We’re about to spend hundreds of thousands of American dollars incarcerating a Canadian who was busted for selling marijuana seeds. He never set foot in the United States, but he’s being extradited. Who did he hurt?
“There isn’t a single victim in my case, no one who can stand up and say, ‘I was hurt by Marc Emery.’ No one.”
Emery is facing more jail time than corporate criminals who defraud widows and orphans and longer incarceration than violent offenders who leave their victims dead or in wheelchairs. Whatever else you may think of him — and I know he rankles many — what is happening to him today mocks our independence and our ideal of justice.
Emery’s crime is so incredibly serious that he would have spent an entire month in a Canadian prison for his crime. But, apparently, we have nothing better to do with American tax dollars than incarcerating people who sell marijuana seeds to people who want to buy them.
Ryan Grim has just published This is Your Country on Drugs, and he has presented some of his main ideas at Huffpo.
[O]ur nation diverges sharply from the rest of the world in a few crucial ways. Americans work hard: 135 hours a year more than the average Briton, 240 hours more than the typical French worker, and 370 hours–that’s nine weeks–more than the average German. We also play hard. A global survey released in 2008 found that Americans are more than twice as likely to smoke pot as Europeans. Forty-two percent of Americans had puffed at one point; percentages for citizens of various European nations were all under 20. We’re also four times as likely to have done coke as Spaniards and roughly ten times more likely than the rest of Europe.
What is driving law enforcement regarding drug use. Grim’s answer focuses on our ambivalence toward pleasure:
When pleasure is suspected, American drug use gets tricky, particularly when that high might do some real good, as in the case of medical marijuana.
According to Gray, it’s easier for kids to get marijuana than alcohol because alcohol is regulated by the government and marijuana is regulated by drug dealers on the street.
These are excellent videos, caused by a thoughtful judge who is in a position to know.
If we started treating marijuana as we do alcohol, we would see five immediate benefits:
California would save $1 Billion in state expenses currently used to prosecute marijuana offenses.
California would generate $1.3B in take revenue per year in California (marijuana is currently the number one cash crop in California, with grapes being #2).
We’d make marijuana less available than it is now, and the quality of marijuana would be better regulated than it is now.
The entire medical marijuana controversy would go away–the Federal government is currently acting like a “bully” harassing sick people.
The hemp industry is a viable industrial crop, more valuable than cotton. You can get more paper from an acre of hemp than an acre of trees, and it’s much more environmentally friendly. The diesel engine was originally designed to run on hemp. The sails of the ship “Old Ironsides,” The U.S. Constitution were made of hemp fibers. The original copy of the founding document, the U.S. Constitution was made of hemp. It is an extremely valuable crop that we fail to exploit.
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Why don’t we treat marijuana like alcohol, even though the majority of people are willing to do this? Why does the federal government care? Here’s Judge Gray’s belief: At least 75% of everyone in the U.S. who uses any illicit substance uses only marijuana. By legalizing and regulating marijuana, the federal government would no longer justify our “colossal prison-industrial complex.” Many government jobs depend on the “war on drugs.” Two Congressmen have admitted to Judge Gray that “the war on drugs is not winnable, but it’s imminently fund-able.” He concludes that the federal government is “addicted to the drug war funding.”
“America’s criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace,” [Senator Jim] Webb said, noting that the United States has five percent of the world’s population but 25 percent of the world’s prisoners.
According to a document released by Sen. Webb’s office, “Its task will be to propose concrete, wide-ranging reforms to responsibly reduce the overall incarceration rate; improve federal and local responses to international and domestic gang violence; restructure our approach to drug policy; improve the treatment of mental illness; improve prison administration, and establish a system for reintegrating ex-offenders.”
[T]he war on drugs has been a disaster, creating failed states in the developing world even as addiction has flourished in the rich world. By any sensible measure, this 100-year struggle has been illiberal, murderous and pointless. That is why The Economist continues to believe that the least bad policy is to legalise drugs.
How can one quantify this illiberal, murderous and pointless struggle?
The United States alone spends some $40 billion each year on trying to eliminate the supply of drugs. It arrests 1.5m of its citizens each year for drug offences, locking up half a million of them; tougher drug laws are the main reason why one in five black American men spend some time behind bars. In the developing world blood is being shed at an astonishing rate. In Mexico more than 800 policemen and soldiers have been killed since December 2006 (and the annual overall death toll is running at over 6,000) . . . [F]ar from reducing crime, prohibition has fostered gangsterism on a scale that the world has never seen before.
In this article, The Economist points out that it has maintained this same position for 20 years, and it is more evident than ever that the “drug war” is a disaster.
On February 17, 2009, Pamela Olson gave a riveting talk on the details of daily life in the Palestinian West Bank. She gave her talk at a recent session of “TechTalks,” a series of talks sponsored by Google.
Olson graduated from Stanford in 2002 with a major in physics. She lived in Ramallah, West Bank, for a year and a half beginning in the summer of 2004 and worked as a journalist for the Palestine Monitor.
What is startling about this video are the many gorgeous scenes from the West Bank accompanying Olson’s introduction to day-to-day life in the West Bank, something which Americans rarely learn of from the American media. The happiness and charm of the West Bank is covered in the first half of Olson’s talk. But there is more to the West Bank, of course. Behind all of the charm:
looms the conflict, the occupation, and violence. Since September 2000, more than 5,500 Palestinians and 1,100 Israelis have been killed. A series of walls, fences, roadblocks, checkpoints, army bases, and settlements keep the Palestinians in the West Bank under an almost constant state of siege and strangle the economy of many towns and villages, including Bethlehem. Gaza has been turned into an open-air prison whose desperate inmates can only get vital supplies through smuggling tunnels — which also transport weapons that Palestinian militants use to target Israeli civilians.
[Her story is] a fascinating world of beauty and terror, of hospitality and homicide, of the absurd and the sublime constantly together — a microcosmic view of a little-understood human story with global implications.
Olson talks in detail about the numerous checkpoints, the wall and the Israeli settlements. She plainly explains that the occupation, the checkpoints, the wall and the settlements are indisputably illegal pursuant to international law. The wall now runs 70 km., cutting Palestinians off from each other. The wall is a “huge scar on the landscape.” It keeps Palestinians from each other, keeps them from farming, keeps them from their own hospitals and keeps their children from getting to school. Even Palestinian politicians are prevented from having free access to their own people. Entire neighborhoods are being destroyed, to make way for more illegal Israeli settlements. The Palestinians are essentially being herded into an ever-smaller prison. Olson backs up her statements with extensive photography.
Olson’s vivid photos and her calm commentary makes the violence by Palestinians much more understandable. Watching this talk gave me more information than watching dozens of the simplistic stories told by the American Media. Perhaps this unrelenting stream of simplistic media stories is a major cause of America’s unflinching support of Israeli’s harsh policies toward the Palestinians. Sadly, it is a common Palestinian saying that “The silence of the West is worse than the bullets of the Israelis.”
Here is Olson’s talk, which lasts 80 minutes:
For more information on Pamela Olson, you can visit www.pamolson.org
Those who vehemently oppose abortion steadfastly claim that abortion is “murder.” They want to make it illegal for any woman to have an abortion.
Therefore, it seems fair to ask anti-abortionists a simple hypothetical question. Assume that we changed the law and that all abortions were illegal. Under that scenario, how would you punish women who committed “murder” by having abortions?”
What do you get when you combine a camcorder, a simple question and a group of fervent anti-abortionists? You get a fascinating set of answers.
Where are all of the unflinching statements that the women who have abortions have thus committed murder and that they should all be punished as murderers? There were no such answers.
Why all the hedging and squirming? Is it possible that abortion is not really the equivalent of murder? Even in the hearts and minds of those who claim to know for certain that it is “murder”? Assuming that abortion were made illegal, why are so many anti-abortionists so willing to allow a bunch of female murderers walk free without without being penalized under the law? Especially when those who committed the “murder” killed “babies,” allegedly with deliberation and premeditation?
This January 2008 video was produced by At Center Network, “a project of the Northbrook Peace Committee, Inc., a group that works for justice and nonviolent resolution of conflicts.”
Michael Moore didn’t mention this country in Sicko, but it offers health benefits that exceed those of most other countries, even France. It is a “model of sustainable ecology.” And check out the prison. This country has the world’s lowest murder rate, yet the longest prison sentence available is 21 years. [...]
The United States. Here are some shocking details from Nomi Prins of Alternet:
The United States has more inmates and a higher incarceration rate than any other nation: more than Russia, South Africa, Mexico, Iran, India, Australia, Brazil and Canada combined. Nearly 1 in every 136 US residents is in jail or prison. That’s 2.2 million [...]
I spent some time over at Focus on the Family, a site that teaches God’s own version of morality, to see what they had to say about drug use. As it turned out, the advice depended on whether the drug was illegal, as though God defers to the U.S. Congress to figure out what drugs [...]
A friend referred me to this video about a strange government facility in a low-crime area in Indiana.
Interesting stuff. Any ideas of what this is? It does look as though the governmnent plans to put a bunch of people into this space. On the other hand, maybe this is just another example of the incredible [...]
This documentary by Penn and Teller characterizes the “War on Drugs” as “The new prohibition.” The documentary is a no-holds-barred presentation that includes some coarse language. Here is Part II and here is Part III.
The statistics are compelling. Alcohol causes 50,000 deaths per year. Tobacco causes 440,000 deaths per year. Marijuana has yet to cause [...]
This whole crisis will just be repeated again because the way W and Obama have stacked the deck.We, the taxpayers are the payors of last resort, and there's no risk, civilly or criminally for the thieves, jackals and vultures who will pick over the last of the bones of the Middle Class at the end of the next crisis when the whole world is thrown ba... »
Erich-It seems that the Chinese are acting as though peak oil were here or something. From the article:This green spending is concurrent with their ongoing efforts to lock up remaining supplies of oil, as I briefly mentioned here. See also this article on Chinese oil buying. »
Jay, I agree. A lot of the house bill, particularly where Medicaid reform is concerned, references specific paragraphs in the Medicaid laws. Understanding the full effect of the changes wil require reading those as well. I've often thought it would be fun to get an amendment to repeal or suspend an obscure law of physics, such as the chandrasekha... »
Ya know, I thought NO ONE actually read those bills. I've always wanted to slip in weird, off the wall statements and regs that make no sense into the middle of such a document to see if anyone is actually reading them. »
Palin quit some appointment to an oil board because of GOP "corruption."Palin says the McCain people didn't let her have her say. The media just did "gotcha" moments on Palin.Palin quits being governor two years early because of conservative allegations of her being "corrupt." Just after Palin pays back Alaska for bilking the state for travel for h... »
Niklaus: I admire your determination. There are probably only a few hundred people in the entire country who have read the first 1,000 pages. When you finish, I'll invite you to read the Senate version too, so that you can do a comparison. »
Well I'm up to page 1000 in the house bill. A lot of the bill addresses specifically the loopholes that have been exploited by large corporations like Wal-mart that have permitted those companies to put most of their employees on public health care or to deny them access to coverage. Some actually includes provisions for making those corporations p... »
Get Over It, It's not about a difference of opinion. Mrs' Palin has repeatedly and proudly her voiced opinions in ways that exhibit a wanton ignorance of current events, world history, and global politics. She has on many occasions voiced opinions that show grounding in the prejudices and stereotyping common to those who prefer to leave the he... »
Hey, Get Over It,What do we do if someone actually happens to BE stupid? I suppose we could say they're rationality challenged.But seriously, I don't for a minute think this woman is stupid. I think she's opportunistic and such a thorough-going politician that she'd use just about anyone, including her family, to win.BTW, American Right To Life (... »
Ya'll need to get over it. Name calling conservatives will never get independents like me. Try to be more balanced and analyze Sarah's actions/remarks to the same degree as your beloved Obama. Also, please stop judging people to be stupid just because they don't agree with you! This elitism in the liberal party is just sickening. »
Aw, bugger! I'm in a "fight?" Who do I punch in the nose? My faith there is a God means I cannot accept that others don't believe as I do? Or that some might believe that I'm delusional and believe in mythical beings?There's some unforseen armageddon between theism and science which will result in the inevitable destruction of theism? Dammit, I gue... »
I've been working hard to not post anything on Sarah Palin, who continues to gather publicity for reasons I can't fathom. I must say, though, that I am aghast at her recent position on the illegal Jewish settlements. http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/11/palin-on-israel.html »
These words by Karen Armstrong bear on this discussion. When we insist that there has to be a "winner" to a "debate" instead of a discussion, we might all be losers:http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/03132009/watch.html »
Ebonmuse: I don't know anything about Mooney's position other than what I heard on this interview with D.J.Grothe. I thought that what he said there sounded reasonable and that's why I posted on it. It now seems, however, that my position is actually somewhat different than that of Mooney. I'd be the last person to tell anyone that they shou... »
