to a specific policy or objective, but rather to a series of anti-drug initiatives that are vaguely directed towards the common goal of ending drug abuse.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower began what The New York Times then called "a new war on narcotic addiction at the local, national, and international level" with the establishment of an Interdepartmental Committee on Narcotics on November 27, 1954, which was responsible for coordinating executive branch anti-drug efforts. The phrase "War on Drugs" first came into common use after President Richard Nixon used it at a press conference on June 17, 1971, during which he described illegal drugs as "public enemy number one in the United States."

1914: The Harrison Narcotics Tax Act regulates the distribution of narcotics (heroin and other opiates). Federal law enforcement will later incorrectly classify cocaine, a central nervous system stimulant, as a "narcotic" and regulate it under the same legislation.1937: The Marijuana Tax Act extends federal restrictions to cover marijuana.1954: The Eisenhower administration takes a significant, albeit largely symbolic, step in establishing a U.S. Interdepartmental Committee on Narcotics.1970: The Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 establishes federal anti-drug policy as we know it.

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 55% of federal prisoners and 21% of state-level prisoners are incarcerated on the basis of drug-related offenses. This means that over a half million people are presently incarcerated as a result of anti-drug lawsmore than the population of Wyoming. The illegal drug trade also sustains gang activity, and is indirectly responsible for an unknown number of homicides. (The FBI's Uniform Crime Reports describe 4% of homicides as being directly attributable to the illegal drug trade, but it plays an indirect role in a much larger percentage of homicides.)

According to the White House's National Drug Control Strategy Budgets, as cited in Action America's Drug War Cost Clock, the federal government alone is projected to spend over $22 billion on the War on Drugs in 2009. State spending totals are harder to isolate, but Action America cites a 1998 Columbia University study which found that states spent over $30 billion on drug law enforcement during that year.

The federal government's authority to prosecute drug-related offenses theoretically stems from Article I's Commerce Clause, which grants Congress the authority to "regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes"but federal law enforcement targets drug offenders even when the illegal substance is manufactured and distributed only within state lines.

According to an October 2008 Zogby poll of likely voters, 76% describe the War on Drugs as a failure. In 2009, the Obama administration announced that it would no longer use the phrase "War on Drugs" to refer to federal anti-drug efforts, the first administration in 40 years not to do so.

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Key Facts About the War on Drugs - ThoughtCo

Deepfakes Are Becoming the Hot New Corporate Training Tool – WIRED

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

This month, advertising giant WPP will send unusual corporate training videos to tens of thousands of employees worldwide. A presenter will speak in the recipients language and address them by name, while explaining some basic concepts in artificial intelligence. The videos themselves will be powerful demonstrations of what AI can do: The face, and the words it speaks, will be synthesized by software.

WPP doesnt bill them as such, but its synthetic training videos might be called deepfakes, a loose term applied to images or videos generated using AI that look real. Although best known as tools of harassment, porn, or duplicity, image-generating AI is now being used by major corporations for such anodyne purposes as corporate training.

WPPs unreal training videos, made with technology from London startup Synthesia, arent perfect. WPP chief technology officer Stephan Pretorius says the prosody of the presenters delivery can be off, the most jarring flaw in an early cut shown to WIRED that was visually smooth. But the ability to personalize and localize video to many individuals makes for more compelling footage than the usual corporate fare, he says. The technology is getting very good very quickly, Pretorius says.

Deepfake-style production can also be cheap and quick, an advantage amplified by Covid-19 restrictions that have made conventional video shoots trickier and riskier. Pretorius says a company-wide internal education campaign might require 20 different scripts for WPPs global workforce, each costing tens of thousands of dollars to produce. With Synthesia we can have avatars that are diverse and speak your name and your agency and in your language and the whole thing can cost $100,000, he says. In this summers training campaign, the languages are limited to English, Spanish, and Mandarin. Pretorius hopes to distribute the clips, 20 modules of about 5 minutes each, to 50,000 employees this year.

Were saying let's remove the camera from the equation.

Victor Riparbelli, CEO and cofounder, Synthesia

The term deepfakes comes from the Reddit username of the person or persons who in 2017 released a series of pornographic clips modified using machine learning to include the faces of Hollywood actresses. Their code was released online, and various forms of AI video and image-generation technology are now available to any interested amateur. Deepfakes have become tools of harassment against activists, and a cause of concern among lawmakers and social media executives worried about political disinformation, although they are also used for fun, such as to insert Nicolas Cage into movies he did not appear in.

Deepfakes made for titillation, harassment, or fun typically come with obvious giveaway glitches. Startups are now crafting AI technology that can generate video and images able to pass as substitutes for conventional corporate footage or marketing photos. It comes as synthetic media, and people, are becoming more mainstream. Prominent talent agency CAA recently signed Lil Miquela, a computer-generated Instagram influencer with more than 2 million followers.

Startup Rosebud has developed AI software that can generate images of models with a range of appearances.

Rosebud AI specializes in making the kind of glossy images used in ecommerce or marketing. Last year the company released a collection of 25,000 modeling photos of people that never existed, along with tools that can swap synthetic faces into any photo. More recently, it launched a service that can put clothes photographed on mannequins onto virtual but real-looking models.

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Deepfakes Are Becoming the Hot New Corporate Training Tool - WIRED

Know Future Opportunities of the Pleasure Boat Paint Market latest Technology, New Innovation, Growing factors with Top Key Players- Attiva Marine,…

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

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Advancements in Technology to Aid the Growth of the Psychotropic Drugs Market Over the Forecast Period 2018 2028 – 3rd Watch News

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

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Advancements in Technology to Aid the Growth of the Psychotropic Drugs Market Over the Forecast Period 2018 2028 - 3rd Watch News

Why OneConnect Financial Technology Crushed the Market on Friday – Motley Fool

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

What happened?

China-based OneConnect Financial Technology (NYSE:OCFT) shot nearly 13% higher on Friday on news that the company signed an agreement to provide "financial and smart supervision services" to the finance authority of Hainan, China's smallest and southernmost province. The company will also perform the same duties for Hainan Free Trade Port.

Image Source: Getty Images.

OneConnect didn't provide the financial details, the scope, or the duration of the arrangement. But considering that the agreement covers both the province's finance authority and the Free Trade Port -- the largest free trade port in China, according to OneConnect -- we can assume it's considerable.

OneConnect is an ambitious company that is well-placed to take advantage of ongoing trends in its country's development.It offers a range of cloud-based tools designed to assist and modernize the operations of Chinese finance companies in a wide variety of segments.

The company was incubated at a massive Chinese insurance company, Ping An (OTC:PNGA.Y), of which it is a subsidiary despite being publicly traded.

As many of OneConnect's target institutions are not up-to-date with their systems and suffer from low digitization, the company has plenty of opportunity in its native and regional markets. Management believes that its potential market in China and Southeast Asia could reach $120 billion by 2023. As the company booked roughly $330 million in 2019, it seems there is much room for that figure to head sharply north.

Originally posted here:

Why OneConnect Financial Technology Crushed the Market on Friday - Motley Fool

9 great reads from CNET this week – MSN Money

Posted on July 12, 2020 by Danzig

Robert Rodriguez/CNET

This week saw mounting evidence that COVID-19 can spread through the air, a form of transmission the World Health Organization had earlier considered very rare. The agency also made a stronger statementthat the virus can be spread by people who are asymptomatic. Meanwhile, the United States has been setting single-day records for coronavirus cases -- it reported almost 60,000 on Thursday alone, according to The New York Times.

On the tech front, President Donald Trump iseyeing a ban on TikTok, Uber has gone all-in on grocery delivery, Apple made iOS betas available for public testing, and CNET kicked off a series on how China aims to dominate everything from 5G to AI.

Here are week's stories you don't want to miss.

It's the stuff of science fiction: chilling your body inside a stainless steel chamber for years on end. But is cryonics a way to reverse death? Or is it just a pipe dream?

China isn't the only country jockeying for control. The US dominated 4G's expansion and expects to do the same with 5G.

Exclusive: Several emergency services in the US and Canada are embracing the What3words service. One tap on a text message lets you tell them exactly where you are.

In a massive warehouse in New Jersey, Bowery Farming is trying to change the future of agriculture (all while using 90% less water).

The reality is that US and China efforts to develop AI are entwined, even if the tensions of coronavirus and trade disagreements may spur a separation.

Wars aren't fought only on battlefields. Here's the little-known story of the gang of Americans who searched for black gold in the heart of besieged Britain.

Kevin Valdez draws on personal experience to play a neurodiverse character on a new Apple TV Plus show.

Commentary: Today's services are primed to help you figure out where you come from.

Old phones and Star Wars toys aren't the only valuable items people will pay for on eBay, Facebook Marketplace and more.

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9 great reads from CNET this week - MSN Money

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