cannabisnews.com: War on Drugs: Throwing Good Money at a Bad Idea War on Drugs: Throwing Good Money at a Bad Idea Posted by FoM on February 27, 2002 at 20:39:11 PT By Radley Balko Source: FoxNews.com In cased you missed it, the Office of National Drug Control Policy spent $3.5 million dollars on Super Bowl commercials earlier this month. The ad campaign will continue into the months ahead. The message? If you use drugs, you might be supporting terrorists. The ads and the accompanying Web site point out that 12 of the 28 terrorist organizations recently recognized by the State Department derive funding through the cultivation and/or trafficking of illicit drugs. Just at first blush, the ads reek of manipulation. The "I Helped" commercial lines up a series of young people, all supposed drug users. One by one they rattle off the nastiness domestic drug purchases have allegedly contributed to."I helped kill a policeman," one says."I helped murder families," says another."I helped kidnap people’s dads," still another.The campaign’s accompanying web site then provides documentation of 14 incidents to support the statements. Six of the documented examples occurred in Mexico. Eight occurred in Colombia. None occurred in the United States, against U.S. citizens, or in any country directly tied to the Sept. 11 attacks. But Sept. 11 is of course what drives the ads. Amid the flags and pomp and tributes that consumed this year’s Super Bowl—just following a halftime show complete with a scrawling list of the names of Sept. 11 victims set to anthemic U2 tunes—the O.N.D.C.P airs a commercial linking domestic drug purchases with international terrorism.There’s no clear evidence any significant amount of Taliban-grown poppy – used to make opium, or refined to make heroin – ever found its way to U.S. soil. The U.S. Justice Department estimates that 82 percent of U.S. heroin comes from Mexico and South America. A small percentage is domestically grown, and much of the rest comes from Asia – of which Afghanistan is only one of a number of exporters, including Thailand, Cambodia, Iran, Pakistan, Turkey, Malaysia and China – to name just a few.That leaves cocaine – and Colombia. Indeed, virtually all of the research and statistics tying drug use to terrorism in the Super Bowl ads and on the campaign’s accompanying Web site center around Latin America and Mexico. And here is where the full hypocrisy of the ads comes into view.Over the past several years, the United States has spent billions of dollars to eradicate narcotics cultivation in South America, mostly in Colombia. Colombia receives the third largest bounty of U.S military aid, behind only Egypt and Israel.President Bush’s proposed 2003 budget calls for $439 million in drug-fighting money for Colombia, including an additional $98 million to train a Colombian military brigade to protect a U.S. oil pipeline from narco-guerillas. The problem is that Colombian military officials have long been in cahoots with right-wing paramilitary groups responsible for the murder, kidnapping and mass slaughter of Colombian citizens. They aren't as bad as the drug traffickers themselves, but they're bad enough.The carnage got so bad that in 1999, Congress required the president to assure Congressional leaders that Colombia had taken significant and convincing steps to eradicate ties between its military officials and terrorist paramilitary groups before any further disbursement of aid. But the situation has not improved much since. The drug most widely used by illicit drug users in America is marijuana, and the marijuana available on the American street is, for the most part, domestically grown. Secondary sources come from Canada, Jamaica or Mexico. America’s pot-smokers aren’t funding terrorists—unless intelligence sources now indicate we should be screening for Canadians and Rastafarians at our airports.Meanwhile, since the U.S. officially declared its "war on drugs," illicit drug use has plugged along at steady rates—though the drugs of choice go in and out of vogue. Domestic DEA drug arrests have gone up from 25,000 in 1988 to over 40,000 in 1999. Marijuana emergency room episodes increased six-fold from 1990 to 2000, and heroin episodes tripled over the same period. We’ve thrown billions of dollars at the supply end and street prices have remained steady, or gone down. We’ve thrown billions at the demand end and people are still using. The "war on drugs" is not only failing; it no longer makes any sense. Radley Balko is a writer living in Arlington, Virginia and publisher of The Agitator.com.Source: FoxNews.comAuthor: Radley BalkoPublished: Wednesday, February 27, 2002Copyright: Fox News Network, LLC 2002 Contact: comments foxnews.com Website: http://www.foxnews.com/Related Articles: 'Drug War' Opponents Blast White House Policy http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12100.shtmlNew Ads Hint at Change in War on Drugs http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12062.shtmlNew Low in the War on Drugs - A. Huffingtonhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11943.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #17 posted by Rev0x on February 28, 2002 at 21:09:31 PT Whoa When FOX starts arguing against the drug war, you KNOW we're real close... [ Post Comment ] Comment #16 posted by The GCW on February 28, 2002 at 16:29:35 PT goneposthole The government IS helping! With out them we wouldn't even have a war on some plants. It's like the bully who stole your lunch money on the playground. He was helping seperate you from your money.What does the government do to help? Read: LAWYER: INFECTED INMATES NOT TREATED http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n352/a08.html?397 about: 20 percent to 40 percent of Colorado prisoners have hepatitis C, a blood borne viral disease that attacks the liver. Many inmates get the disease in prison. Caging a human for using cannabis, exposes humans to the death penalty gamble increasing your odds of this wrath. But even that is profitable to the prohibitionist. With out the help of government, this would not be happening. [ Post Comment ] Comment #15 posted by goneposthole on February 28, 2002 at 15:10:14 PT What does the government do to help? It begs the question, obviously, and the question begged makes it all instantly laughable.I mean funny.The cold hard fact of the matter is: They make matters worse.Now, it isn't very funny.Sad fact of the matter is: It is too much.Think of all of the examples.Tom CrosslinSteve KubbytraitorsYou turn and look for more, and it turns out that every single person you see is affected by the drug war.Truly a sad situation. The only reason why alcohol prohibition ended is because those who prohibited its widespread use finally came to their senses.>The "war on drugs" is not only failing; it no longer makes any sense.That is the only kind of sense there is in the "war on drugs", none whatsoever [ Post Comment ] Comment #14 posted by DdC on February 28, 2002 at 13:55:46 PT Jesus Never Claimed to be Christ or Christian The forefathers were Deist. Christianity is Fascism. Started by elite Romans and Sanhendren Jews while most of the Jewish yuppie Phillistines sat by as they do today. I trust Archiology over Theology (theory). The sackcloth of burlap or the ship sails of canvas can not be denied. The hashish incense means Jesus either toked or pulled the longest Klintoon in human history. I believe he was missing for 3 days as a child. Must have been some of that old Lebanese blond. The new weird odor is Bushits modern version but it all speals from the same fascism. The rich who revolted against King George, including Washington had no intent on Freedom, just a way to avoid taxes. Now we the people enmasse have power to change things. But not with the status weird profitting on prohibition, selling competition to cannabis. Oye the hypocritters will get their just rewards. Its all happenening as planned. Its never been about winning or losing, its how you play the game each day. Same with profits being only in perpetuating the war, not in winning or losing. Each day brings new light to more people. That is good for the people, not so for those in control, opiating the masses through administrated education depravation and legislation to benefit the international corporatist over the individual citizen. Thousand points of darkness ompanies as those mentioned. Originating under IG Farben and Hitler, broken up into Bayer, Monsanto Dyncorps etc. Profit on misery, profit creating illness to treat, profit creating crimes to punish, profits keeping truth silent. Peace, Love and Liberty DdCIn every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. -- Thomas Jefferson, 1814The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter. -- Thomas Jefferson, 1823Give Us This Day Out Daily Rant http://pub3.ezboard.com/fendingcannabisprohibitionstuff.showMessage?topicID=85.topicBushit Cheneynagans D.E.A.th & Oil! http://pub3.ezboard.com/fendingcannabisprohibitionprohibitionistwodjunkies.showMessage?topicID=53.topicMaintaining Dysfunction http://pub3.ezboard.com/fendingcannabisprohibitionstuff.showMessage?topicID=142.topic [ Post Comment ] Comment #13 posted by Unknown pleasures on February 28, 2002 at 13:36:28 PT Propaganda is smack "I helped murder families," drug user? HAh!!! ...sounds like your friendly neighbourhood SWAT stormtrooper to me! [ Post Comment ] Comment #12 posted by The GCW on February 28, 2002 at 11:05:18 PT DdC quote: Another lucrative vested ignorance of the New Weird Odor Orchestration.If the new world order is involved, their interest may be in protecting the revelations of cannabis, Biblically, that have been known since times of the original Masons, Illuminati and . Just one of the many references to cannabis is sweet smelling inscense. Through prayer, there is connections, and it seems, THAT is what the powers want kept from us. There is great Biblical conotation in all of this. The Bible indicates full on, that cannabis is holy, beautiful, and a blessing, that can be used for evil, by the evil, to support evil. The Bible examples, show when cannabis is mistreated, by the powers, that wrathe comes.The new world order has it's own Biblical implications. You gotta serve somebody. Better it be Christ God and his glories, including cannabis.The failure of this farce, is getting to be, where it is unavoidable. The word is out. [ Post Comment ] Comment #11 posted by JR Bob Dobbs on February 28, 2002 at 09:51:18 PT Sure, FOX says it in PRINT... ... but where is the TV air-time devoted to the issue? I'd love to turn on Fox News Network and see someone editorializing against the Drug War, but it hasn't happened yet. Oh well - at least they're better than CNN, who has apparently hired William J. Bennett to give their Drug War commentaries... [ Post Comment ] Comment #10 posted by mojo on February 28, 2002 at 07:11:09 PT: emergency room? Emergency visits? Can you tell more?What you expect when you can't remember where you get your goodies from! Heh, yeah, you can get it from ANYWHERE and don't give a s--- about it. [ Post Comment ] Comment #9 posted by kaptinemo on February 28, 2002 at 06:32:49 PT: The sharks are finally smelling the blood in the water...I have no illusions about the (to me, incredibly surprising) volteface Fox has just done. It's purely a sh*t-pot stirring manoever; they have no more concern about where the chips fly than any other media corporation.But what is surprising is that it was Fox. It is shocking that this mouthpiece, wholly owned and subsidized by arch-'conservative' Rupert Murdoch, has had the effrontery to try to rap the Reps on their calloused-from-dragging-them knuckles. Astounding; you have to wonder what they are up to? [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by Jose Melendez on February 28, 2002 at 06:10:14 PT: worldwide rants I guess George W. is going to have to start watching CNN instead of Fox. Funny you should mention that. The other night (the same day as the Libertarian ads ran in USA Today suggesting John Ashcroft helped funnel millions in illicit drug profits) Dave Letterman showed a CNN clip of the teetotaler singing one of his "inspirational" songs... "Let the eagle soar..." He pointed out that the guy sounds like a drunk karaoke participant. "I'll have another Cutty Sark" and "Gin and tonic for everyone!" were some of the joke lines Letterman used. But he set up the piece by pointing out that Janet Reno is running for Governor of Florida and hinting that the current holder of her former post (John Ashcroft is the current U.S. Attornet General) comes off as a whacko, compared to Ms. Reno. On Fox, when Ethan Nadleman debated with Bill O'Reilly, O'Reilly suggested that Nadleman "hung out with a bunch of potheads." So thanks, David Letterman and your staff of writers at Worldwide Pants, for pointing out that our leaders hang out with a bunch of drunks. :) (Also, the music between sets is great!) [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by goneposthole on February 28, 2002 at 05:18:12 PT My ad "I helped kill the drug war." [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by DdC on February 27, 2002 at 23:59:11 PT *Dyncorp*Monsanto*Sikorsky*Enron*Haliburton*Bayer* W the Cheerleader to Teddy the Rough Rider-Overnight? Yeah Right... http://www.cannabinoid.com/boards/politics/media/35/35162.jpg Beach front property sale in Winamucka too! Drugs are bad cause they're illegal and they're illegal cause they can't sell em homegrown in your kitchen and they're competition to chemicals disclosed in tobacco. Caring about our well being, ha- while killing half a mil legitimately hawking Joe, Bud and the Marlboro man. $19.2 billion sold for WoD just this year alone. $19.2 billion fighting the war on some drugs and plants not sold in the stores. $19.2 billion earned by the korpse whores above. Grooming this war on some people using some drugs they don't sell. Bought with taxes, health and prison cells. Another lucrative vested ignorance of the New Weird Odor Orchestration. Keeping cannabis caged along with its users. Keeping poor countries afraid, to sustain themselves with hemp, while D.E.A.th keep warlords and terrorist wealthier than most governments. Selling the war ads on TV perpetuating WoD on American workers, families and kids. More right wing Bushit maintaining dysfunction. DdCDo You Own Yourself? by Butler Shaffer One of my favorite quotations comes from Thomas Pynchon: "if they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers." Our world is in the mess it is in today because most of us have internalized the fine art of asking the wrong questions. Contrary to the thinking that would have us believe that the conflict, violence, tyranny, and destructiveness that permeates modern society is the result of "bad" or "hateful" people, disparities in wealth, or lack of education, all of our social problems are the direct consequence of a general failure to respect the inviolability of one another's property interests! I begin my Property classes with the question: "do you own yourself?" (snip)-- The rest of the article can be read at: http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/shaffer9.htmlThe $150 Billion `Welfare' Recipients: U.S. Corporations http://www.corporations.org/welfare/globe2.html"I am bound by the laws of the United States and all 50 states...I am not bound by any case or any court to which I myself am not a party...I don't think the Congress of the United States is subservient to the courts...They can ignore a Supreme Court ruling if they so choose." --Pat Robertson, Washington Post, June 27,1986)I don't know that atheists should be considered citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God." -- George Bush The Integration of Theory and Practice: A Program for the New Traditionalist Movement http://www.freecongress.org/centers/conservatism/traditionalist.htm#4j "We should resist the temptation to identify our religious convictions with the platform of a party or the platitudes of favored politicians." --Ralph Reed, 1996 Clothed in secrecy since its founding in 1981, the Council for National Policy is a virtual who's who of the Hard Right. Its membership comprises the Right's Washington operatives and politicians, its financiers, and its hard core religious arm. http://www.ifas.org/cnp/index.html"We want...as soon as possible to see a majority of the Republican Party in the hands of pro-family Christians by 1996." --Pat Robertson, Denver Post, 10/26/92Language: A Key Mechanism of Control http://web.utk.edu/~glenn/GopacMemo.html"I know this is painful for the ladies to hear, but if you get married, you have accepted the headship of a man, your husband. Christ is the head of the household and the husband is the head of the wife, and that's the way it is, period." --Pat Robertson, "The 700 Club," 1/8/92How To Think Like A Republican http://www.politicalupgrade.com/thinkrepublican/index.html"You say you're supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists and this, that, and the other thing. Nonsense. I don't have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist. I can love the people who hold false opinions but I don't have to be nice to them." --Pat Robertson, The 700 Club, January 14, 1991Conserving Compassion...A Few Buzzwords http://pub3.ezboard.com/fendingcannabisprohibitionstuff.showMessage?topicID=131.topicInternationalism, an Old Trick http://pub3.ezboard.com/fendingcannabisprohibitionwhyitstimetolegalize.showMessage?topicID=207.topicControlling the Herd http://pub3.ezboard.com/fendingcannabisprohibitionwhyitstimetolegalize.showMessage?topicID=34.topic Welcome: Sacramental Cannabis Food,Fuel,Fiber,FARMaceuticals... [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by null on February 27, 2002 at 22:52:35 PT from Fox New?!?!? In the words of Bill and Ted, "Whoa!"Fox News - favorite of President George W. Bush - just put out an article that says:*The ONDCP commercials smack of propoganda and are a waste of taxpayers' money.*The Columbian aid package is an extremely dubious affair.*This last one is word for word cause it's huge that Fox News put it out there: The "war on drugs" is not only failing; it no longer makes any sense.I guess George W. is going to have to start watching CNN instead of Fox. I really think it is significant that such a major U.S. new corporation (and a right wing one at that) would put out this article. The wall really is going to come down. Truth is going to win. [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by E_Johnson on February 27, 2002 at 22:22:50 PT Even McCaffrey stopped flogging that one That statistic is so obviously bogus and unrelated to anything alarming that even the Clinton administration stopped flogging it after a while. [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by E_Johnson on February 27, 2002 at 22:20:15 PT It's a completely bogus statistic If you go to the emergency room for ANY REASON WHATSOEVER and report on their form that marijuana was among the things you use that day, it goes down as a "marijuana emergency room visit".Even if a car comes crashing through your house totally unrelated to anything you did that day, and you smoked a joint that day and tell the emergency room staff about it when you are admitted, it is reported as a marijuana emergency room visit. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by FoM on February 27, 2002 at 22:01:05 PT Snatchmo First of all hello and when I see marijuana emergency visits I think that it could happen. If a under age person gets caught with marijuana they might be so scared of what could happen that they get hysterical. . If a child got really afraid parents generally are not as harsh if they think the child is really having a reaction to the drug rather then a reaction to the possible consequences. Hope this makes sense but I do believe that would be how it happens, if it does. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by Snatchmo on February 27, 2002 at 21:43:42 PT ... Marijuana emergency room episodes??? [ Post Comment ] Post Comment