by Jacob Sullum. Contrary to what you may have read or heard, Congress did not quietly lift the federal ban on medical marijuana. Nor did it lift the ban loudly. It did not lift the ban at all. Here is what actually happened. In December 2014, Congress approved an
omnibus spending bill that included a rider prohibiting the Justice
Department ... MORE
Showing posts with label drug war. Show all posts
Showing posts with label drug war. Show all posts
What The War On Smoking Tells Us About The Drug War
by Danielle Allen. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. In January 1964, the Beatles first broke onto the Billboard chart with “I Want to Hold Your Hand”; by June, Ringo Starr had collapsed from tonsillitis and pharyngitis. In January , the surgeon general announced
that scientists had found conclusive evidence linking smoking to ... MORE
Jacob Sullum: The Puzzling Persistence Of Pee Tests
A favorite tactic of control freaks. Slate columnist Daniel Engber, who was recently "shocked" to discover that workplace drug testing is still a thing, wonders: What's up with that? He finds, as I did back in 2002, that there's little evidence drug testing is a sound investment for employers: As was the case 30 years ago, testing has no solid base of evidence, ... MORE
Labels:
drug war,
employee,
employer,
individual liberty,
marijuana,
obligation,
privacy,
prohibition
Michael Thomsen: Legalizing Weed Isn’t Enough
Permit marijuana use in public. Recreational marijuana use has been legal in Seattle since 2012, but I still felt like I was getting away with something when I walked into a dispensary there this fall. There was a bouncer waiting behind a roped-off entryway on the otherwise quiet Capitol Hill side street. He passed my driver’s license through a ... MORE
Labels:
alcohol,
behavior,
cannabis,
crime,
drug war,
marijuana,
prohibition,
racism,
victimless crimes
Justin Gardner: A Federal Judge Just Shamed The DEA For Fabricating Sham Cases Trying To Justify War On Drugs
Entrapment, law enforcement's favorite tool. Since the War on Drugs began in earnest under Nixon and Reagan, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has ruined millions of lives for nonviolent, victimless behavior. The DEA’s drug crusade is not limited to the homeland either, as it also has sole responsibility for pursing international ... MORE
Jeff Nesbit: We Have Lost The War On Drugs
Criminalizing drugs just destroys more people. It's time, finally, to face the ugly truth. We've
lost the war on drugs in America. We need a new playbook, now, before
more lives are lost. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said last week that fatal drug overdoses in America were the highest in recorded history in 2014.
The news ... MORE
Christopher Ingraham: One Of The Biggest Arguments Against Marijuana Legalization Is Falling Apart
Drug use continues a decade-long drop. America's high school students are using drugs and alcohol at or near the lowest levels on record, according to federal data released Wednesday. The 2015 Monitoring the Future Survey,
conducted by the University of Michigan and the National Institute on
Drug Abuse (NIDA) ... MORE
Labels:
alcohol,
cannabis,
drug war,
drugs,
government,
legalize,
marijuana,
pot,
prohibition,
youth
Top White House Drug Official: War On Drugs Is A Failure
by Alex Mierjeski. That makes it unanimous. The nation's top drug official went on CBS' "60 Minutes" Sunday night and proclaimed the old War on Drugs a failure. Michael Botticelli, who serves as the director of the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, also said he wants to reform and refocus U.S. drug policy. When
asked by "60 Minutes" ... MORE
Labels:
addiction,
drug war,
government,
incarceration,
policy,
prohibition,
reform,
victimless crimes
How Cops Turn Young, Low-Level Drug Offenders Into "Confidential Informants," A Job That Might Kill Them
by Jacob Sullum. Drug war draftees. On November 22, 2013, his 20th birthday, Andrew Sadek sat down across a table from Richland County Sheriff's Deputy Jason Weber at the Law Enforcement Center in Wahpeton, North Dakota. It was the day after cops had searched Sadek's dorm room at the North Dakota State College of Science, finding "an orange ... MORE
Labels:
blackmail,
drug war,
exploitation,
government,
incentives,
law enforcement,
police state,
tactics
Drug Czar Wants More $ To Spend On Taking Your Stuff
by Nick Gillespie. The Washington Post reports that the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) wants more money "to identify assets, prosecute cases and 'manage the massive paper flow associated with forfeiture.'" Asset-forfeiture, in which law enforcement seizes property, cash, and goods that it says is connected to drug ... MORE
Montana Man Walks Thanks To Jury Nullification
From the Tenth Amendment Center. In Montana, citizens rendered a marijuana law unenforceable through jury nullification. Recently, a man was arrested for possessing a small amount of marijuana, but the judge could not find one single person willing to sit on a jury and convict him. Unable to seat a jury, the judge was forced to give up and offer ... MORE
Labels:
cannabis,
drug war,
government,
jury,
jury nullification,
justice,
law,
marijuana,
pot,
reason
Going To Pot? Canada Leads Way In Legalizing Marijuana
by Michel Comte. Justin Trudeau raised eyebrows when he admitted to having dabbled in marijuana while a member of parliament, but his pledge as prime minister to legalize pot has been broadly cheered. He said in a policy speech on Friday that his Liberal government would introduce legislation as early as 2016 to legalize marijuana, making Canada ... MORE
Labels:
black market,
Canada,
cannabis,
drug war,
individual liberty,
legalize,
marijuana,
prohibition
Heroin And Prohibition Are A Lethal Combination
by Jacob Sullum. After the esteemed actor Philip Seymour Hoffman died in February
2014, press coverage of the "heroin epidemic" exploded. Mentions of that
phrase in the newspaper and wire service articles cataloged by Nexis
rose from 681 in 2013 to 3,222 in 2014, an increase of almost 400
percent. Yet Hoffman—who by his own account used
... MORE
J.D. Tuccille: Business Opportunities For Corrupt Cops
Drug laws and gun controls. Following in the footsteps of so many people before him, Juan Pimentel
saw opportunity in restrictive laws. It's an old story; government
officials tell people they can't have what they want, and that
prohibition creates a lucrative business opportunity for anybody willing
to break the law to keep buyers happy. But ... MORE
Labels:
cocaine,
corruption,
crime,
drug war,
incentives,
law enforcement,
police,
policing for profit
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)