The Superlative Suppository

I don't live here any more

2004-11-19T14:24:00.000-05:00

Due to issues with my choice of URL I have moved over to here.

Afghan facts

2004-11-19T11:35:00.000-05:00

More specific information about the impact of opium production on the Afghan economy:

Afghan opium cultivation jumped 64 percent to a record 131,000 hectares (324,000 acres) this year and drug exports account for more than 60 percent of the economy, the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime said Thursday.

It said opium, the raw material for heroin, was grown in all 32 provinces and 10 percent of the population, or 2.3 million people, were involved in a business worth $2.8 billion a year.

So scratch my earlier statements, they want to crush the majority, rather then just half, of their economy and put 2,300,000 people out of work.

Poppy Jihad

2004-11-19T10:42:00.000-05:00

I have been keeping a rather close eye on the drug war in Afghanistan as in my view it is at its more absurd in that area of the world. As I have posted before the production of poppies and opium actually makes up almost 50% of the Afghan gross national product and is simply the most profitable thing that the farmers can grow. In many cases it's a rather simple choice, grow poppies and make money or don't grow poppies and starve:

"We are not able to support our families unless we grow opium," said Tela Mohammad, from Mer Mandab district, Helmand province. "The government wants to prevent its cultivation, but doesn't help farmers."

He said he would keep growing opium, "even if it costs me my head."

...

Mer Dad of Shenwar district in Nangarhar province, said he would take extreme measures to protect his opium crop.

"I must support 17 family members – I can't let them to die from hunger," he said. "I will even plant mines to preserve my fields."

...

"Growing anything else isn't that profitable," said Sufi Payenda of the village of Yangi Hariq, in Balkh province. "We can't sustain our lives by growing other plants, so we won't stop growing opium."
...

"We will die from hunger if we don't grow opium," said Malim Mohammad Zaher, from village of Kutaki in Balkh province. "Even if the government tries to kill us, we won't stop."

However the enlightened folks in the Afghan government are not swayed by any thing quite so reasonable as economic or calorific necessity, so they have declared Jihad:

[deputy interior minister]Daud said it is time for the government to declare holy war – jihad – on narcotics.

"It is jihad, and there is no greater service that can be rendered to Afghans and the people of the world," he said. "It is our religious, Islamic duty."

It is our duty to force farmers into debt and starvation. We're from the government and we are here to help.

Possible Progress in Congress

2004-11-18T11:39:00.000-05:00

From the Common Dreams News Wire comes this:

WASHINGTON -- November 18 -- U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL), joined by Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Jim Jeffords (I-VT), have introduced the first-ever Senate bill to ensure that federal juries hear the full story when medical marijuana patients and providers, operating legally under state law, are tried on federal marijuana charges.

S. 2989 is similar to H.R. 1717, the "Truth in Trials Act," introduced by a bipartisan House coalition last year and inspired in part by the case of Ed Rosenthal. In January 2003, Rosenthal was found guilty of felony marijuana cultivation charges by a jury that was not allowed to consider that the marijuana was for medical use by seriously ill patients and was grown with the authorization of the city of Oakland, California.

I can't wait to hear the arguments against fully informing juries.

Irony via programming

2004-11-17T16:56:00.000-05:00

Today I was reading this article about an all too typical beat them into submission boarding school for teens who use, or are suspected of using, drugs or who have just been the typical shits were all are from age 12is to 20 something when a spot of light came from the whole sad tail of paid for child abuse. Unfortunately the spot of light was mild amusement from seeing that the ad program the site is using thinks that people reading this story about such boarding schools abuses would be interested in shipping their kids off to one of them. Meh, cheap thrills is better then no thrills.

All volunteer army my ass!

2004-11-17T16:10:00.000-05:00

It is defiantly not Mr. Barr’s day. First he gets his house robed, ends up shooting one of the low lives trying to rob him then the cops are nice enough to bust him for cannabis possession. Now in court he is given the damned if you do, damned if you don’t options; join the army or go to jail:

SALINAS, Calif. (AP) -- A Salinas man will have to choose between going to jail or joining the military as his punishment for possession of marijuana.

A judge surprised both the prosecution and defense yesterday when he told Brian Barr that he could avoid a jail term by enlisting in the military.

Now them are some lousy options.

Fuck the south!

2004-11-10T17:01:00.000-05:00

While I am currently living (read trapped) in the south and was actually born here I could not agree more with this rant:

[the] gravy train is fucking over. Take your liberal-bashing, federal-tax-leaching, confederate-flag-waving, holier-than-thou, hypocritical bullshit and shove it up your ass.

And no, you can't have your fucking convention in New York next time. Fuck off.

It's all ok

2004-11-08T20:45:00.000-05:00

The DEA moose is on the case. Equal parts disgustingly cute and plain disgusting.

Screw you Packers, planets!

2004-11-03T13:08:00.000-05:00

So much for the football prediction, astrological prediction, and my own stubborn optimism; we now officially get four more years of Shrub.

Beer, election style

2004-11-03T01:54:00.000-05:00

While for some reason I stopped drinking a few hours ago dispute having every reason in the world to knock'em back, while on the subject I came upon this rather amusing post:

Beer selection via bullets ballots

Whichever beer won would be the only beer available for the next four years.
You would have to pay for the elected beer whether you liked it or not, or even if you didn't drink beer.
Even if you had no strong preference for Bud or Miller, you would be admonished to vote, as that would somehow, magically, improve the quality of the choice.
If you did have a strong preference, some elementary math would tell you that voting for it would have essentially no chance of influencing the outcome.
People would get in loud confrontational arguments on the merits of Bud vs. Miller. Even sober people.
If you started talking about microbrews or imports, people would consider you a bit nutty.
The Complete Joy of Homebrewing would be a book owned only by wacky anarchists.
In order to appeal to the least common denominator, Miller and Budweiser would eventually come to have nearly identical, weak, flavors. Oh, wait.
Despite this, people who had never tried other beers would insist that the two are quite different

New Afghan import

2004-11-03T01:00:00.000-05:00

Our courts are not already clogged with enough drug cases, let’s import some more:

Afghan drug barons could stand trial in American courts before the end of next year as part of a Washington-driven offensive against the booming drugs trade.

...

A Western official in Kabul said: "We think this will really scare these guys. They know that if they end up in an American court their money and connections will be of no help to them.

After all money has never gotten any one, who was guilty as sin, off in the US. Money has no impact, none what so ever!

At the end of the story this small tidbit turns up:

In the past year, the elite, British-trained Force 333 has begun destroying heroin laboratories, sometimes getting into gunfights with gangs.

American bombing raids have had to be called in to support them at least once.

Looks like my worries about troops being wasted on the Afghan drug war were well founded.

8% swing towards Kerry!

2004-11-02T15:45:00.000-05:00

Ok so the swing in this case consists of exactly 4 people in who the hell knows New Hampshire.

Thus far the only numbers in are from the midnight vote in Dixville Notch, NH as reported by Mark Kleiman:

In 2000, Hart's Location and Dixville Notch, NH, which traditionally vote at midnight and release their results immediately, went for Bush over Gore 38-15, with one stubborn fool voting for Nader. This year, the score was Bush 34, Kerry 19, with one stubborn fool -- perhaps the very same one -- still voting for Nader.

That's a swing of nearly eight percent away from Bush and toward the Democrat. Using a likely voter model I just pulled out of my hat, this station can now project a Kerry landslide, with the Massachusetts liberal carrying the popular vote by 58-42 and winning everything but Alaska, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, the Dakotas,Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Indiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina for a total of about 350 EV.

While I would love to see Bush beaten like he owes me money, which he does, I think you are pulling those numbers out from some place farther south then your hat.

Out damn spot!

2004-11-02T14:36:00.000-05:00

I voted. I did my civic duty. Why do I feel so dirty? Well here's one for you Johnny, you fucking drug warrior sack of mediocre shit. (but I haven't had a cunt drinkstable!) Now for that shower.

Bah

2004-11-02T08:35:00.000-05:00

Every one seems to be posting their get out to vote messages today, perhaps because it's election day, but I will suffice to say this if after the past four years you have no reason to vote that's going to get you out of that chair away from this screen and into the voting booth I got nothing that is going to move your apathetic hind quarters.

So here's my message, do what ever it was you were going to do.

I am now heading to class but will be glued to this key board, post casting my vote, hammering out the election results as they come in or as they don't come in as the case may be. I intend to make a drinking game of it so do not expect coherence.

Poor baby

2004-11-01T13:56:00.000-05:00

While I have done more then my fare share of heckling over the years every time I do so I am fully prepared to be bounced, booed or even slugged for my trouble and never get all indigent when any of that happens, it's just a professional hazard of being opinionated and short tempered.

However a heckler of George Soros is shocked, shocked, that he was not allowed to disrupt a press conference to berate the man and try to lay his sons death at the mans feet:

Press & Sun-Bulletin

...

Steven Steiner, 44, of Tioga Center said he wanted to ask billionaire financier and political activist George Soros about Soros' stance on drugs. Soros was the scheduled speaker at a luncheon Thursday.

Rather then write his question down and wait his turn like every one else he jumps up on stage, waves around pictures of his dead son and demands to be heard. You see anti-drug people are special they get to disregard the rules of decorum, throw public hissy fits and if they are removed to restore order they sue:

"You'd have thought I threatened someone," Steiner said. "I wanted to talk to America."

Steiner wants to contact an attorney to understand his legal rights. A lawsuit is possible, he said, although he added, "I'm not a sue-happy person."

Cry me a friggin river.

Roundup ready coca

2004-11-01T13:27:00.000-05:00

While I have not blogged on the subject before the herbicide bombing of the countryside in Columbia to stamp out coca is one of the drug war tactics that really chaps my hide more then the rest of the nonsense. It damages the environment, poisons the people and defoliates legal crops along with the illegal ones leaving the already dirt poor peasants even worse off. Now it seems it does not even kill the coca plans any more and is making people plant it as it's the only think the sprayings don't kill:

Over the past three years, rumors of a new strain of coca have circulated in the Colombian military. The new plant, samples of which are spread out on this table, goes by different names: supercoca, la millonaria. Here in the southern region it's known as Boliviana negra. The most impressive characteristic is not that it produces more leaves - though it does - but that it is resistant to glyphosate. The herbicide, known by its brand name, Roundup, is the key ingredient in the US-financed, billion-dollar aerial coca fumigation campaign that is a cornerstone of America's war on drugs.

One possible explanation: The farmers of the region may have used selective breeding to develop a hardier strain of coca. If a plant happened to demonstrate herbicide resistance, it would be more widely cultivated, and clippings would be either sold or, in many cases, given away or even stolen by other farmers. Such a peer-to-peer network could, over time, result in a coca crop that can withstand large-scale aerial spraying campaigns.

But experts in herbicide resistance suspect that there is another, more intriguing possibility: The coca plant may have been genetically modified in a lab. The technology is fairly trivial. In 1996, Monsanto commercialized its patented Roundup Ready soybean - a genetically modified plant impervious to glyphosate. The innovation ushered in an era of hyperefficient soybean production: Farmers were able to spray entire fields, killing all the weeds and leaving behind a thriving soybean crop. The arrival of Roundup Ready coca would have a similar effect - except that in this case, it would be the US doing the weed killing for the drug lords.

Whether its resistance came from selective breeding or genetic modification, the new strain poses a significant foreign-policy challenge to the US. How Washington responds depends on how the plant became glyphosate resistant. That's why I'm here in the jungle - to test for the new coca. I've brought along a mobile kit used to detect the presence of the Roundup Ready gene in soybean samples. If the tests are inconclusive, my backup plan is to smuggle the leaves to Colombia's capital, Bogotá, and have their DNA sequenced in a lab.

In my hotel room, I put the swizzle stick-sized test strip into the tube filled with mashed Boliviana negra. The green water snakes up the strip. If the midsection turns red, I'll know that the drug lords have genetically engineered the plant and beaten the US at its own game. If it doesn't, it'll mean that Colombia's farmers have outwitted 21st-century technology with an agricultural technique that's been around for 10,000 years.

...

We are hiking through the jungle. The path is narrow, overgrown, and muddy. The knee-high rubber boots I just bought keep getting stuck in the muck, and I have to pull them out with my hands. Don Miguel walks fast and confidently. He has assured me that we are well within the government-controlled territory. The guerrillas, he says, haven't been here during daylight hours for at least a couple of years.

We come to a makeshift bridge. Two slender tree trunks are suspended over a flooding river the color of milky tea. Thin steel cables run above them to give you something to hold on to. Miguel says that the land on the far side belongs to a coca farmer who now grows Boliviana negra. "Everybody is planting negra now," he says and steps catlike over the bridge.

I follow, trying not to slip into the river 5 feet below. After climbing a small incline, we come upon an arresting sight: 300 yards of devastation. An entire slope of hillside vegetation has disappeared. There's only brown-gray dirt, a half-dead tree, and withered coca plants, which I recognize from photographs. "Peruviana blanca," Don Miguel says, pointing at the dead plants. "Not resistant. This slope was sprayed last year."

We hike up the ridge, and suddenly there are healthy coca plants stretching to the horizon. On one side of an imaginary line, devastation. On the other, billowing, neck-high coca plants dotting hillsides that are denuded of all other vegetation. "Boliviana negra," Don Miguel says, pointing at the large bushes. "They were sprayed as well."

...
...the aerial spraying was successful [at first], but now, with the arrival of Boliviana negra, it's affecting only those who are growing lawful crops. "The truth is that the fumigation drives us to the one thing that will survive - and that is Boliviana negra [n]ot bananas, not yucca, not maize."

Worse still the prospect of the spraying been ineffectual has raised the possibility of taking the drug war into the arena of biological warfare:

Last summer, documents show, anti-narcotics officials at the US embassy in Bogotá quietly approached Colombia's president, Álvaro Uribe, and asked him if he'd consider switching from Roundup to Fusarium oxysporum, a plant-killing fungus classified as a mycoherbicide. Some species are known to attack coca; in the early '90s, a natural Fusarium outbreak decimated the Peruvian coca crop.

But Fusarium is not a chemical - it's a fungus, and it can live on in the soil. A proposal to consider using it in Florida in 1999 was rejected after the head of the state's Department of Environmental Protection found that it was "difficult, if not impossible, to control [Fusarium's] spread" and that the "mutated fungi can cause disease in a large number of crops, including tomatoes, peppers, flowers, corn, and vines." A switch to Fusarium would, at the least, be an escalation in the herbicide war and a tacit acknowledgment of glyphosate's failure. It could also turn out to be the A-bomb of herbicides.

It's a long article but worth the time.

Piss to party

2004-11-01T13:15:00.000-05:00

As much as I detest the drug war in all its forms I would be a liar were I to say we have it the worst here in the US. Thailand makes the US look like Amsterdam on new years. For example:

BANGKOK, Thailand Police burst into the dark nightclub after midnight, weave through the crowd and lock the doors, trapping nearly 400 bewildered customers inside. The lights flicker on, and a voice over loudspeakers orders everyone to submit to urine tests for drugs.

It's part of a three-year-old 'social order' campaign to curb drug abuse that has cast a damper over Saturday night partying in Bangkok.

...

Guests who passed got a green stamp on their forearm. Just two out of 373 people tested positive and were later cleared, according to club sources who asked not to be identified. The tests cannot distinguish between illicit drugs and legal medications, police say.

This reminds me of a similar, and equally in effective, tactic used in the UK also used on club goers.

Dying drys

2004-10-31T17:21:00.000-05:00

The AlterNet DrugReporter has an intresting article on what reamins of the Prohbition party:

The current state of the Prohibition Party is less than imposing. In 2000, Dodge's presidential campaign garnered only 208 votes, down from Dodge's personal high of 14,000 votes during his first campaign and the worst showing by the party in nearly 130 years. The party's convention last year, where Dodge was nominated for president, totaled nine people, two of whom were Dodge's daughters. Colorado is the only state left that lists the Prohibition Party on its ballot.

At least there is nothing to fear from that lot of prohobitonists.

The Packers have spoken

2004-10-31T16:22:00.000-05:00

Packers win against the Skins 28-14, Bush you're history.

Go Packers!

2004-10-31T15:20:00.000-05:00

Please do not mistake this for me actually having an interest in sports, I dont have one, this is purely political.

As I am typing this the Greenbay Packers are playing the Washington Redskins, and beating the snot out of them (20 to 7 in the third quarter). How is this a matter of politics might you ask? Well its a matter of a rather strange 68 year long string of correct predictions based on the outcome of the last Redskins game prior to the presidential election. If the Skins win the person or party in power keeps the white house, if they lose the person or party in power also loses

So count this as my one manly thing I am doing this year go Kerry, err, Packers!

Update 3:35

Three minutes into the fourth still 20-7 Packers.

Update 3:39

I really should know more about this crap being a male US citizen but, is this game on TV any where? Hitting refresh over and over on the Yahoo page is rather frustrating. Still 20-7 Packers by the way.

Update 3:48

Five yard penalty for the Skins, for something or the other. 20-7 packers.

Update 3:51

Greenbay has the ball again and, er, well I don't know shit from shineola here so screw this I am going to shut up and wait for the final score. Oh yeah and 20-7 Packers.

Update 3:57

Goddamn it! Touch down for the Skins. 20-14 Packers. Come on this is my life you are fucking with here! Get out there and win one for the Geffer damn it!

Update 4:06

Another five year penalty against the Skins for something. Something bad I hope. 20-14 Packers. Hey look at that 17 yard gain for the Packers, that's good right?

Update 4:13

Touchdown Greenbay, all is forgiven you wonderful meat heads! I worship the ground you bleed on! Go you shaved apes! And they even made the conversion 28-14 packers.

Update 4:21

Packers win! Yeah! I'm not going to get shipped off to Iran or North Korea! In your face Bush! Get packing (pun intented) you worthless sack of shit! Go Kerry, er, Packers!

North of the boarder

2004-10-31T01:10:00.000-05:00

While I like to think of the Canadians as Americas sane cousin to the north their commitment to drug reform is continual over stated. Seems they like to piss away money on pot spotting flyovers too and they even have the gall to say it's not an invasion of privacy:

Toronto, ON, Oct. 30 (UPI) -- A Canadian court has ruled that it's legal for police helicopters to use infrared cameras to find marijuana grow houses, the Toronto Sun said Saturday.

A decision by The Supreme Court of Canada overturned a lower court ruling that the practice was an invasion of privacy.

Regional police chief Armand La Barge said Friday he was delighted that the flights can resume after a five-year absence.

"This is a very handy tool and we will be using it to its fullest ability," La Barge said.

Locations of growing houses will be passed on to Toronto's drug and vice bureau for further investigation.

La Barge assured that the infrared system in the helicopters poses no threat to citizens' privacy.

"It cannot take people taking baths or people at a kitchen table having coffee," he said, "Unless they are growing marijuana and losing exorbitant amounts of heat, they have nothing to fear."

Yeah, just like the electricity bill snooping never getting the wrong place raided. On a side note thermal imaging searches are actually not legal with out a warrant in the US. Hey we can't be the worst on all counts!

Lost and found

2004-10-31T01:06:00.000-05:00

Did you lose your bong while on your beach trip this summer? Fear not, it may be safely stored in the Sea Pines Sheriff's Office.

New tactic

2004-10-29T06:23:00.000-04:00

The ever creative drug warriors are trotting out a new tactic to put an end to drug trafficking, restricting convenience store opening hours:

TROY, N.Y. Convenience stores in Troy were to shut overnight at midnight under a new city law. Violations carrying fines from 500 to 1-thousand dollars.

Police backed the measure that took effect at midnight Thursday, saying the stores attract drug traffic in the early morning.

What, people can't traffic drugs if they do not have easy access to coffee and twinkies at 3:30 am?

Amen to that

2004-10-27T20:08:00.000-04:00

For one of the better evaluations of our Texas village idiot vs Massachusetts mediocrity and the blind partisanship that comes with it I quote from The Agitator:

The blind partisanship on both sides come election season gets so damned tedious. Otherwise smart people start foaming at the mouth. Embracing patently ridiculous assaults on the other side's character. My guy's shit smells like cherry pie. Your guy bites the fingers off of handicapped babies.

...

The incumbent has, with a friendly Congress, run up a massive deficit; trampled on civil liberties; taken us to war under false pretenses, with no fall-back plan, and alienated from the world in the process; broken countless campaign promises; run the most secretive administration in history; and after the biggest mass murder in U.S. history, done very little to make us safer.

And your guy is barely tied with him.

Shouldn't that tell you something?

Legal pot = legal murder

2004-10-22T11:19:00.000-04:00

Forget for a moment that legal murder is an oxymoron and just stay with me here.

Perhaps in an attempt to get the Drug Lord to lay off Canada there is this little jewel of stupidity from up north:

Toronto Police Chief Julian Fantino likened decriminalizing marijuana to legalizing murder yesterday as he rejected arguments that legal pot would cut down on organized crime operations now growing it. "I guess we can legalize murder too and then we won't have a murder case. We can't go that way," Fantino said.

Yeah, making a victimless crime no longer a crime is the same thing as murder no longer being looked into by the cops because after all people drop dead from smoking pot all the time, right? It would, also, of course have no effect on organized crimes involvement with the production of the substance as after all post prohibition the mafia is still in charge of distilling and distributing alcohol with gun battles in the streets common when Bud and Miller trucks meet at an intersection.

Liberate the Afghans from their meager prosperity

2004-10-21T18:14:00.000-04:00

Lately there has been a great deal of rumbling about the booming poppy farms in Afghanistan from the Narcs. Seems they can’t quite stomach the thought of the poor farmers making a decent living and are demanding they go back to the bone grinding poverty, not that they ever left it, of growing things not worth half what they get from poppies. Seems the pentagon agrees with them:

Even as the Bush administration hails Afghanistan as a major foreign policy success, the country's soaring drug profits now equal about half of its gross national product and have become the principal source of funds for reconstruction, outpacing foreign aid. ...

They have found a way to make money and are starting to fend for them selve, quick crush half their economy!

In Washington yesterday, the senior American ground commander in Afghanistan said the United States is considering expanding the role of the roughly 18,000 American troops in the country to help crack down on the skyrocketing drug economy.

Wonderful, now we may soon have ground troops dieing for the drug war.

I'm back

2004-10-21T18:12:00.000-04:00

Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.

New blogger

2004-10-18T11:19:00.000-04:00

While my brain remains on a slow simmer I am not going to even attempt to actually commenting on drug war news, after all the frustration cannot do wonders for my immune system, so I will just point to a new blog which has come to my attention Grits for Breakfast. It keeps track of various drug war/police abuses and is a wonderful addiction to the drug reform bloggerhood, welcome aboard.

bleh

2004-10-17T13:56:00.000-04:00

Due to a slight case of the plague the total lack of posting will continue. Hit the links if you are looking for drug war news.

Good work comrade child

2004-10-06T17:07:00.000-04:00

In the USSR the propaganda masters made a hero of a young boy who turned in his parents for being less then enthusiastic about the revolution. They built statues of him, told his story to little girls and boys in the state schools and celebrated him as an example of devotion to the revolution. I wonder if the narcs will have the hutzba to do the same for this little brain washed shit:

On Tuesday, Charlotte Lewis, 34, appeared in Cook County bond court, where Judge Mary Margaret Brosnahan set her bail at $200,000.

...

... police confiscated 5,000 grams of cannabis, 77 grams of cocaine and five grams of mushrooms from Lewis' home in the 4600 block of West Altgeld. Total street value: $31,325.

But it was her son who made the bust possible.

On Monday, the boy's father, who doesn't live with Lewis, came to pick up his kid. The boy confided that he'd seen mom grow, cut and smoke marijuana, and that he knew it wasn't a good thing for her to be doing. So the father, worried about his son's safety, went to police, said Chicago Police Officer Michael Birmingham.

Long live the glorious drug war comrade!

Welfare we-we update

2004-10-03T15:49:00.000-04:00

The Bill that would allow the state of Michagan to demand people receving welfare submit to drug tests has passed in that states House and is set to go to the Senate.

It doesn’t work, but we need it!

2004-10-03T13:36:00.000-04:00

I have come across equal portions of rationality and stupidity in local (read North Carolina) drug news. The rationality comes in with the Rowan-Salisbury school board’s decision to not inflict random drug testing on its inmates, ah, students.

Salisbury Post

EAST SPENCER -- Students in the Rowan-Salisbury School System will not be subject to random drug testing in the immediate future, a divided school board decided Monday night.

Members of the Rowan-Salisbury Board of Education voted 5-2 Monday night not to pursue random drug testing of its high school students beginning with the 2005-2006 school year.

First off 5-2 is not a divided vote, it's a clear majority. But any how.

The article even goes on to list some of the problems with the policy of random drug tests nothing major really, other then it does not work and would be illegal:

...the most comprehensive study [on random drug testing] was completed in 2003 by researchers at the University of Michigan. Those researchers... determined that random drug testing did nothing to deter students' use of drugs.

He said students who use drugs quickly become adept at masking their tests. Another problem...is the number of "false-positives," results that show a student has been using drugs when he hasn't.

...random drug testing of the student population as a whole is illegal...students have to basically volunteer to be tested.

...

The cost of each drug test typically ranges from $25 to $30, making the undertaking a fairly expensive one, Heffern added.

But hey, it's not like public schools don't stick to ineffectual policies, violate students legal rights and waste money all the time so what's the big deal?

Now the idiocy starts. After finding that random drug testing is ineffectual, illegal and very exspensive the school board, after rightly voting against it, votes to have more information about it delivered to them:

Board members did vote 6-1, however, to ... continue tracking the effectiveness of random drug testing in other school systems

Surely the forth amendment does not apply some place!

My anti-munchie

2004-10-03T13:05:00.000-04:00

Back in July I noted the creation of vaccinations against various types of drug induced euphoria by English doctors/drug warriors that were, of course, to be inflicted on children. I also pointed out the possibility of them being imported and used here in the US. I found the thought of meddling with children’s brain chemistry to further the drug war disturbing back then, now it’s just flat out menacing.

A recent study funded by The National Institutes of Health (your tax dollars at work folks) found that blocking the brains naturally occurring cannabinoids, chemicals similar to THC, improved memory. However it also rendered the test subjects, thankfully birds not kids, unimaginative to the point where lateral thinking was impossible.

While this was not a study directly linked to creating an anti-cannabis vaccination I think it is rather ominous to consider the implications of such a thing. It also makes me wonder just what effect the opiate blocking vaccinations that already exist have on endorphins.

But enough wild conspiratorial musing, it's not like the government would ever do any thing that is not in our best interests. Right?

(Hat tip: Last One Speaks)

In other news...

2004-10-01T23:09:00.000-04:00

I am so far behind the with recent drug war news that I am just going to go right off the tracks and head for something else. Che Guevara.

To the eternal chagrin of my leftist acquaintances I detest the man. He was a totalitarian, homophobic waste of flesh. The man signed peoples death warrants for the oh so outrageous crime of being homosexual yet the left hoist him up as sight of liberation. But enough of my disorganized rant check out this much more thought out one.

Today's Slogan

2004-09-23T23:19:00.000-04:00

Draft the NRA!

Do you remember when...

2004-09-22T16:03:00.000-04:00

Bush and Co. sent $43,000,000 to the Taliban in thanks for banning Opium cultivation? And these people then have the hutzba to accuse drug users of supporting terrorism? (hat tip to The Agitator)

Raid, just in case

2004-09-22T13:34:00.000-04:00

In this era of preemption the narcs have come out with a new sort of preemptive measure, the preemptive drug raid. This tactic is of course being used on one of the narcs favorite chew toys, students:

VIENNA - The message was clear to students at Jackson Junior High School Wednesday: Drugs are not welcome.

Hum, hour after hour of DARE mantra chanting, increased penalties for possession or sale, signs screaming out “drug free zone”, police lectures, piss tests, reefer madness documentaries, forced medication with government approved drugs and general demonizeation of every pleasure inducing substance knowing to man has not sufficiently cowed the students. Alright bring in the cops and drug dogs, that should do the trick!

Two classrooms and a gym locker room were searched Wednesday by the Vienna Police Department's drug-sniffing dog, King, during a lockdown at the school.

The dog found no drugs, but did smell something in one of the gym lockers, which police believe may have contained a faint smell of narcotics. The locker was not assigned to a student and was unlocked, said police.

...

"There has been something in that locker at some point, I'm sure of that... Even if you touch narcotics and then touch something else, the dog can smell what you touched," Lindsay said.

So you bring in the police taking them away from preventing crimes that actually have victims and all you can turn up is a locker that no one was using which perhaps at one point was possibly touched by some one who touched some form of drug?

"This is not a one-shot deal. We are going to do this again. The mere fact we had the dog here today will scare anybody who is remotely thinking of bringing drugs," he said.

...

"This is not really a drug raid; it's a more preventive approach. I believe Jackson has one of the best student bodies, but it only takes one student to make a choice to bring drugs or alcohol to school," Summers said.

I really can’t wait for this tactic to spill over into general drug enforcement. Coming soon to a private home near you, perhaps after they test the door knob, just in case no knock raids! No we don’t have any reasonable suspicion that you have unapproved substance in your house we are doing this just in case you do.

We are from the government and were a here to help!

Testing, testing...

2004-09-20T18:07:00.000-04:00

There is a great article about student drug testing and its problems over at America's Future Foundation :

Why are Washington bureaucrats so enamored with random student drug testing? The evidence thus far is clear: drug testing has a poor track record in reducing student drug use, particularly in comparison to other drug prevention and education programs. Its fiscal toll on local school budgets saps money that would be better spent on basic educational needs. Drug testing also undermines parental authority, as parents have no input as to whether their child will be tested. Most ominously, the practice creates future citizens who become accustomed to ever-broader government surveillance as merely routine.

Befuddling fundies

2004-09-20T17:43:00.000-04:00

Now this is how you deal with Fundies(hat tip VLWC):

Preacher Lady 2: “I got freedom of speech! And GOD TELLS ME THAT THE GAY DEVILS ARE CONTROLLING NEW YORK.”

Me: (standing up) “If you do not cease and desist fouling the air with homophobia, I must sing…SHOW TUNES.”

Don’t drink and deliberate

2004-09-16T13:53:00.000-04:00

In the puritanical landscape of the drug war I find this little tidbit to be amusing:

NEW YORK (Reuters) - New Yorkers dreading jury duty take note: it's OK to be drunk on booze or high on pot or cocaine while doing your civic duty.

...

Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Ellen Coin cited a 1987 Supreme Court decision which rejected the argument that jurors consuming alcohol, smoking marijuana, snorting cocaine and falling asleep constituted an "outside influence" on jurors.

There would be a certain amount of irony being convicted on drug charges by stoned jurors.

Not just for school kids any more!

2004-09-15T13:47:00.000-04:00

Right, so you’re out of work and unable to find a new job finally you gulp down your pride and apply for welfare; as if there is not sufficient indignity involved in the process already Michigan wants to heap on one last indignity, drug testing:

LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- Welfare recipients could be required to have a drug test to continue receiving state aid under legislation approved Wednesday by a state House committee.

The bill would allow the Family Independence Agency to require a drug test if an agency employee has probable cause to suspect a recipient of substance abuse.

...

It's the first time the Legislature has taken up the issue since the ACLU and the state reached a settlement to end their four-year dispute over state's 1999 pilot program to drug test all welfare recipients. The agreement followed an April 2003 ruling by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that said the drug-testing program violated the Fourth Amendment.

The welfare drug testing bill is House Bill 6161.

Hey, when at first you don’t succeed to strip people of even more of their privacy try, try again.

Mushroom Cloud Reported in N. Korea

2004-09-12T02:42:00.000-04:00

Ahem, this just in SHIT!

SEOUL, South Korea - A large explosion occurred in the northern part of North Korea...

...

The South Korean government said it was trying to confirm the report of an explosion at 11 a.m. on Thursday in Yanggang province near the border with China.

The Yonhap news agency carried conflicting reports from unidentified sources, with one in Washington saying the incident could be related to a natural disaster such as a forest fire. It also cited a diplomatic source in Seoul as raising the possibility of an accident or a nuclear test.

Excuse me, I am going to go brush up on my duck and cover routine.

Cheep! Oh so cheep

2004-09-10T01:53:00.000-04:00

But it's funny I say! The Sloganator.

Narcs and knobs

2004-09-09T22:37:00.000-04:00

Pete over at Drug WarRant has discovered a new little absurdity from the narcs, nicking peoples knobs:

...the police swipe your front door knob and test it for microscopic traces of drug residue that might have come from your hand. If it comes up positive, the police use that as probable cause to search your house.

Be sure to rub your knob often!

Male bovine feces alert

2004-09-01T16:07:00.000-04:00

I was contemplating giving this rather odious, bovine excrement laced editorial the once over but as it has already been effectively demolished over at Last One Speaks I am calling off the search for my manure handling equipment and will just direct you fine people over there.

Unflinchingly guarding the president, hey there's some pot!

2004-09-01T13:06:00.000-04:00

Just when I thought calling out the National Guard to look for pot was a misappropriation of resources of the highest order, turns out I was under estimating the Drug Warriors The folks guarding the president took time during their shift to harass people for their choice in plants:

The security force helping to protect President George W. Bush spotted marijuana growing behind a Romulus home on Tuesday, according to Local 4 reports.

...

"There (were) roughly eight plants at the house ranging anywhere from 6 feet in height to 8 feet in height," said Liss.

I am no great fan of Dubbya, I am in fact counting the days till him and his pack of two bit idiotic cronies get thrown out on their ear this election, but god damn it you’re supposed to be guarding the most powerful man in the world not snooping in peoples gardens!

Also "roughly eight plants" what, did they not teach you how to count in nark school? Was it eight, more then eight or less then eight this not trigonometry here just basic addition, how many plants were there?

Congratulations boys, two more nonviolent, otherwise law abiding Americans removed from the work force, thrown into our overcrowded courts and likely into our equally over crowded prisons all while you were supposed to be guarding out countries leader from harm. Good work, dick heads.

Forth amendment, smorth amendment

2004-08-31T23:51:00.000-04:00

In yet one more instance of the forth amendment being suspended when it comes to school kids, the enlightened folks of Hagerstown Indiana and considering introducing random oral swab testing of their students for drug use.

What sets this incident apart from the day to day trampling of kids forth amendment rights at school is that it would seem from that article that the tests are not being aimed at athletes or people in other elective activities, just random kids who have no choice to be there and likely face suspension if they stand up for their rights.

Public schools, proudly producing plebeians for the police state.

The Drug Lord vs. reality

2004-08-30T13:09:00.000-04:00

John Walters the US Drug Czar, hence forth known as the Drug Lord, tells some real whoppers about Cannabis Sativa that really have nothing to do with reality what so ever. But any one that pays any attention to the guy, and is actualy intrested in the facts, knows that he's full of shit so what am I on about? Now even the US Department of Justice officially says he’s full of it.

A newly released federal report refutes claims by US Drug Czar John Walters that the United States is being inundated with Canadian pot, that the drug's potency is dramatically rising, and that marijuana poses a greater public health threat than heroin or cocaine.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice report, "National Drug Threat Assessment 2004," the overwhelming majority of commercial grade marijuana consumed in the U.S. comes from California and Mexico. The report further adds that Hawaii, not Canada, is the US' "leading source of high potency marijuana."

...

According to the DOJ report, however, increased mentions of marijuana during emergency room visits "in recent years have not been significant," and account for less than ten percent of all drug mentions. The report further stated that the average THC content of U.S. commercial grade marijuana is around five percent, despite claims by Walters that today's marijuana potency levels are "10 to 20 times stronger" than they were a generation ago.

Don’t you just hate it when the facts ruin perfectly propaganda?

The whole report is here, there should be more later as I work my way through it.

Tree reprieve

2004-08-30T12:54:00.000-04:00

Earlier I mentioned that the bright sparks of the Florida drug warriors were going to hack down an ancient oak tree due to disliking what took place under it.

I am pleased to report that in a turn of events not typical to things associated with the drug war, the tree will not be cut down:

A free trimming offered by Fritz Bros. Tree Service has been accepted, sheriff's spokesman Rick Hord said Thursday. Les Fritz said his company also will try to seal cavities in the tree that have been used to hide contraband.

"It's an old tree and I think it would be a shame to cut it down without pursuing other options, increasing patrols, putting a fence around it, pruning it," Fritz said. "It's like we're cutting off our arm because our hand is offending us."

But wait, there’s more atypical rational thinking!

C.C. Fearson, executive director for the Sylvania Heights [said that]

"The tree doesn't sell drugs," he said. "The tree isn't the problem and [cutting] it [down] definitely isn't the solution. Everybody makes it sound like that tree is a drug dealer."

However you cannot have this much rationality with out some one having to stick up for irrationality:

Cypress Street resident Osie Brown was angered by outsiders lobbying to save the tree.

"They don't live on Cypress Street," she said. "They do not see those people standing up peeing in front of these kids. My grandkids and my children walk by there."

Yes, people would be model citizens who urinated only in approved places, do not use illegal substances or exchange money for sex if we just cut down that damned devil tree! Cut it down and all will be well!

Sorry sir but your town name is unacceptable

2004-08-26T12:35:00.000-04:00

Please beware if you are from Hempstead your towns name is considered offencive by the Gwinnett County school system in Georgia:

The town of Hempstead, N.Y., has a message for Gwinnett County administrators: Before you target a student wearing a Hempstead shirt, look at a map.

Terrell Jones, a student in Gwinnett County's Grayson High School, was weeded out of a classroom by a school administrator Monday because he was wearing a shirt that read: "Hempstead, NY 516," a reference to the Long Island town and its telephone area code.

No word on if it’s acceptable to indicate that you are from POTtsville, PA, HASHan Chuchg, AZ, SMOKEY Hill, KA or PIPE WI.

When in doubt, destroy

2004-08-26T11:55:00.000-04:00

The true spirit of drug/vice policy is alive and well in Fort Wayne Beach Florida. It is reported that a good deal of drug dealing and prostitution takes place under a large oak tree there and they have gone up the mountain to consult the drug war gods about how to solve this problem. Thus sayith the Drug Lord, cut it down:

Okaloosa County sheriff's deputies think they have found a solution for getting rid of drug dealers and prostitutes who congregate under a giant oak tree: chop it down.
The sheriff's office is seeking permission to have the tree removed from a county right of way on Cypress Street.

The people that live on the street seem to think that the tree has some mystical evil about it and should be destroyed even though they know it will not stop the drug trade:

Community activist Audrey Williams said it is unlikely cutting down the tree will solve the drug problem, but she still wants it gone.

"As long as they can hang out under the tree and do their dirty deeds we won't get any change," Williams said.

Cypress Street resident Shelby Brown plans to move if the tree stays.

"If there's a fight on this street, that's where it starts," Brown said. "As long as the tree's there, I'll do it."

Damn evil tree! Burn it I say!

Link love

2004-08-25T12:37:00.000-04:00

It’s official my blog has risen above total isolation and obscurity. With recent links from Drug War Rant and Last One Speaks I think it’s a distinct possibility that I will not wither in obscurity forever. Thank you all, I love you guys! [/groveling]

2004-08-23T21:02:00.000-04:00

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

The war on, frappuccino?

2004-08-23T18:50:00.000-04:00

The drug reporter over on AlterNet is carrying a very amusing satire of drug policy concerning the evils of caffeine and why it should be next on the prohibition hit list:

The U.S. government allocates many billions of dollars a year to the "War on Drugs," but it spends hardly a penny on the most insidious, most omnipresent psychoactive drug of all. I refer, of course, to caffeine (C8H10N4O2), the little alkaloid that made Starbucks' Howard Schultz a billionaire.

More stupid, ineffectual, shake downs

2004-08-23T16:25:00.000-04:00

It turns out that there are a number of ineffective shake down operations taking place over in the UK from Last One Speaks:

[at the at the V2004 festival in Weston Park] Police reportedly seized quite an amount of drugs, Almost 500 grams of cannabis, 2.3 grams of cocaine, 1.4 grams of heroin, 198 ecstasy tablets and 8.6 grams of amphetamine as a result of over seventy searches based on the latest CCTV technology.

...

...why do the police go to these great lengths to arrest 13 people out of a crowd of 70 thousand? The amount of drugs they found may sound like a lot to non-consumers but trust me, the pot was their greatest haul and figuring a gram in every joint, it would not have made a dent in the sobriety of a crowd that size and outside of the ecstasy, the other drugs wouldn't be enough for more than a half a dozen people -- it was all clearly personal stash meant to enhance their own enjoyment of the event, not meant to be sold at the concert.

Note to UK drinkers: don’t get stoned before you get pissed

2004-08-23T15:48:00.000-04:00

A few months back the Broward County School Board considered employing a swab test to tell if their students had come into physical contact with some drugs and at the time I thought little of it with such intrusions being about par for the course with the rights of students. It would seem that the cops over in the UK thought it was a good idea to try this on pub goers:

Officers are [working] with landlords to carry out drug tests on customers using new equipment which can detect up to 200 types of drugs, including cocaine, heroin, cannabis, amphetamine and ecstasy.

"Over the coming weeks any pub customer may find themselves facing the test in Harpenden, St Albans or London Colney," said one officer.

All landlords in the area are being invited to ask for the £35,000 [$63,243.90] testing equipment, called an itemiser.

During a test a special cloth is wiped across the palm of a customer and placed in the itemiser for analysis.

A result comes up within ten seconds.

It costs as much as a luxury car, invades the privacy of people who just want a stiff drink and gives results really fast! Oh boy! How many of those damn, dirty, degenerate drug users does this land in jail?

None:

The itemiser was first trialled in the Beehive in Keyfield Terrace, St Albans, last October.

Of 35 people tested, 21 were found to have been in contact with drugs but none were found to be in possession of them.

The latest initiative was launched in Harpenden on Tuesday when 152 customers of The George pub in High Street were tested as they entered the bar.

Four tested positive for recent contact with illegal substances. Officers searched these people but no one was found to be possessing drugs.

Great so even with all those shake downs you could not turn up one person who was breaking the stupid drug laws? This is a good investment of public money and police time why?

Step away from the text book!

2004-08-20T18:22:00.000-04:00

Isn’t it nice to know that the police are with in legal boundaries when they raid a high school, guns drawn and handcuff students?

CHARLESTON, S.C. -- A guns-drawn raid at a Goose Creek high school last year did not violate civil rights laws and the case is closed, the U.S. Justice Department says.

...

Using a drug dog, police found no drugs or weapons in the Nov. 5 raid that frightened children, provoked marches and lawsuits and brought national media attention and the resignation of Stratford High School's longtime principal.

Fifteen officers entered Stratford's main hallway and ordered 130 students to the floor. They used plastic ties to handcuff 18 students and school officials opened and searched 17 book bags police dogs reacted to.

When you mean one thing but say your mother

2004-08-20T17:30:00.000-04:00

Cruising the usual suspect blogs today it would seem that there have been a few people accidentally telling the truth.

From Drug War Rant:

The Nevada Appeal newspaper makes an interesting slip in their headline about Drug Czar John Walters and the Nevada Supreme Court's ruling:

High court avoids drug lord disclosure case

From D'Alliance:

It's always refreshing when a slip of the tongue reveals the truth. As happened here, when Taylor Norman, purchasing agent for the city of Amarillo, TX, described how asset forfeiture works to benefit the city:

"When federal agencies seize items for whatever illegal reason, that's who ends up with them," Norman said.

Forth what?

2004-08-19T12:18:00.000-04:00

In a pleasantly surprising development today it turns out that the forth amendment actually applies to school students:

The Little Rock School District’s random searches of students’ belongings is unconstitutional, the U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday.

And what a lovely policy it was:

[the policy allowed] a principal [to] single out any class, busload or lunchroom full of students, even if they don’t reasonably suspect that someone in the group is hiding something illegal.

Which in practice allowed for the school to simply say “every one out we’re going to rummage thru your stuff now” such as when:

school officials entered a seventh-grade classroom and asked all the students to leave. School officials then searched all the students’ belongings, including their backpacks and purses. During the search, a small amount of marijuana was discovered in a container in a purse belonging to one of the students, identified in the lawsuit as Jane Doe.

God save the queen!

2004-08-16T17:34:00.000-04:00

After ten days of this that and the other thing here I am back at the stained keyboard hammering out things on the blog but first, as threatened, my cousin Joel in a thong:

Two words

2004-08-04T00:49:00.000-04:00

Road Trip!

Pardon me I have a mad dash to some place else to make.

Is it so hard to say you’re sorry?

2004-08-03T10:29:00.000-04:00

In another “we’re the cops, we are never wrong!” moment over here were have Katie Rhodes and Josh Brudwick:

The two were the victims of a drug bust gone awry July 25 when Summit County Drug Task Force members handcuffed them at a local restaurant and ransacked their Frisco condo looking for the makings of a crystal methamphetamine lab.

They found nothing, and left behind a mess of broken doors and strewn clothing and trash.

While the cops are actually going to pay to fix up their mess even in doing so they cannot quite grasp that the scum bag informant or paranoid snooping neighbor who pointed them towards their house could possibly have been wrong:

The Sheriff's Office is still waiting for test results taken from the scene, notably those in the garage where officers said it smelled of a flammable solution.

Flammable materials are often used in the production of crystal meth - and are often to blame for lab explosions.

"We still don't have any answer for the odors," Woodman said. "We speculated the Jeep might have had some sort of gas leak, but there was no evidence on the ground."

They have since heard that a man Frisco police said was leaving the apartment with a duffel bag and a trash bag might have been a neighbor heading out on a camping trip. The officer who witnessed that is out of town, so they are unable to follow up on that until his return.

So you found exactly nada, even after ransacking the place, discover that the guy leaving with bags was most likely just going camping and are down to a solvent smell found in a garage of all places, what do you say then?

"It's kind of hard to say this fell apart," Woodman said of the raid

Does there need to be a body count for a raid to have fallen apart?

Chronic pain better then being stoned. - DEA

2004-08-03T10:09:00.000-04:00

Meet Dana May, a man who has suffered from chronic pain from 1996 to the present due to a work related accident. He has tried the full gambit of pain medications over the years, morphine, methadone, Demerol, he even tried acupuncture.

Having tried most every thing else after Colorado's passage of medical marijuana legislation in 2000 he consulted with his doctor about trying that option. What do you know, it worked:

"The marijuana is so much better, and I don't know why that is," said May, who often walks gingerly around in his home in his shorts and bare feet. He said that when he wears socks and pants, they cause an additional burning sensation in his legs and feet.

"It kind of dulls (the pain) because nothing takes the pain away. It knocks it down enough for me to function, to see the kids play sports," he said.

When he smoked his marijuana, May said he did it in the basement of his home where he grew his plants and where his three children, ages 15 and 9-year-old twins, can't gain access.

So a chronic pain patient finds a medication that works to ease his pain and allows him to function normally, what do you do with such a person? Why track him down, hold him at gun point and take away his medication, of course.

While May was preparing to pick up his children from school May 27, he noticed a couple of Aurora police cars speeding to his home, which is at the end of a cul-de-sac.

Then he saw more patrol and unmarked cars, and police officers and Drug Enforcement Administration agents with their guns drawn.

When they asked May where his marijuana was, he told them his plants were in the basement and displayed his medical marijuana "patient" and "caregiver" documents. Nonetheless, the agents took away his 109.1 grams of dried and usable marijuana and 31 pieces of equipment, including transformers, water pumps, cloning machines and exhaust fans that he used to grow his supply.

I wonder if there would be quotation marks around the word prescription were he to have been using morphine to treat his pain.

Them’s some raggedy draws boy

2004-08-01T13:41:00.000-04:00

Here we find more lovely conduct from the people that brought us the hibiscus incident :

According to the complaint mailed to police officials Friday, about a dozen law enforcement officers from several agencies banged on the front door of Stone’s house between 6:45 a.m. and 7 a.m. July 20, so hard that it knocked pictures off the wall.

The officers would not let him put his clothes on after he got out of bed, demanding that he come outside immediately just as he was, Stone told The Paris News. When he said no one was there by the name of the female defendant they sought, they demanded his wife come outside.

Stone said he and his wife were traumatized by about a dozen officers who kept rifles pointed at their heads. He said his mailbox was off its hinges because of the force with which the officers had hammered on his door. The officers threw his lawn chairs in the yard and stepped all over his flowers, he said.

So you break some ones door, drag them and their partner out into the yard in their undies, hold them at gun point, throw around their law furniture and trample their flowers for good measure; what do you do upon finding out that you have the wrong people in custody and the perosn you are looking for has not lived there for more then two years? Why laugh at the poor man for wearing “raggedy drawers”.

That will teach him to expect privacy in his own home!

Just say no, to $60,000+ a week

2004-08-01T13:06:00.000-04:00

How people can say they support capitalism and the drug war at the same time and not see how the former shows the later to be lunacy in terms of economics is really beyond me, and this lovely bit of news from the UK really drives that one home big time:

Home Secretary David Blunkett has been told that despite handing police massive new powers to beat the drugs menace, the young street pushers are now earning as much as top Premiership football stars.

A Whitehall source said: "It's hard to believe these kids are making such incredible amounts of money, but we have heard they are getting £7,500 a day selling hundreds of pieces of crack and heroin for £15 or £20 a go.

In US dollars that's $13,646.39 per day. Let's assume that the dealers like the idea of the traditional work week, hold your laughter till the end please, and they put in five eight hour shifts per week and even take three weeks vacation a year. Doing the math that brings their earnings, baring arrest, death or change of heart, to $3,343,365.50 per year, $68,231.95 per week or $1,705.80 an hour.

Now if one does not have moral reservations about selling heroine or cocaine do you honestly expect them to pass up that kind of money and work for the UK minimum wage of $7.40 an hour?

It couldn’t happen here?

2004-08-01T12:16:00.000-04:00

In an earlier post I detailed the rather chilling prospect of people being vaccinated against various ways of experiencing pleasure from the use of some drugs. As it turns out baystatebar over at last one speaks has discovered that the usage of those vaccinations is not only much closer to reality then I feared it's much closer to home given that there are plans to use them in the US as well as the UK.

Crotch pot cooked meth

2004-07-31T12:22:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I came upon a story about some one trying to cook meth in a church kitchen; I thought that was an odd place to attempt to manufacture the stuff but today I found that it is one of the more mundane methods of doing so, at least compared to this one:

LaFAYETTE, Ga. - A Walker County man was charged with manufacturing methamphetamine after his pants exploded while he was talking to social services workers outside his home.

Daniel Gabriel Doyle, 39, met the social workers at his front door Tuesday, walked to their car and sat down to fill out some forms, said Patrick Stanfield, commander of the Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit Drug Task Force.

"Finally, while he was sitting in the back seat, the front of his pants exploded," Stanfield said Friday.

He said Doyle apparently had mixed red phosphorous and iodine in a film canister and stuck it in his pocket.

Note to meth cooks, mixing chemicals in your pants is a bad idea only made worse when you do so prior to doing government paper work.

Total lack of communication and trust strengths relationship

2004-07-31T12:02:00.000-04:00

Suspect your child is using drugs? Unable to communicate with them to the point where you could actually ask them about it? Don't trust their answers any how? Well if you are in Georgia your troubles are over, just get junior to pee in a cup and all worries will end:

...parents who worry that their child may be abusing drugs, Northeast Georgia Health System is offering a way to find out the truth.

In mid-July, the hospital introduced the Parental Assurance Drug Screen, a $40 test that checks urine for traces of cocaine, marijuana, amphetamines, heroin and a variety of other illegal drugs.

But don’t worry about such petty issues as privacy, trust or your relationship with your child being so poor that you are not able to communicate with them because:

In a family situation, a child suspected of using drugs may be unwilling to comply with a parent's demands. But Brewer said it is not an invasion of privacy as long as the child is under 18.

Brewer thinks the screening could actually strengthen the parent-child relationship.

"I've got a 14-year-old, and I'd certainly want to bring him in to get a specimen if he began behaving oddly," she said. "It shows that I care enough about him to keep him on the straight and narrow path."

Sure, because the last thing one would want to do when their child starts to act out of character is ask they what is wrong or why they are acting differently. No perish the thought! Drug tests have out modeled communication.

We know it when we see it

2004-07-30T14:33:00.000-04:00

I would think that if it was your job to find, eradicate and in all ways hound that foul, nefarious, virtue stealing evil demon weed cannabis sativa you would at least be able to oh I don’t know be identify it by sight or be able to distinguish it from other plants of similar description. Apparently I gave the narcs too much credit as they have failed even that basic test of competency in the case of this poor bastard (via Last One Speaks).

Landscape contractor Blair Davis was in his northwest Harris County home around 2 p.m. Tuesday when there was a knock at his door.

Davis said he hadn't even gotten his hand on the doorknob when it flew open and he was looking at the barrel of a pistol.

Behind the gun were about 10 members of the Harris County Organized Crime and Narcotics Task Force, who burst into the home, guns drawn, and began shouting at him to get down on the floor.

There on the floor, Davis said, it took a while to figure out that what had caused the swarm of lawmen to descend upon him was the hibiscus in his front yard.

That's right, hibiscus.

The foliage of the Texas Star hibiscus, a native plant that's growing in popularity, vaguely resembles that of marijuana.

Now at this point the cops could have done the proper thing, apologized for invading this mans privacy, helping him back to his feet and perhaps buying the guy a beer, offer to ignore any parking tickets he gets in the next few months but the people in question being part of a drug tasks force mistake and sorry are not words found in their vocabulary.

Refusing to accept that they made a mistake they proceeded to show just how dumb they really are:

...the team of narcotics officers [then] combed his house for about an hour, at one point discussing whether red and gold bamboo growing in his window might be marijuana. They also asked what he did with the watermelons and cantaloupes growing in his back yard.

I am surprised they did not try to book him on drug paraphernalia charges, after all those insidious melons are just bongs waiting to happen.

Don’t you feel safer knowing that the narcs don’t even know pot when they see it?

Anti-pleasure vaccine

2004-07-27T13:57:00.000-04:00

It would seem that the English opposition of enjoying ones self has spilled over into their study of science as they have developed a vaccination that would make it impossible to experience pleasure from some drug use, here I thought they would have made one that removed the pleasure from sex or masturbation first. At present the vaccination works against pleasure from nicotine, heroin and cocaine

Professor Nutt [!?], head of psychopharmacology at the University of Bristol and a senior member of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, said: "People could be vaccinated against drugs at birth as you are against measles..."

Less pleasurable living thru pharmacology?

The votes are in

2004-07-26T15:01:00.000-04:00

The people have spoken, Dubbya wins the award for Stupidest Man of the Year.

When anti-drug ads tell the truth, by accident

2004-07-23T15:09:00.000-04:00

Those lovely folks over there at the Media Campaign almost hit on the truth in one of their ads. In the aptly titled hypocrite ad they try to tell parents not to feel bad about being hypocrites for demanding their children not experiment with pot if they did in the past, now if only I had photo shop to play with this lovely image:

Any takers?

Be on the look out for batteries, fertilizer or hot plates

2004-07-23T14:56:00.000-04:00

Have you seen some one buying batteries? Fertilizer? Perhaps a hot plate? Matches? Aluminum foil? If so then you should of course be suspiscious of what they plan to do with thoes incidious items, or at least that's what the Pennsylvania state police seem to think. Way to fight the drug war boys!

Dead heat from all polls

2004-07-23T12:21:00.000-04:00

Polling report.com has good and not so good news , good news Kerry is ahead in all polls, bad news the difference between him and bush remains with in the margin of error for all polls, even the fox one.

Now for the worse news, Kerry's a drug warrior.

Pot is worse then meth, drug czar says so!

2004-07-23T11:48:00.000-04:00

Over at Drug War Rant the Drug Czar is given a good beating over his preposterous remarks about pot the worst, or should I say most choice, of which is that the "dangerous, dangerous" evil satanic scourge of a noxious weed is:

...the single greatest drug threat. It's twice as important a factor in addiction as cocaine. It's vastly more important as a problem than methamphetamine..."

Because we all know about the Alzheimer's like brain damage pot causes, how grow rooms are driving down property values and rendering houses unfit for human habitation with their toxic slag even putting sanitation workers' lives in jeopardy!

Oh wait, those are the results of crystal meth use and production, but pot is a bigger problem, because, um, ah, because people are enjoying them selves damn it! This must be put to a stop!

Join the Navy, see the world...

2004-07-22T17:39:00.000-04:00

...get your boobs done!

The New Yorker magazine reports in its July 26th edition that members of all four branches of the U.S. military can get face-lifts, breast enlargements, liposuction and nose jobs for free

About that bill

2004-07-21T17:01:00.000-04:00

As it turns out the war in Iraq has cost more then was thought, $12.3 billion more to be exact.

...the Pentagon has $5 billion left to fund the 2004 shortfall but will need to find $7 billion to cover it in the last two months of the fiscal year.

The White House is expected to seek a larger emergency spending bill early next year, after the elections, for Iraq and Afghanistan -- which Democrats say will top $50 billion.

He's a bastard but he's our bastard redux

2004-07-19T11:34:00.000-04:00

What do you do after invading a country to depose a brutal dictator and free the oppressed people? Well Bush and Co.'s answer would seem to be install a guy whose' first act as big banana is to shoot six people in the head to impress the other people in his government.

It was apparently an "act of mercy" given that they had been beating the guys in eight hour shifts.

Dr. Iyad Allawi, Saddam lite.

That's not a choice it's a threat!

2004-07-19T11:27:00.000-04:00

I am finally going to get out and vote this November, shame I only have the option of voting for an irresponsible idiot or the most uninspiring old bastard in the Democratic party. Due to not wanting to see how many more quagmires Bush and Co. can get us mixed up in and having no desire to see their domestic policy go any farther I have no choice but to vote Kerry.

So let me point every one to http://www.johnkerryisadouchebagbutimvotingforhimanyway.com/ and I could not agree more. You're a bland wanker, but you got my vote Johnny.

Just when you thought...

2004-07-18T19:34:00.000-04:00

When Arnold won the election over in California I thought he would be doing his best to avoid the cliche's that made him famous and try to show him self to be a serious political animal, well so much for that:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger mocked his opponents in the California Legislature on Saturday as "girlie men," and called upon voters to "terminate" them at the polls in November if they don't pass his $103-billion budget.

link

and here I thought that Kissenger made satire obsolete.

Some one said it...

2004-07-17T20:32:00.000-04:00

In the it's about damn time some one came out and said it section today I find this article about helping change the view of pot smokers:

Campaign director Mikki Norris points out that cannabis smokers could have their children, jobs, public housing, drivers licenses, student loans and even their freedom taken away from them at any moment. "This is not just about the right to get high, it's about equal rights," said Norris in a recent address to the annual NORML conference in San Francisco. "I pay taxes, I earn a living, I recycle, I am a good neighbor, and at the end of the day and at the end of work, I like to smoke a joint."
"I would love to see a time when we are judged not by the contents of our urine, but by our characters."

I am still here why?

2004-07-14T18:22:00.000-04:00

So I am dreaming of throwing what little stuff I have into a bag and getting out of here to some place else, I think I have the money to make it to the west coast if I play it right but in any case here is an interesting list I hope to have to use one day to detox from being gone too long (lifted from 355days)

Trouble readjusting to life back home after spending time travelling?
Here's a few handy hints that should help you settle back in:

1) Replace your bed with two or more bunk beds, and every night invite random people in to sleep there. This will make things seem more hostel like, and will also boost your karma. Ensure at least once a week a couple gets drunk and shags on one of the top bunks all night. Remove beds one by one as symptoms improve.

2) Sleep in your sleeping bag, and forget to wash it for months.

3) Sleep in a different room each day, varying it by setting the air conditioning either too hot or too cold. Sleep behind a pot plant for that jungle effect. Cats also double as pumas with a little imagination. Put up a mosquito net, ensuring that there are plenty of holes, and it falls down at least twice during the night.

4) Enlist help of a family member to set your radio alarm randomly to go off at some time during the night, filling your room with loud talking. Works best if you can find a radio station in foreign languages.

5) Slowly remove items of clothing etc from your backpack, until you are completely using your wardrobe instead. Maybe only one item a day, but remember its one step at a time kids, one step at a time. Don't forget to smell your clothes before wearing them, and re-introduce the use of the iron SLOWLY.

6) Buy your favourite foodstuffs, and despite living at home, write your name and when you might next be leaving the house on them. This should be the backpackers staple diet of mainly pasta,potatoes and beer.

7) Ask family member to every now or again steal one of the above foodstuffs, preferably the one you've most been looking forward to, or the most expensive.

8) Keep at least one item of food far too long or in a bag out in the sun, so you have to spend at least 24 hours within sprinting distance of the toilet.

9) Even if it's a Sunday, make sure you're out of the house by 10am, and then stand on the corner looking lost. Ask first passer-by of similar ethnic background if they've found anywhere good to go yet.

10) Once decided to possibly get a job, take a fully packed rucksack to work with you every day. Although it's perfectly safe next to the coffee machine, watch it like a hawk.

11) Buy your bus, train ticket or order a taxi in a foreign language. The fact the person behind the counter won't understand you simply adds to the authenticity. Remember to barter for everything, if the bus driver says 70p, offer 30p.

12) When sitting on public transport (the tube in London is the best) introduce yourself to the person sitting next to you, say which stop you got on, where your going to, how long you have been travelling and what university you went to. If they say they are going to Morden, say you met a guy on the central line who said it was terrible, you've heard Parsons Green is better, and cheaper.

13) When possible travel everywhere at break neck speeds on a moped carrying as much luggage as possible, without protection

14) Shower infrequently, ensuring that you continue to apply Deet for that true travel aroma.

These simple but effective instructions should help you fall back into normal society with the minimum of effort. Good luck!

Sigh.

When you fall to the right of the Southern Baptists…

2004-07-08T21:01:00.000-04:00

I must say my theories that Bush and the religious right go together like back packer hostels and exotic strains of chlamydia took a hit recently when I discovered that his campaigns latest attempt to march their congregations off to vote in his favor fell flat with the Southern Baptist Convention who said that the attempt to get churches to organize in his favor left them:

...appalled that the Bush-Cheney campaign would intrude on a local congregation in this way

For a detailed explanation of the initiative I defer to Americans United for the Separation of Church and State.

One more time

2004-06-25T00:34:00.000-04:00

Right then false start #13756, I’m damned to the Seventh Level of Hell:

Guarded by the Minotaur, who snarls in fury, and encircled within the river Phlegethon, filled with boiling blood, is the Seventh Level of Hell. The violent, the assasins, the tyrants, and the war-mongers lament their pitiless mischiefs in the river, while centaurs armed with bows and arrows shoot those who try to escape their punishment. The stench here is overpowering. This level is also home to the wood of the suicides- stunted and gnarled trees with twisting branches and poisoned fruit. At the time of final judgement, their bodies will hang from their branches. In those branches the Harpies, foul birdlike creatures with human faces, make their nests. Beyond the wood is scorching sand where those who committed violence against God and nature are showered with flakes of fire that rain down against their naked bodies. Blasphemers and sodomites writhe in pain, their tongues more loosed to lamentation, and out of their eyes gushes forth their woe. Usurers, who followed neither nature nor art, also share company in the Seventh Level.

I am tempted to launch into an anti-religious rant just now but I will surmise with, blech!

The break down of what is pointing me towards such an unpleasant fate is as follows:

Level Who are sent there? Score
Purgatory Repenting Believers Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo Virtuous Non-Believers Low
Level 2 Lustful High
Level 3 Gluttonous Low
Level 4 Prodigal and Avaricious Moderate
Level 5 Wrathful and Gloomy Very High
Level 6 - The City of Dis Heretics Very High
Level 7 Violent Extreme
Level 8- the Malebolge Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers Moderate
Level 9 - Cocytus Treacherous High

Go on, test your damnation.