cannabisnews.com: Make War On The War on Drugs





Make War On The War on Drugs
Posted by FoM on July 26, 2000 at 09:19:54 PT
By Judy Mann
Source: Washington Post
The Justice Department has just issued another indicator of the damage being done by the war on drugs: An all-time high of 6.3 million people were under correctional supervision in 1999--1.86 million men and women behind bars and 4.5 million on parole or probation, 24 percent of them for drug offenses. The criminal justice system reached 1 percent of the adult population in 1980. Its reach now exceeds 3 percent--about one of every 32 people. Our $40 billion-a-year war on drugs has created more prisons, more criminals, more drug abuse and more disease. An estimated 60 percent of AIDS cases in women are attributed to dirty needles and syringes.
A recent U.S. Supreme Court decision probably will spur more litigation in the drug war, as prisoners use the ruling to appeal unusually harsh sentences.The court ruled that any factual determination used to increase a sentence will have to be made by a jury, not a judge. While a judge can use a standard of the preponderance of the evidence in sentencing, a jury must decide beyond a reasonable doubt, says Graham Boyd, director of the Drug Policy Litigation Project of the American Civil Liberties Union. "If the government wants to impose draconian sentences for drug crimes, they should have at the very least to prove their case to a jury by a criminal standard, and that hasn't happened in the past--amazingly."That's just one example of the civil rights casualties of a war in which paramilitary police raid people's homes and authorities seize their assets without due process, flying in the face of the Fourth and Fifth amendments.A few politicians are brave enough to declare the obvious: The war on drugs hasn't worked. New Mexico's Gary E. Johnson (R) was the first governor to call for marijuana legalization and other major drug policy reforms. Rep. Tom Campbell (R-Calif.), a candidate for the U.S. Senate, is the first major-party politician to run statewide with a platform that includes prescription access to heroin. They will speak at the "shadow conventions" to be held at the same time as the Republican and Democratic conventions to address three issues of critical importance that organizers say are being given short shrift by the two major parties: the drug war, campaign finance reform and the growing gulf between rich and poor.Drug policies affect millions of people who have family members behind bars. Some of them will be at the shadow conventions. They will put names and faces on this whole failed drug war effort. Many of them are likely to be black. While African Americans constitute 13 percent of the illegal drug users, they account for 74 percent of those sentenced for drug offenses. Convicted felons lose their right to vote, a backdoor way of reinstituting Jim Crow laws.Pressure to change drug laws is mounting, and it is coming from unlikely places, including farmers, who are forbidden to grow hemp, the plant from which marijuana comes but which has other, non-drug uses. The Lindesmith Center, which advocates drug policy reform, did a survey several years ago that found more than 50 percent of farmers in five midwestern and western states favored legalizing hemp. Only 35 percent were opposed."This was the first indication we had that the public, in fairly conservative agricultural states, were supporting this," says Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the center.More recently, Hawaii and North Dakota passed legislation legalizing hemp's cultivation, and similar measures are "in play" in more than 10 other states, Nadelmann says. From 30 to 40 countries, including Canada, have made it legal. "This is quite galling for farmers on the northern border who can look across the border and see people growing this stuff," he says.Nadelmann believes that both Texas Gov. George W. Bush and Vice President Gore, the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates, would be well served if they did some research on hemp. "It may be an issue that a number of people care about, and it would be sending a message they are willing to think rationally about the economic and agricultural interests of farmers even when the product has a relationship to marijuana."The Lindesmith Center is one of more than 35 public policy, health, religious and racial advocacy organizations that sent a list of 10 tough questions to the presidential candidates during the primaries, pointing out where the drug policies have failed and asking what they would do to change them.None of the candidates have answered, according to Kevin B. Zeese, co-chair of the National Coalition for Effective Drug Policies, although the groups will try to pursue the issue during the general election campaign. "Unless the drug issue is forced on them, they prefer to avoid it rather than confront it," Zeese says. "Our basic point is the drug war is bankrupt and our policymakers aren't facing up to it. We tried to construct those questions in a way that showed the drug war methods are causing more problems than they solve, and we got a range of groups to show a breadth of concern about this."Highly visible people, including Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura (I), are now calling for a genuine debate on how to deal with drugs. Approaches gaining support include legalizing marijuana (except for sale to minors), prescription access to heroine, needle exchanges, taxing drugs and redirecting most of the drug war funding into public health and education.We are a nation of intelligent and thoughtful people who deserve better than overheated rhetoric and a drug policy dictated by crazy hard-liners and pandering politicians. At the very least, in the face of the well-documented harm the war on drugs has caused, we deserve a debate on how to control the drug market in a way that works. This lackluster presidential campaign would be a good place to start.Judy Mann can be reached at (202) 334-6109 or by e-mail at: mannj washpost.comE-mail: letterstoed washpost.com Feedback: http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/edit/letters/letterform.htmWednesday, July 26, 2000; Page C13 © 2000 The Washington Post Company Related Articles & Web Sites:ACLUhttp://www.aclu.org/Common Sense For Drug Policyhttp://www.csdp.org/The Lindesmith Center/Drug Policy Foundationhttp://www.drugpolicy.org/High Court Ruling May Rewrite Sentencinghttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread6485.shtmlNM Governor Makes Foes on Front Lines of Drug Warhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread6521.shtmlRefocus The Drug War http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread6513.shtmlNumber of Probationers, Parolees at Record Highhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread6499.shtmlCannabisNews Articles On The Shadow Conventions: http://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=shadow+conventions 
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Comment #8 posted by dddd on July 29, 2000 at 05:25:54 PT
I'm on board
Yup,,I emailed her too
[ Post Comment ]

Comment #7 posted by Kanabys on July 27, 2000 at 09:17:08 PT
I just....
emailed her too, to show my support.
[ Post Comment ]

Comment #6 posted by MikeEEEEE on July 26, 2000 at 17:20:40 PT
WAR
Just thanked her and the editor for the article, perhaps the Washington Post will continue this trend. Watch, the Drug War trails will be like the war crime trails the Nazi's had after the war. The anti’s will have a hard time hiding from their crimes.
[ Post Comment ]

Comment #5 posted by fivepounder on July 26, 2000 at 13:04:47 PT
this great article
I also wrote and thanked her for telling the truth. I also wrote the washington post letters to the editors.  
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Comment #4 posted by Dan B on July 26, 2000 at 12:41:45 PT:
I agree, Kaptinemo... 
...And I sent her an e-mail as well. It's important that people like her, with enough clout to get published in major newspapers, hear positive feedback from people like us. Thanks for the suggestion.
[ Post Comment ]

Comment #3 posted by observer on July 26, 2000 at 12:23:19 PT
hear, hear!
kaptinemo: I just wrote Ms. Mann at her email address a very nice letter, thanking her. May I recommed that we all follow suit?I agree! This is a breath of fresh air, especially coming from the Washington Post. It definitely goes against the party line, and that in itself is notable for the Post. What would interest me especially at this point, is for Ms Mann to document what kind of pressure she comes under because of her writings. 
some Judy Mann articles
[ Post Comment ]

Comment #2 posted by kaptinemo on July 26, 2000 at 10:21:01 PT:
I just wrote Ms. Mann at her email address
a very nice letter, thanking her. May I recommed that we all follow suit?This is what I meant by the Tide of Truth is coming back to shore. The antis have had almost exclusive access to the media, and have been able to verbally vomit their dreck with impunity. But no more. The more intelligent of the media types are beginning to hear the increasingly loud voices of the opposition. They are tumbling to the fact that sites like this exist. They are starting to look around, and lo! the Emperor is, indeed, bare-ass naked. But he's also beating up - and in some cases, like Peter McWilliams, KILLING - people who have the temerity to say so publicly. And that is just the sort of thing journalists like to report on.Oh, yes, the journalists are starting to smell blood. And they are starting to sharpen their knives. Like I said once before, it's gonna be a long hot summer... and it ain't over yet.
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Comment #1 posted by Dan B on July 26, 2000 at 09:54:14 PT:
Wow! This is from the Washington Post?
This is a significant article, if only for the fact that it comes from a major inside-the-beltway publication. This is the newspaper most likely to be read by pols in Washington. I hope they read this article, I hope they respond to it, and I hope their responses spark a national debate. This article can only be positive.Thank you, Judy Mann. And thanks again, FoM, for posting this. 
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