I wish you well with this. I can give some information though.

1. UK ministers are ordered to give preferential treatment to brewers and distillers (now who would be in a position to command that?). Recommendations to decriminalize pot are always rejected.

2. Many of us are into growing our own flowers and veg, not just because of finances (lack of) but because it's inherently satisfying and better than irradiated tasteless supermarket grub. It would only be natural (pun acknowledged) for many of us to want to grow our own relaxants. The prisons are already overwhelmed with people convicted of drug offences. It is going to become obvious that prohibition doesn't really work.

3. Give the work of Bruce K Alexander exposure. It was back in the 1980s that Alexander and his colleagues proved with their Rat Park experiment that opiates were not addictive. This research suggests that addiction itself is a con. We self-medicate when we are unhappy and much unhappiness comes from living in a hierarchy where there is great inequality.

4. For information on that see the work of Richard Wilkinson, an epidemiologist whose latest book is Income Inequality and Population Heath.

Good luck!

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

I see some references to this frequently. We do need our own media.

Or do we?

Why can't we have access to the "mainstream media"?

Why is that just for republicans and corporate whores and selling products we don't really need?

Why can't we just have CBS news tell us the truth about cannabis? The truth as we know it to be is scraped out of the MSM religiously and with an efficiency that says "we can do anything we put our minds to".

Why do we have to recreate the wheel?

Why can't we pre-empt the fucking Price is Right, to tell the truth about cannabis and the war on drugs?

Why can't we have ABC's 20/20 tell us the thing we write about on the internet?

Because the media is a capitalist construction intended to be used to sell material goods and keep people's heads filled with gibberish on many topics, to deny them information they need to make better choices and so forth.

Why can't we get cannabis truth on there? (Aside from the fact people will be demanding investigations once they learn they have been viciously lied to for 80 years.)

Because cannabis truth is diametrically opposed to the capitalist agenda: anything you touch or enjoy HAS to result in some rich person getting richer. It's the law of capitalism.

Legal, cannabis is more or less something good for nothing.

The best things in life are free and and cannabis is one of them: Capitalism will not tolerate this.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Bush called me out.

Here is the tape of him taking us to war in Iraq. Timed for the Persian new year, I guess. He is so evil.

President Bush

I did not believe it. I became an activist on the spot.

I will send you (AlterNet) some money but I want a responsible discussion of the risks to us both of becoming financially tied FIRST.

Perhaps the editors have not considered with serious thought what it is like to be hunted by the government. I have.

Do you really want my financial support? We aren't sure. I don't trust the lawyers' advice either. It could be a trap. What if they try to say... well victims of slander learn to not give the slanderers ideas.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

That is people in the streets screaming at the government for change.

Partisan or special interest media can help with this but only to a limited point. And in many respects all of this online interest media, I fear, actually detracts from effective organizing because it lulls people into believing that sitting around reading blog posts all effective organizing for social justice. In reality it is stupefying people into a new form of informed apathy.

Unless media translates into action it is meaningless.

Unfortunately, the organizations that should be getting people out into the streets have become fat, lazy, trivial and/or myopically obsessed with the minutia of process. Lost in a morass of moving punctuation in myriad criminal codes. Content with successes that in reality serve to actually make the prohibition more palatable by making sentences less onerous and prison conditions more livable than they are in tearing down the god damned prisons.

Until there is a debate on what is needed organizationally to END THE F@%*ing DRUG WAR NOW media can have no effect but to be empty propaganda supporting ineffectual reform organizations. I can't support that. Not with my heart and certainly not with my dollars.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Oregon Medical Marijuana Doctor on PTSD: Part 4 (VIDEO)

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

I don't mean to throw a flare here but this kind of begging without acknowledging the fact that Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich are actually trying to end this drug war by reintroducing the BIGGEST FEDERAL HELPER THAT CAN SAVE AMERICA AND SHUTDOWN THIS GOD DAMN MOTHERFUCKING DRUG WAR named the HEMP FARMING ACT OF 2009 pisses me off to no end. Do you realize that even conservatives in certain states including North Dakota actually had the brains to get it right ?!?!? DOES IT EVER GET THROUGH TO YOU that you CANNOT just rely on cultural framing but have to consistently bring up the INDUSTRIAL side of the plant ? By only talking about pot, YOU only make it easy for the phoney "war on drugs" to fucking continue ! NEVER MIND !

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Pissed away on the "war on drugs". Does anyone seriously believe that if the money extorted from us was actually spent on eradicating drugs and drug kingpins that the effort would be worse than futile, and in fact, would result in making the situation steadily WORSE? Another explaniation would be that the illegal drug trade is a source of huge profits for major distributors, banks, and crooked politicans, and will ALWAYS be illegal for these reasons. This makes a lot more sense than the dirty lies fed to us by our "leaders".

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Mexican drug wars now worse than Iraq

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Obama to Reconsider Federal Blockade Against Medical Marijuana Research

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Here are two, out of the mainstream, links that folks might appreciate.

CNBC's Jim Cramer supports Drug Legalization

President Barack Obama's Drug Warrior "sort of" Harm Reduction

The first is a quote cut from the Daily Show confrontation between Jon Stewart and CNBC's Jim Cramer.

The second is an animation I created to illustrate a recent pro drug war intensification quote from President Barack Obama that got no play at all on sites like Alternat.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Ever since 1929 newspapers,movies,and laterTV and 24 hour news services have always supported the drug war, Why? They get their FCC permits yanked if they don't,in the case of broadcasting or as in the case of print media your ad revenue suddenly begins to drop if you support legalization in any way. Most of what has been said has been outright lies and disinformation.

it's up to the people to educate the masses with new and more accessable media,the online media. The truth is there and a good many of us tell it on our personal pages. If you want the truth you can check out my page;

www.myspace.com/jeffrey1776

Then hit up my friend Jack Herrer.

All we have to fight with is the truth. They survived on lies for long enough, Educate yourself,your friends,family and your church. A mind is like a parachute,it works best if it's open.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Even killing is not prohibited in man’s or God’s law! It is regulated. The police and citizens have the right to use deadly force to defend themselves.

Prohibition increases the problem.
Freedom with reasonable regulation minimizes the problem.

Prohibition benefits both the tax sucking enforcement bureaucracies and the crime organizations.
Freedom minimizes tax sucking enforcement bureaucracies and crime organizations.

Prohibition destroys the lives of otherwise productive law abiding citizens.
Freedom allows otherwise law abiding citizens to be productive.

Prohibition often puts innocent citizens between gang/gang and government/gang warfare.
Freedom allows families to go outside without fear of getting shot in the middle of a gun battle.

Prohibition tears apart more families.
Freedom keeps more families together.

Prohibition punishes the users, who are usually in the majority, with the abusers.
Freedom respects the intelligence of the users and punishes only the abusers.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

I credit the *good stuff* with opening my eyes. When I realised that something like this was too harmless to be illegal, I stopped trusting anything I heard from the government. When the government uses lies(even for good intentions), they must realize that people will eventually stop trusting them and law enforcement. And thus the breakdown of society!

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Students in my area are beginning to mobilize around this issue after a local student was shot in the chest by police executing a search warrant. The reason for the warrant, from what is know so far? You could smell pot smoke in the hallway. What was seized, from what has been released so far? A few tablespoons of marijuana.

Google "Derek Copp"

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

.....switch your focus from a money raising campaign to end the drug war and since 90% of the War on Drugs is about marijuana anyway, raise the money from the industrial hemp and medical marijuana sectors while simply IGNORING personal, small scale marijuana use.

Alongside the improvements to our society that legalizing industrial hemp and medical marijuana can bring, we should all quietly, discreetly grow our own small stash for personal use. We should - especially at the initial stages - dampen our ambition to profit from our growing and refrain from lugubrious demonstration but simply grow small, private stashes and use it discreetly.

I suspect that soon enough all the other elements of the 'War' will fall away and then the truths of our second, foolish experiment with prohibition will become evident to the wiser eyes of a public no longer influenced by lies!

By then perhaps, the truth about the herb will be printed on fine, hemp papers and delivered on plastic bicycles made of hemp oil.

Regulation and taxation are simply more of the same, immoral and inconvenient - only switching the power from hand to hand. If you doubt this talk to any 'organic farmer' and ask him how involving the state in his operations has 'helped'. Once the 'legality factor' reduces the price of the herb to realistic levels based on what it costs to raise and distribute legally, the tax value alongside the criminality factor would be virtually destroyed. Imagine a state of 'nobody's damn business' - as it should be!

Like many readers', my pockets are empty right now but I humbly submit my million dollar idea!!

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

What's wrong with the California model one may ask?

For a combat zone its better than those without cover. But the war is based on lies and that is what needs ending, not regulating the Peace to keep the prohibition bucks flowing. Basically its really no ones damn business if I toke, and signing my name to a cop list has nothing to do with rolling a joint. And damn sure nothing to do with any fascist Politikopsuckers...

This Just In Nixon is Still Dead and Still a Liar and reformers still barter and ConPromise for "legal" crumbs Just one tiny detail they keep forgetting... Ganja doesn't fit, Hemp doesn't fit as a schedule#1 Narcotic. So Obama and Joe Biteme are letting chicken little build pavilions in case of falling skies. Under the specs of state AG Brownose re-write of the citizens initiative 215, "making it clear", and the people bowed and prayed to the Neon gods they made...

Remove the lies and Rx Ganja and Hemp are Free. Re-Creating an alternative to manufactured inebriations, unlike Ganja stress reduction. Let Mexico grow, Indians, Inner City, family farmers reduce the Fossil Fools imports, Alcoholics, junkies sick dying treating ills and aches and pain spasms airways and obesity. Prevention over treating. Homegrown Hemp plastic, wood, paper, Omega 3 and skin care. Lubricants and clothing without 90 million pounds of poisons used on cotton. Buyers Clubs have proven they doneeed no stinkin bodges. Ganja has been used safely before Reefer Madness. Prohibition is a product they want to keep selling. ConPromise? Reform? What? A lie with no scientific validation?

If Bama is true then let him be true. Not with Bliedome lies and hype guiding another tin soldier drug worrier. Oh thankyou kind sir for not beating me? I'm so fortunate. Feds won't waste taxes raiding but the state will. Keeping Hemp a schedule#1 narcotic burlap and 98% of Green Harvest eradications. Corporate Welfare, Wars and Prohibitons sucking tax dollars faster than Banksters, Jobs going elsewhere while thousands of hemp products stay off of the market shelves, no one dealing with reality, no money in Peace for the status weird, just citizens.

The wages of Nixon's sin is D.E.A.th!

"You're enough of a pro," Nixon tells Shafer,
"to know that for you to come out with something
that would run counter to what the Congress feels
and what the country feels, and what we're planning to do,
would make your commission just look bad as hell."

The Shafer Commission of 1970
Marijuana does not lead to physical dependency,
although some evidence indicates that the heavy, long-term users
may develop a psychological dependence on the drug"

"You know, it's a funny thing,
every one of the bastards that are out for legalizing marijuana is Jewish.
What the Christ is the matter with the Jews, Bob?

It's those Jewish Bastards Out for Legalizing!
R.M.N.

Richard Nixon missing tapes

Shafer Commission (US federal government, 1973)
Drug Use in America: Problem in Perspective

1972 US Marihuana: A Signal of Misunderstanding,
US National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse
addendum: Other Recommendations

1. Reclassification of Cannabis

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Corporate Welfare Rats

Corporate welfare is a large and growing component of the federal budget. America's most costly welfare recipients today are Fortune 500 companies. In 1997 the Fortune 500 corporations recorded best-ever earnings of $325 billion, yet incredibly Uncle Sam doled out nearly $75 billion in taxpayer subsidies.

The Ganjawar Comes To The Rez

When Alex White Plume planted a field full of industrial-grade hemp, he hoped that his crop might lift his family and community out of poverty. Then the DEA came to Pine Ridge.

The sovereignty enjoyed by Indian nations in the United States is inherent to the Indian tribes. This means that the Creator granted sovereignty to the tribes, not the federal government or the Congress.The federal government has acknowledged the inherent nature of tribal sovereignty in the U. S. Constitution.

High on Hemp

"The past it just crumbled, the future just threatens;
Our life blood shut up in your chemical tanks.
And now here you come, bill of sale in your hands
And surprise in your eyes that we're lacking in thanks
For the blessings of civilization you've brought us,
The lessons you've taught us, the ruin you've wrought us --
Oh see what our trust in America's brought us.
My country 'tis of thy people you're dying."
- Buffy Sainte-Marie

Nixon lied to schedule Hemp a #1 Narcotic.

Nixon Lie Keeps on Killing

The U.S. federal government spent over $19 billion dollars in 2003 on the War on Drugs, at a rate of about $600 per second. The budget has since been increased by over a billion dollars.

People Arrested for Drug Law Offenses this Year[/b]
407,434 10 22:28pdt

People Arrested for Cannabis Law Offenses this Year[/b]
193,128

"Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth."
- John F. Kennedy

Bailouts and Corporate Greed-Enough!
Countdown: Olbermann: Mar 19, 2009 (Excerpted)
To all of you in the Corporate boardrooms.

Stop viewing the public's reaction to this naked, unhindered robbery of the public coffers, and your audacious, immeasurable sense of proprietorship and entitlement stop viewing our anger as some kind of brief impediment, some traffic delay that keeps you from your God-given corporate ballpark sponsorships, and perpetually remodeled offices, and the divine right of $38 million "compensation packages."

U.S. Department of Defense

The budget provides $515.4 billion in discretionary authority for the Department of Defense (DoD), a $35.9 billion or 7.5 percent increase over the enacted level for Fiscal Year 2008.

2.2 million soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines

Maintains 545,000 facilities at 5,300 sites in the U.S. and around the globe

Grassley and Souder work for the chemical Agrobiz...

High on Hemp
Wall street's Spontaneous Abortionists

Ooo - eeeee - hoo! Yooo - ho!

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

The whole "let's be pro-drug reform" agenda has one massive flaw: it ignores the issue of pharmaceutical drug pushers, which is the real public health issue in the U.S. today (including the drug nicotine, which kills more people than anyone else).

Honesty about drugs cannot be limited to honesty about cannabis - we also have to point out the fact that the pharmaceutical industry operates on the same principles - maximizing profit - that the cocaine and heroin cartels do.

This is why pharmaceutical opiates kill more people each year than illegal heroin does. Of course, tobacco kills half a million and alcohol accounts for some hundred thousand deaths - and much of the bill goes onto Medicare, as tobacco and alcohol addiction is highest in the poorest communities, leading to all kinds of health issues, from diabetes to liver failure to lung cancer and heart disease.

However, the pharmaceutical and drug industries are very profitable (illegal and legal both) and that means banks and funds are heavily invested in them. That includes the big pharma concerns (Johnson & Johnson, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck, Pfizer, Schering-Plough, Lilly, Abbott, Novartis, Sanofi-Aventis, etc.) as well as the "major diversified food concerns" which includes tobacco and alcohol commodity sales - Kraft, Heinz, Coors, AltriaGroup (PhillipMorris), etc.

For example, the tobacco industry has responded to limits on sales and marketing by expanding their marketing to developing nations without regulatory controls, and have attempted to undercut laws on tobacco marketing to children using various strategies - sugary sweet tobacco treats being one avenue. They know that addicts generally pick up their habits in adolescence, so that is the key group they push their drugs on.

You might be wondering who "they" are - it's just the same banks and investors who were responsible for the subprime collapse, selling drugs to children on the side and getting rich as a result. I mean, the current CEO of Altria Group was one the director of "Futures For Children", a non-profit group. The top investors in Altria should be familiar:

Altria Group Ownership

The problem with all the "golden givers" that keep the alternative news sites alive is that their cash flows rely heavily on fossil fuel and pharmaceutical sales, and that's what all the "philanthropic giving" is intended to protect: their bottom line.

See: George Soros' top 10 investments

That's the same Soros whose Open Society Foundation gives millions to left-wing news organizations like Democracy Now! - makes you wonder, doesn't it? Does that account for the non-coverage of NAFTA issues by the "radical left"? I would say so. It's also highly suspicious that the U.S. Justice Department under Bush has relaxed rules on non-profit reporting, so that it is now even harder to find out where the money behind groups like Democracy Now! is coming from - but Soros is clearly a major giver.

The same goes for the pharmaceutical companies that market oxycontin to opiate addicts, or the ones that push amphetamines on children as "ADD treatment". Does that lead to later problems with amphetamine addiction in adulthood? Yes, it does - Adderall and Ritalin are amphetamine knock-offs, and Desoxyn is pure meth - no different from the street version, except of higher purity.

That's the real issue - admitting that cannabis is less harmful than alcohol is hard enough - but we must also admit that our pharmaceutical drugs are often killers, a situation brought on by corruption at the FDA, corruption with the American academic system, and the general failure of regulatory oversight.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

According to Allen St Pierre from the Norml Blog, some of Obama's biggest financial donors are friends of the legalization movement. [They are billionaires] St.Pierre notes:

"Frankly George Soros, Peter Lewis and John Sperling-this triumvirate of billionaires-if those men, who put up 50-60 million to get Democrats and Obama elected can't pick up the phone and actually get a one-to one meeting on where the drug policy is going, then maybe it's true that when you give money, you don't expect favors."

Hello to the above staff of these billionaires Alter-Net deserves your financial support.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

I could get rid of the uneasy feeling that I would be donating to a organization that is helping to cover up the crimes of 9/11.

The only Alternet staff comments I have seen on this site ridicule those of us who haven't been fooled by the looniest conspiracy theory of all.

If Alternet would run articles by architect Richard Gage, Physicist Steven Jones, and many other experts on why 9/11 could not have happened as the official story says, then I could feel proud to donate and support Alternet.

Since they don't run articles that give the other side of the debate on 9/11, I have to think they are more devoted to acquiring corporate advertisers than getting the truth to readers.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

I share your consternation - Obama hasn’t made the drug war a priority.
Have you ever considered the drug trade as the only true capitalism in the U.S.? No regulations, no taxation, no advertising … purely a deal between buyer & seller. For every seller we take off school corners, three will take their place. Perhaps the real danger of the drug trade is it is true capitalism & oppositional to imperialism. Orwell knew that we would willingly give up our rights of personal responsibility & Democracy while wasting many lives fighting Fascism; so we thought. If war is good, 40+ years of drug wars is our best yet; demanding no exit.
Governments can chip away constitutional rights & freedom with laws that portend saving us from drugs. Drug laws are doors to uber-cops with little respect for anyone not a cop. We’ve been trained to be subservient to a badge & gun; the real purpose of our drug war. It’s not about drugs; drugs are gateways to controlling the populace. Our dogmas would be released if we decriminalize drugs. Stop thinking in terms of legalizing … that’s like legalizing air.
For us who remember before Nixon’s war on drugs, cops couldn’t pull you over just because they wanted to. We didn’t have INS stops 100 miles from borders inconveniencing every vehicle on that highway for unconstitutional indiscriminant searches, not just looking for illegal aliens as they would on the real borders. Most of us don’t do drugs, much less transport them, but we can be stopped & have our vehicles stripped if they choose. We are all potential criminals, not citizens with inalienable rights. Worse, any of us can legally be shot & killed by an officer who claimed a “furtive move”. We have government in our bank accounts, especially transactions larger than $10,000. Thank you, Tricky Dick, for making government larger; always needing more law enforcement.
We finally see the wrongs of Reaganomics & still carry on a war that started ten years earlier. In fact, Reagan decided the way to win the loosing drug war was to make drugs so expensive, people would stop using them. Thank you, Roni. And thanks again for giving bounties to cops who find drugs. Copcycles can pull you over & confiscates inordinate sums of cash from your pocket & it’s up to you & your expense to prove your legal rights to that money.
Remember the horror stories of children in Fascist Germany turning in parents for not being good Nazis? Now we reward the same behavior if their parents do drugs. Remember when we didn’t have road-side alcohol & drug check points? If these are so successful, why are drugs a growing problem?
We’re no longer a democracy – period! & the drug war is the primary reason why. We’ve created a nation that willingly pays billions for our very own enslavement, while more concerned about bonus money from those that screw us out of millions. That's a legitimate anger, but should be far behind the encouragement of more laws that makes our kids criminals. Is that how good Christians save our families?
Lastly, if there was any way to win this war, we would win at least a few battles. That hasn’t happened. Instead, law enforcement considers every new law & military armament & jackboots as signs of success. They boast of more financing & assistance in other lands (again, boosting the military industry) as success … how Orwellian is that?
One question for Obama - would he be where he is now if imprisoned instead of enlightened? This is the first time since Kennedy that our citizens have been so happy about our president. He has a golden opportunity that would lead to many more successes & a return to Democracy & personal responsibility, not to mention flavor-flashes. Let’s decriminalize America … & the rest of the world.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

IM sick ad tired of hearing these people that weed legalized would make America peaceful and better. If you legalize weed the death toll will grow and more and more. more people will be robbed, more innocent children will be pushed in to smoking weed. people don't wont our kids to smoke cigarettes but they wont to allow weed. how would you feel to see a child sitting outside smoking a joint and then does something really stupid. its not hard to find go online you can find thousands of videos with kids grown ups doing stupid tings that they wouldn't do if they were not smoking weed if we allow weed to be legal what is stopping the Mexican cartel from commin to America and taking America on from in the inside, look at Mexico. that is Americas future if you allow drugs to be legal. and you know for a fact no one is going to give the government money to sell weed. try telling and bunch of the big time gangs that now they have to pay a fee to sell. sounds like a war in America. AND OF COURSE THEY ALWAYS BRING UP THE SUBJECT THAT WEED CAN BE USED AS A MEDICINE TO HELP PEOPLE THAT ARE SICK, IF YOUR GONG TO BRING THAT SUBJECT UP THEN SHOW ME A DOCTORS NOTE THAT SAYS U NEED IT. IF YOUR GOING TO FIGHT TO MAKE WEED LEGAL THAN DO IT FOR THE PEOPLE THAT NEED IT NOT FOR YOUR OWN SELFISH NEEDS, and easy money.

TROY L.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]