cannabisnews.com: 'Nightline' To Devote a Full Week To Drugs 'Nightline' To Devote a Full Week To Drugs Posted by FoM on March 19, 2001 at 07:03:40 PT Media Talk Source: New York Times Ted Koppel is the first to say that "Nightline" this week will be journalism imitating art: five nights about drug trafficking inspired by the Steven Soderbergh film "Traffic." That will be 150 minutes of "Nightline," three minutes more than the entire film. But that includes the commercials."It's not the movie that got me to do five nights, it's the subject," Mr. Koppel said last week. Mr. Koppel sounded as if he had questions about the consequences of laws mandating tough sentences for drug offenders. "We've got more than two million people in prison in this country, more on a per capita basis than in any other country in the world, and the majority are in for drug-related crimes," he said.Moviegoers who watch "Nightline" on ABC may have a sense of the past revisited as Mr. Koppel covers much of the same ground that "Traffic" did."One of the first questions I wanted to raise with people, customs officials or D.E.A. people, is, `Have you seen the movie, and how does it compare to reality?' " Mr. Koppel said."They all had the same reaction: this movie gets it right, and what it gets right above everything else is the interconnection between and among the growers, the traffickers and the consumers. It never lets you believe if we could just get rid of the growers, the problem would be over, or if we could just get rid of the traffickers, the problem would be over. This is a demand-generated problem." James BarronSource: New York Times (NY) Published: March 19, 2001Copyright: 2001 The New York Times Company Address: 229 West 43rd Street, New York, NY 10036 Fax: (212) 556-3622 Contact: letters nytimes.com Website: http://www.nytimes.com/ Forum: http://forums.nytimes.com/comment/ Traffic Official Web Site http://www.traffic-movie.com/ABC News Nightline with Ted Koppel http://abcnews.go.com/sections/nightline/index.htmlArcherd: Koppel Hooked on Drugs http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread9038.shtmlCannabisNews Articles - Traffichttp://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=traffic Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #18 posted by NiftySplifty on March 21, 2001 at 02:16:37 PT I think I gave Nightline too much credit. Classic Anti propaganda tonight. I'd be surprised if the tone went back to not on their best day. They know talking about torture by insane drug lords is sensational. The fact that they'd be out of business if drugs were legal isn't sensational enough.You should change your name to toldddd you soNifty... [ Post Comment ] Comment #17 posted by dddd on March 21, 2001 at 01:11:25 PT I'm Sorry I sorta feel weird in the way that I blabber on about stuff.I sometimes wonder ifI might be kindof annoying to people who visit here regularly,,or perhaps peoplethink I have no life,so I sit and write these verbose and abstract ramblings,,,,anyway,,I cannot resist to further babble about this Nightline thing.....Yes,It's true that there are many evil and sick people involved in the drug dealin' world.Thesepeople are often ruthless psychos,who commit unspeakable acts of mayhem,and violence. This is nothing new,,,this is no suprize. It may be relevant to the film "Traffic",which iswhat this show is supposedly about.The tales of grisly violence committed by deranged drug dealersis little more than the sensationalist decorations of TV rating whores!,,,Furthermore,I'm sure itis encouraged,and approved of by those who are responsible for the content,because it makes for anincreased viewer rating,and the ondcp/dea loves it because it diverts the focus away from their own scandalous skullduggery.........Additionally,it gives the appearance that the whole problem is with the ruthless evil drug suppliers.It gives the viewers the impression that we are on some sort of noblecrusade to stop these purveyors of carnage,and the drugs that they are killing American childrenwith. The pols/antis know that this aint no game.This is a national,mainstream broadcast on the subject.Does anyone doubt that the producers and directors of these morsels are not getting their paychecksfrom "The Man"????Oh well....three more "episodes" to go,,,keep a close eye on them.....Maybe Ted will do a rebelliousfreakout,and expose the whole thing........d......d.............d....................d [ Post Comment ] Comment #16 posted by dddd on March 20, 2001 at 23:54:34 PT drug war infomercial I'm going to hate being an 'I told ya so",,but so far,this is nothing more than a DEA infomercialto justify increasing the drug war.It seems to me,that what we are basicly seeing,is theportrayal of the wrong villians.....Hopefully I am speaking too soon,and on friday theywill have the segment where they portray McCaffrey as the idiot he is,and highlight hiscriminal activities,,or maybe Mr. Koppel will do an unauthorized freelance critique onthe ondcp paying MILLIONS to poisin TV and printed media with propaganda...I got a feelingthat this whole series is gonna amount to little more than BULLSHIT PROPAGANDA.ddddisgusted! [ Post Comment ] Comment #15 posted by dddd on March 20, 2001 at 20:30:19 PT good and bad You're right Nifty,there are good aspects involved in these shows,and Iam probably taking a bit too much of a negative position.Any discussion isprobably a good thing,,,,but the day that ABC/Disney broadcasts any significantshow,that has actual dissenting views of the government,I'll donate my 1956 Les Paulto FoM and DRC.It'll bring 10 Grand on Ebay. Like I said before,I think that most people believe that Ted Koppel,and his peers are somesort of freelance journalists who cover the stories the way they want.I know they try to makeit seem as if they are cuttin' the bullshit,and getting to the bottom of the story,but the sad fact is,that Mr Koppel is owned and operated,copyrighted and patented in much the same way Mickey Mouseis. As you pointed out,they may make a few nicks in the antis world of illusions,but I think the overallseries that we will see this week,,will end up portraying a picture of overworked and underfundedenforcers,as opposed to the reality of a totally out of control government money party drug war fake out.We have already been guided into thinking of the "War on Drugs",as being somehow normal,and justified.The public has already been convinced of a huge falsehood,and the whole thing is based on a masterpiece ofdisinformation. Remember to step back,and try to view this whole thing from an overall viewpoint.Dont be thinking thatthose who want to continue the war on drugs,are not directly involved behind the scenes in making sure that minimal damage is done to their cause.They will gladly toss us a few positive tidbits to make us feelas if they are concerned so we can get excited about the reforms to come,but keep in mind thatthere are BILLIONS of dollars at stake that fuel a whole fleet of gravy trains,and they know that they must keep a close balancing act to try and keep the hog trough full,but not actuallypiss off the public.............Let's hope for the best.....but watch out for those who would try to make us believe that thingswill change.They are most often not people with our best interest in mind........................d.d.d.d...................... [ Post Comment ] Comment #14 posted by NiftySplifty on March 20, 2001 at 19:30:48 PT Megadddd... But, they did point that by seizing the huge amount of cocaine (when speaking with the "former drug dealer") the only benefit was higher profits for the dealer, not increasing the effectiveness of "the War". That doesn't appear to be a common thing for antis to admit. As far as they're concerned, every seizure is one more hack at the base of the tree. Nightline at least allowed someone to point out that the antis are actually nicking their own ankles.Nifty... [ Post Comment ] Comment #13 posted by dddd on March 20, 2001 at 16:13:14 PT Nightline.....Partyline? So last nights report wasnt bad.It informed the public about what's going onat the border. But keep your eyes open as to what the overall message of these shows addsup to.I will be very interested to see what the rest of the weeks broadcasts holdin the way of critical comments concerning the government. Last nite they didnt tell us anything that we didnt already know....And if you thinkabout the presentation,the main message seemed to have the overall flavor of thedrug smugglers outfunding,and overwhelming the customs/deas' efforts to stop them.In other words,it was almost an infomercial to justify further funding for the poor,outnumbered,and underfunded antis.What seems to be an objective report on the situation,is actuallysubliminally spiked to justify continuing,and enhancing the mega-billion "War".Beware my friends.....beware.....dddd [ Post Comment ] Comment #12 posted by Kevin Hebert on March 20, 2001 at 12:01:30 PT: Nightline In general, I feel Nightline is a great show. They seem to do a halfway decent job, most of the time, in getting good stories done about important issues. The fact that they are spending a full week on this one issue is huge news. The reaction of the average American is snowballing. After seeing Traffic, it's very hard to think how putting people in jail will solve our problems. I watched Nightline last night and thought they did an excellent job. I will continue to watch this week and hopefully they will address how putting people in prison is not working to stop the problems drugs can cause. [ Post Comment ] Comment #11 posted by mungojelly on March 19, 2001 at 20:34:39 PT: i have hope I don't know what the effect of this show will be, but I've got a good feeling about at least the intentions behind it. What I am hearing from Koppel, the subtext, is "maybe this issue has been broken, there's a crack in the taboo, and we can finally get out some of the truth." They're absolutely censored, which is why they didn't do this show BEFORE Traffic came out. There's no way that, like they're saying, they saw Traffic and that's when they started thinking about it. They saw Traffic and they thought "this is an opportunity." There are people in showbiz who want the truth to be heard, just as there are people in every other biz who want the truth to be heard. I think maybe some of them have seen an opportunity to make that happen, and they are grabbing it. [ Post Comment ] Comment #10 posted by zion on March 19, 2001 at 20:16:16 PT Words of wisdom, dddd Alas, you share very good words of wisdom, dddd. Perhaps I have let myself be duped by the table scraps thrown from the hands of corporate media. I agree, it would certainly be awesome to see the likes of Observer or Kaptinemo dissect the War on Drugs [tm] in a highly visible, national forum such as network TV.-z [ Post Comment ] Comment #9 posted by dddd on March 19, 2001 at 17:43:05 PT zion I agree with your disagreement...Koppel,,Stossel,,Downs,,They have allappeared on the networks,and made some ripples in the issues concerningthe drug war....It is not my intention to downplay any discussion of thematter in a national broadcast.Like I said,something is better than nothing.I'm talking about a much more subtle overview of such presentations.I willbe waiting to see how Mr Koppel reports on Plan Colombia.I will be pleasantlysurprized if Teds' boss allows any real look into the poison rain that we arefunding and sponsoring in Colombia....Maybe ABC will suprize the shit out ofus,and have Jiminy Cricket take us on a ride in one of those brand new helicopterswe bought for them.Goofy can narrate and explain why we are showering thepeasants with Dow chemicals,,and Donald Duck will play the silly role of aColombian peasant farmer who got caught outside without his umbrella,and endsup getting douched with Roundup......Nope,you wont see Mickey with any wiltedboquet for Minnie......And pay special attention to how they portray their Drug War.Watch for the way they present it...I'll bet you that the flavor of the whole thingwill be more towards looking at the drug hungry scums in the U.S.,and trying tomake it seem as if they are the cause of the "problem"...Here are some great quotes for your perusal.Alex Carey It is arguable that the success of business propaganda in persuading us, for so long, that we are free from propaganda is one of the most significant propaganda acheivments of the twentieth century. Alex Carey The twentieth century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance: the growth of democracy, the growth of corporate power, and the growth of corporate propaganda as a means of protecting corporate power against democracy. Consider what our friend Al Einstein says; Albert Einstein Private capitalists inevitably control, directly or indirectly, the main sources of information. It is thus extremely difficult, and indeed in most cases quite impossible, for the individual citizen to come to objective conclusions and to make intelligent use of his political rights.I dont mean to say that this broadcast will be all bad and evil,it will open updiscussion of the topic at the very least....But as you watch it,dont forget to consider thinking of it in this way;,,Perhapsit is a way for the government to answer some of the questions raised by thefilm,and make it look as if everyone knows how bad things are,and that someonehas now looked into the matter,,so now things are OK!....Think about it,,what betterway to manage the voice of dissent,than pretending you are on their side?Step back for a minute,and look at the big picture.Do you really believe that ABCnews,and Ted Koppel/Jennings/Rather/Blitzer/Sawyer/etc,, are some sort of independent,freelance,unscripted journalists,who are allowed to come up withtheir own sort of shows,like some kind of grown up Waynes World report?...I dontthink so.Everything you see is finely tuned and tweaked by the big dogs.It is designedto portray things in a certain way.Too much is at stake to let Kaptinemo or Observersit in for Ted Koppel.Nonetheless,Please dont be offended by my ramblings Zion.They are not aimed at you,and we will hope for the best...........but beware,,,I dont think the term "free press",applies to national journalism much anymore.May JAH Shine on all and Glow within your hearts.............................dddd [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by zion on March 19, 2001 at 16:14:06 PT I disagree I've seen Koppel's reports on Prisons and I believe that ABC is taking the lead among networks in questioning the drug war. You have Stossel from 20/20 repeatedly doing reports attacking the notion that government should be criminalizing personal choice, and Hugh Downs came out strong against the drug war insanity on his last ABC news stint (20/20) before retirement - this, when it was generally considered to be network suicide to question the status quo.I think Koppel is genuinely trying to raise the awareness, and I think he's done a great job educating people on the prison problem in America, and it's source (all the increased drug sentences). I hope you will be pleasantly surprised because I really think that they are the only mainstream media outlet outside of PBS Frontline that are doing anything to raise awareness of this issue near and dear to our hearts.-z [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by superstoner on March 19, 2001 at 16:08:01 PT: Kopple kopple has adminted to smoking weedcheck this segment lots more on this sitehttp://www.crrh.org/hemptv/news_mcwilliams.html [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by dddd on March 19, 2001 at 14:58:16 PT re:spin...final rinse Quit trying to brown-nose me Observer... [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by observer on March 19, 2001 at 14:42:37 PT re: Spin cycle I think it will be a Disneyland of questionable "journalism".Yes, dddd., I'm not optimistic either. The pre-determined conclusion will be: "It is a demand 'problem.' 'We' need both treatment and 'threat' of jail." Cannabis will be lumped in with other "drugs." Though they won't say it, the idea will be to quietly build "consensus" that "drug abusers" (meaning marijuana smokers) need to be "treated." (The law enforcement seizure money and treatment money rests largely on keeping marijuana illegal.) No mention of responsible, adult cannabis use will be allowed; no mention of the fast that Americans were free to grow and use cannabis medicines before 1937 will be made.Hope I'm very wrong. I'd love to come back here and admit I was incorrect about this. [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by craven on March 19, 2001 at 11:49:51 PT I agree bible.... what we need now is a multi-million $$ movie that shows the average mj smoker going about his daily productive life. A "Truman Show" about an mj smoker... It's obvious now that it takes an entertainment venue to snap these people to reality.. ironic eh? After all, (i believe) Reefer Madness is still the reason all the anti's still think of it as.. what was it, devils weed.. or something like that.. Murder.. Madness.. INSANITY!!! No one reads anymore.. that's obvious by the way the politicians talk about the medical mj provisions. "Does this mean medical mj users can rape and pillage" to quote one politician that obvoiusly didnt read the issues. What makes him think that by allowing a medical mj user to get his meds means he has the right to rape and pillage? No one reads facts, they (obviously) must be presented in an entertainment context on tv or a movie screen to keep the peoples interest. [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by dddd on March 19, 2001 at 11:17:02 PT Spin cycle,,,Fluffed and folded Keep a close eye on the Koppelster,and the actual content of the broadcasts.I think it will be a Disneyland of questionable "journalism".I doubt we will see anything too severe,or even close to radical,when it comes to significantlycritisizing the party line...Instead,I predict a masterfully formulated tweaking of the actual factsof the matter,that will effectivly misrepresent the truth,and successfully calm the voices of dissent.It will be a really well produced puppet show.Let's hope I'm wrong.........ddddisgruntled [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by bible belt on March 19, 2001 at 10:46:04 PT: We will see but.... The movie still made the drug user look sad. The fact is we need a movie to show how drug usere can still live a very productive life. And yes even the heron user as seen by the Swill.the "treatment line" is good but I fear this will only change the way money is spent. Drug users and their peacefull way of life will still be destroyed to feed a new money hungry system.The system needs to be down sized and yes good hard working amaricans will loose their jobs. Will the government do this? Hope Gary Johnston is included in the story in a positive way.Actually can't wait to see how night line approaches this subject.Been reading this list for two years every day. This is my 1st post. Sort of like lifting my head out of the trench in war. Now the government knows who I am and how I think.I know folks that won't even go to a web site like this for fear of being found out. Sad day in America. Fear. Powerfull tool. The anties know all too well. Now there is a deep subject.VCR is ready, is yours. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by Superstoner on March 19, 2001 at 07:39:44 PT: helllll yeahhhhhhh get ur vcrs ready i know i will be recodeing this show all week cause im sure this is a major jump from the taboo of talkin about drugs the the hard core in ur face show of the truth and dispeling the belife that the war on drugs can be won by elimnation.Its not like people in the us dont want drugs in their country, its more or less they demand it and go to many extents to get them .. this is the problem that has been ignored and replaced with political matterial that has helps canadits get office.. and its ending very rapidlypeace out.SuperSToner [ Post Comment ] Post Comment Name: Optional Password: E-Mail: Subject: Comment: [Please refrain from using profanity in your message] Link URL: Link Title: