Monthly Archives: June 2017

The War on Drugs has been one of the most lopsided defeats ever.

We're talking Grenada vs. U.S. Custer vs. Sioux. Phillies vs. Everyone.

We've spent well over a trillion dollars and several decades in return for overflowing prisons, dead law enforcement officers, thriving drug dealers, urban battlegrounds controlled by gangs of thugs, grossly inadequate rehabilitation efforts and no reduction of drug use.

More and more people have figured this out. According to Gallup polling, a majority of Americans supported legalizing marijuana by 2013, and that number had reached 60 percent by last year. These attitudes have been playing themselves out in state legislatures all over the country.

Pennsylvania finally legalized medical marijuana last year, making it one of 29 states and the District of Columbia to do so. Eight states and the District of Columbia have legalized recreational use, and other states have decriminalized the possession of small amounts.

I was a passionate advocate for Pennsylvania's medical marijuana law, and I thought it was important not to muddy the waters by injecting recreational use into that discussion. But I've been clear about where I stand on that subject. As I wrote years ago, decriminalizing marijuana is a good start, but I wouldn't stop there.

If we legalized, regulated and taxed marijuana and other drugs, we not only would have a hefty injection of new funding for desperately needed treatment and educational programs from those tax revenues, but we'd also reap a windfall from savings in prison and law enforcement spending. Gangs and other criminals that depend so heavily on drug-dealing would find themselves out of business or operating at a severe competitive disadvantage.

Noting the monumental task facing state budget negotiators this year in the face of a growing deficit, Auditor General Eugene DePasquale said at a Capitol press conference, "If I told you that the budget negotiators from the Legislature and the governor's office will have $200 million of found money that does not harm one other state program or one other state tax, would they throw that money out the window or find a way to utilize it?"

He said, "The one area ... that will bring in revenue and actually cut costs at the exact same time would be the regulation and taxation of marijuana."

Former Allegheny County prosecutor, now criminal defense attorney Patrick Nightingale of the nonprofit Law Enforcement Action Partnership, an organization of criminal justice professionals who advocate for solutions across a broad range of drug policy and criminal justice issues, argued that DePasquale is underestimating the windfall when you consider the savings in incarceration and law enforcement costs.

He concluded, "It's a win win win for Pennsylvania if we can get out of our conservative reefer madness mentality."

LEAP, founded in 2002 as Law Enforcement Against Prohibition by five police officers dedicated to educating the public about the harms of drug prohibition, became Law Enforcement Action Partnership in January to broaden its areas of advocacy.

Even if recreational marijuana legalization is a bridge too far for some of you, I suspect the vast majority of readers would agree that we at least should decriminalize possession of marijuana, eliminate mandatory minimum sentences and clear our prisons of a lot of nonviolent offenders.

Two bills have been introduced in the state Legislature that would reduce a conviction for possession of small amounts of marijuana from a misdemeanor to a summary offense, punishable by a relatively low fine instead of potential jail time.

Unfortunately, as with many other areas of progress in our society, this growing realization that drug policies of the past aren't working hit a big, not-so-beautiful wall with the election of Donald Trump and his appointment of troglodytic Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Far from approving the trend toward scaling back the War on Drugs, Sessions wants a troop surge that would include prosecuting more drug cases, seeking more mandatory minimum sentences and directly confronting what he considers a deadly trend toward legalization of the evil weed.

Sessions said at a Senate hearing last year that our elected leaders should make it clear they take marijuana prevention efforts seriously, by "the creating of knowledge that this drug is dangerous, you cannot play with it, it is not funny, it's not something to laugh about ... and trying to send that message with clarity that good people don't smoke marijuana."

Nightingale told me, "It's as if we woke up in 1983 with Jeff Sessions. 'Good people don't use marijuana.' 'It's a gateway drug.' 'I don't believe it has medical value.'"

Nightingale, who also is executive director of the Pittsburgh branch of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, said, "We can look at three, four years' worth of data from Colorado to understand that loosening marijuana laws is not resulting in an increase of criminality, it's not resulting in an increase in hard drug use. In fact, it's the opposite."

He was particularly critical of a memo Sessions sent out last month to federal prosecutors that reversed the Obama administration approach to low-level drug crime. Sessions wants prosecutors to charge violators with the most serious offenses they can prove and seek the most substantial sentences.

Former Attorney General Eric Holder responded at the time, "The policy announced today is not tough on crime. It is dumb on crime. It is an ideologically motivated, cookie-cutter approach that has only been proven to generate unfairly long sentences that are often applied indiscriminately and do little to achieve long-term public safety."

Nightingale said Sessions thinks locking more people up for longer stretches will help solve our drug problems. "We absolutely know from 45 years of failed drug policy," he said, "that is not going to work."

This is no time for a troop surge. It's time for a carefully negotiated peace.

bill.white@mcall.com 610-820-6105

Bill White's commentary appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays

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War on Drugs doesn't need a surge - Allentown Morning Call

While American foreign policy has for years fixated on the conflict in Syria and the Middle East, just across the border in Mexico and throughout Central America tens of thousands of people lost their lives last year because of the conflict between drug cartels competing to deliver illicit drugs into the United States.

According to a recent report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies, whereas approximately 50,000 lives were lost in Syria last year, approximately 39,000 were killed in Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, much of which is attributable to drug-war violence.

Mexicos homicide total of 23,000 for 2016 is second only to Syrias, and is only the latest development in a conflict that stretches back to 2006, when President Felipe Calderon deployed the military to combat drug cartels.

Although the exact number of people killed because of the drug war in Mexico is unlikely to ever be known, a recent report from the Congressional Research Service cited estimates from 80,000 to more than 100,000 in that country alone.

The cause of this violence is obvious, and it is a direct, predictable consequence of our failed policy of drug prohibition. In the near-half century since President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs, hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans have been killed in conflicts fueled by a lucrative illicit drug trade made possible by our prohibition of drugs.

This is an insight a certain New York developer possessed 27 years ago. Were losing badly the war on drugs, Donald Trump said in 1990. You have to legalize drugs to win that war. You have to take the profit away from these drug czars.

While Trump may have since lost this insight, the fact remains that the war on drugs does more harm than drugs themselves.

Rather than squander more lives and resources fighting a War on Drugs that cannot be won including in our inner cities the United States must recognize the futility and harm of its drug policies.

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'War on drugs' is costing thousands of lives - Manhattan Mercury (subscription)

Ventura 3:58 p.m. PT June 12, 2017

In this Jan. 12, 2014 file photo, men belonging to the Self-Defense Council of Michoacan, ride on a sandbag-filled truck while trying to flush out alleged members of The Caballeros Templarios drug cartel from the town of Nueva Italia, Mexico.(Photo: Eduardo Verdugo/Associated Press)

The following editorial appeared in The Orange County Register:

While American foreign policy has for years fixated on conflict in the Middle East, just across the border in Mexico and throughout Central America tens of thousands of people lost their lives last year because of drug cartels competing to deliver illicit drugs into the United States.

According to an International Institute for Strategic Studies new report, 50,000 lives were lost in Syria last year, while 39,000 were killed in Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, much of which is attributable to drug-war violence.

Although the exact number of people killed because of the drug war in Mexico is unlikely to ever be known, a recent report from the Congressional Research Service cited estimates of 80,000 to more than 100,000 in that country alone.

The violence is a predictable consequence of our failed policy of drug prohibition. In the near-half century since President Nixon declared a war on drugs, hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans have been killed in conflicts fueled by a lucrative illicit drug trade made possible by our prohibition of drugs.

Were losing badly the war on drugs, Donald Trump said in 1990. You have to legalize drugs to win that war.While Trump may have since lost this insight, the war on drugs is still doing more harm than the drugs themselves.

Rather than squander more lives and resources fighting a war that cannot be won, the United States must recognize the futility and harm of its drug policies.

Read or Share this story: http://www.vcstar.com/story/opinion/editorials/2017/06/12/editorial-war-drugs-costing-too-many-lives/391089001/

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Editorial: 'War on drugs' costing too many lives - Ventura County Star

On May 31, Ross Ulbricht lost his appeal with the Second Circuit appellate court. He will serve out the remainder of his life sentence, a sentence passed down in part due to allegations that he commissioned multiple murders-for-hire. Whether or not Ulbricht ordered these hits, his case illustrates how, by criminalizing drugs, the United States government has created an institution that incentives violence.

Ulbricht did not begin with violent intentions. He was an Eagle Scout who founded The Silk Road as a beacon of freedom. He agonized over the idea of a hit: As Wired reports, He had talked to Inigo [an employee] about how he just wishes the best for people, and loves them in the libertarian spiriteven Green [Ulbrichts first alleged target], in flagrante delicto. But for Ulbricht and others involved in the drug industry, violence was in his self interest.

Opponents of drug prohibition argue that the drug industry is by nature violent. However, buying and selling drugs isnt inherently more violent than is buying and selling alcohol. Rather, its black markets that create incentives for violence.

Black markets naturally attract criminals, in part because its difficult for convicted felons to find a career aboveboard. The black market for drugs offers lucrative opportunities that are especially attractive to those who have already committed violent crimes and are thus unlikely to find legal work.

Black markets also attract violent individuals because the crimes associated with selling drugs are proportionately less costly for those who already have a rap sheet. Legitimate businessmen are unlikely to sell drugs, because if they are caught they could face decades in prison. But for hardened criminals, the primary danger is in being caught, not in one more charge being added to an existing long list.

Additionally, black markets incentivize criminals to protect their secrecy. For many drug sellers, the most effective way to do so is to silence potential leaks. This was the context for Ulbrichts first alleged hit: He feared that if his victim (an employee of The Silk Road) werent silenced, the employee might report Ulbrichts crimes to the FBI. The difference between serving 10 years for drug trafficking and serving life for murder was a relatively small one compared to the difference between going to prison or remaining free.

Finally, black markets require violent dispute resolution. As Attorney General Jeff Sessions correctly argues, You cant sue somebody for drug debt; the only way to get your money is through strong-arm tactics, and violence tends to follow that. Faced with employees he suspected were cheating him, Ulbricht resorted to a seemingly violent resolution.

Ulbricht wasnt attracted to illicit sales by his background, but once in the industry, his incentives pointed towards violence.

Violence is inherent in black markets, not theoretical: History makes a strong case that prohibition encourages aggression. When the 18th Amendment was passed, alcohol transitioned from a legitimate business to a funding source for organized crime. Violent crime increased dramatically as sellers went to extreme lengths to protect themselves and their stake. The 18th Amendment was passed in 1919, and homicides rose steadily from 1920 to 1933. Writing in American Law and Economics Review, Harvard Professor of Economics Jeffrey Miron argues that drug and alcohol prohibition have substantially raised the homicide rate in the U.S. over much of the past 100 years.

By contrast, when goods are legalized, crime declines. Legitimate businessmen replace Mafia gangsters, and entrepreneurs lose their incentive to kill in order to protect themselves. After the 21st Amendment ended Prohibition in 1933, homicides diminished for 11 years straight. Part of this was due to improving economic conditions, but part was likely also due to the fact that legal markets discourage violence.

The same trend can be seen with regards to medical marijuana. Writing in the Journal of Drug Issues, researchers analyzed violent and property crime in 11 Western states and found, Significant drops in rates of violent crime associated with state MMLs [medical marijuana laws]. When drugs are legalized, violent crime declines.

Prohibition advocates argue that legalizing drugs might increase violent crime, as criminals move from the drug market into other illicit enterprises. This movement is plausible, but the net effect is still likely to be less crime. Prohibited substances fund criminal enterprises, and strangling this funding also strangles the organizations other activities.

Ulbricht began The Silk Road as a beacon of freedom and non-violence, but if reports about his activities are true, then he eventually embodied the violence of prohibition. Prohibition creates an incentive structure that encourages aggression. Black markets attract violent individuals, and move even decent people to brutality. If we want a safer and more peaceful world, we should learn a lesson from Ross Ulbricht and end the war on drugs.

Julian Adorney is a Young Voices Advocate and a FEE 2016 Thorpe Fellow. He currently works at Colorado SEO Pros. Hes written for a number of outlets, including National Review, the Federalist, the Hill, FEE, and Lawrence Reeds latest anthology Excuse Me, Professor.

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The Uncomfortable Link Between the War on Drugs and Violent Crime - Observer

New York Times

Duterte, Focused on Drug Users in Philippines, Ignored Rise of ISIS New York Times The government has largely been in denial about the growth of ISIS and affiliated groups, said Zachary M. Abuza, a professor at the National War College in Washington who specializes in Southeast Asian security issues. Duterte has been preoccupied ... Philippines: Duterte focused on drugs, ignored rise of IS analystAsian Correspondent US Special Forces Help Philippines Fight Islamic MilitantsBloomberg The warning from Marawi for regional securityThe Straits Times Rappler -BusinessWorld Online Edition all 596 news articles »

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Duterte, Focused on Drug Users in Philippines, Ignored Rise of ISIS - New York Times

Forbes

The War On Cannabis Heats Up Forbes The war on drugs or at least the cannabis industry is heating up and certain to create even more nervousness among cannabis investors. While the Department of Justice has its hands tied with regards to being funded to pursue cannabis law breakers ... and more »

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The War On Cannabis Heats Up - Forbes

NEW figures show methamphetamine use has plunged across WA, providing the first real evidence that the hundreds of millions of dollars being spent on combating the drug is paying off.

Tests in April that measured the concentration of the meth in raw sewage showed that consumption in Perth had almost halved since September when usage was at its peak.

It was also the best result since testing for meth in wastewater began two years ago, showing consumption had fallen about 25 per cent on the average recorded in the 2015-16 financial year when West Australians consumed about 2.1 tonnes of the drug.

Consumption is now estimated to have fallen by more than half a tonne.

The trend downwards in the past three test periods is obviously pleasing, but the sobering reality is WA still has a projected annual meth habit of 1.54 tonnes, with an estimated street value of just over $1.5 billion, State Crime Acting Assistant Commissioner Pryce Scanlan said.

No one is immune to this drug and it is still having a significant impact on the community.

While the sudden fall has been cautiously welcomed, it comes after a huge investment by the State and Federal governments to help tackle the supply and demand of the drug.

Mr Scanlan said WA Police had made unprecedented efforts to target meth dealers in the past two years, setting up dedicated meth teams within the organised crime squad which had helped seize almost 900kg of the drug.

From a policing perspective we have had considerable success, in tandem with our Federal partners, in interrupting supply, and in 2015-16 and 2016-17 we have so far intercepted approximately 890kg of meth headed for our streets, he said.

It could be that the major trafficking syndicates may not be viewing WA as such a soft target after those losses.

And the theory that WAs mining boom and the high disposable incomes it created contributed to our high rate of meth use in the past could, if true, be working in reverse with the end of the boom.

Since 2015, significant government funding had also been poured into education to warn users about the dangers of meth and money for rehabilitation facilities had also been boosted.

The downward trend in WA mirrored the results of a recent national survey that showed meth use around the country had been steadily falling.

The National Household Drug Survey, released this month, showed the number of Australians who admitted using meth had fallen from 2.1 per cent in 2013 to 1.4 per cent last year.

Although no new State-based figures were available, WA is still believed to be the biggest user of any State, running at almost twice the national average.

The survey also found that respondents now considered meth to be the most addictive drug on the illicit market and the drug most likely to cause serious harm to users, overtaking heroin.

Of the regional centres tested for meth, Bunbury had the biggest fall, which helped it shed its tag as the meth capital of WA.

That tag has now shifted to Kalgoorlie which has also recorded significant falls.

The rate of meth use per 1000 people in Bunbury in September was 50 per cent higher than in the Perth metro area. Bunbury was still higher than Perth in April, but consumption had more than halved.

Kalgoorlie mayor John Bowler said that though the meth capital title was obviously unwanted, his community would be pleased to see drug use overall had come down.

While it is a title we obviously do not want ... the use is coming down pretty clearly, so we take that as a positive, he said.

Police Minister Michelle Roberts said that while the local results were encouraging, tackling the meth scourge would remain a top priority for her party.

The McGowan Government wont be taking its foot off the pedal when it comes to tackling the devastation meth causes in our community, she said.

We have laws before Parliament which give life jail sentences for meth traffickers and were boosting police efforts to seize more of the drug before it hits our streets, by introducing a meth border force.

Shadow police minster Peter Katsambanis also welcomed the results which he said were a credit to the former Barnett governments commitment to tackling the meth problem.

I call on the Government to continue these initiatives to make sure our community continues to see improvements in relation to this insidious drug, he said.

Police for the first time in April also tested for the presence of meth at 11 remote Aboriginal communities, finding it was present in all, but only in low levels.

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War on drugs: Raw sewage testing shows drop in meth use across WA - Perth Now