The relaxation of cannabis laws shows the failure of the war on drugs

[xchrom]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/22/relaxation-cannabis-laws-war-on-drugs


A police officer with a man accused of harvesting cannabis in San Salvador. Photograph: Yuri Cortez/AFP/Getty Images


When the Uruguayan president José Mujica was asked about his proposal to make a historic break with global prohibition and put in place a legal, state-controlled market for cannabis, he replied: "Someone has to be first."

In fact, recent years have seen reforms to cannabis policy and law proceeding apace around the world. The trend for decriminalisation of possession for personal use (with civil or administrative penalties replacing criminal ones) has spread across much of Europe, Latin America, and beyond. Some countries have gone further, finding various ways around the strictures of international prohibition (under the three UN drug conventions) to have de-facto legal supply as well. The famous Netherlands cannabis "coffee shops" operate under a legal fudge in which their activities are technically illegal, but in practice are tolerated and licensed. The Spanish decriminalisation policy tolerates the personal possession of two plants and has allowed the creation of more than 300 cannabis co-operatives. These pool the allowances of all their members, then farm and supply the resulting grass on a non-profit basis to these members from premises managed by the co-operative.

Most surprising have been reforms in the US, the spiritual home of the "war on drugs" ethos and still its primary cheerleader internationally, despite more than 50% of Americans now supporting cannabis legalisation. Fourteen US states have decriminalised cannabis possession, and 17 now allow medical cannabis – in some cases with the distinction between medical and non-medical use becoming increasingly blurred. Most significant are the three state ballot initiatives, in Washington, Oregon and Colorado being voted on in November, which will legalise and regulate cannabis markets for non-medical use.

While the US initiatives are groundbreaking and, if current polling holds up, may well be the first real cracks in the edifice of global prohibition, they are, like most reforms, being led by (excuse the pun) grassroots campaigns. One of the unique aspects of the Uruguayan legalisation proposal is that it is government led. Indeed, the Mujica proposal for a state monopoly on cannabis production and supply has, ironically, run into conflict with another Uruguayan bill promoted by cannabis activists that seeks to decriminalise personal consumption of up to eight plants and establish co-operatives along the lines of the Spanish model.

[NOLALady]

1. It seems to me that the war was/is a success.

It's succeeded in creating the prison industrial complex.

[xchrom]

3. Daniel Barrera's arrest is a hollow victory in the 'war on drugs'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/21/daniel-barrera-arrest-hollow-victory


Colombian drug trafficker Daniel 'El Loco' Barrera after his capture in Venezuela. Photograph: Reuters

Details are fast emerging of the web of corruption spun by the Colombian cocaine trafficker Daniel "El Loco" Barrera to cover the traces of his empire. Barrera was arrested on Wednesday morning – by that evening Colombian anti-drugs police had begun forfeiting the 500 front companies, property investments and small businesses that Barrera used to launder the vast sums he made from cocaine smuggling over the past 20 years.

Barrera was one of Colombia's biggest traffickers. The Colombian president, Juan Manuel Santos, called him "the last of the great capos". His arrest is being celebrated in Colombia as a second major blow to the traffickers, coming three months after Venezuelan authorities arrested another big name cocaine trafficker, Diego Perez Henao, aka Diego Rastrojo.

But while Santos has good reason to be cheered, future court hearings are likely to raise awkward questions about how the capos avoided detection for so long, as well as the efficacy of the war on drugs.

Barrera and Rastrojo are part of the second generation of Colombian cocaine traffickers, who learned how to duck under the radar of the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) in the years following the death of Pablo Escobar in 1993. Both were adept at striking production and trafficking agreements not only with the Farc guerrillas, but the rightwing paramilitary armies that sprang up to combat them in the 1990s.

[geckosfeet]

4. "the last of the great capos" - what a laugh. The guy looks to be hardly 30 years old...

[kestrel91316]

5. Gawd, that's some seriously deficient ditch weed.

I grow the good stuff on my balcony. I wouldn't pay for stuff that looks like THAT, lol. Looks like fiber hemp.

[HopeHoops]

8. Yeah, that's what I was thinking - gym sock weed. If it was GOOD weed it would look like...

[kestrel91316]

10. Yup. LOL, those folks probably didn't have the sense to use feminized seed.

Sinsemilla? What's THAT???



Hey, guys, it's not 1975 anymore.

[HopeHoops]

11. Matanuska - also known as "Thunder Fuck".

[kestrel91316]

12. I've heard of that. Mine at home is Mazar i Sharif, aka kestrel's Balcony Bomb.

[HopeHoops]

13. I'm a bit out of the loop now. I haven't touched the stuff since '90.

We cleaned out to have our first child. There's no evidence I've seen that it impacts genetics or child development, but we didn't want to take chances. We cleaned out the alcohol and caffeine (both KNOWN problems) and just focused on the pregnancy, well, before she got pregnant actually. All three are top students and scholars.

Sometimes you have to err on the side of safety, even without evidence.

[kestrel91316]

14. I never had kids. Don't have to worry about such things these days either.

I went decades without it, and finally said fuckitall and started using it medically for my poor abused skier/mountaineer body, lol.

[HopeHoops]

15. I took all of my college finals stoned all to Jesus and graduated Magna Cum Laude.

It makes you focus. As a programmer, I would often hold my pee for hours just to run "one more time" (as in 50). After the pee, it was bong hit time. Same with homework. Several bong hits and on to the homework - everything else went away. On one occasion, I easily went through a dime bag working on ONE PROBLEM in my Complex Analysis course. When the professor asked if anyone had the answer to the question, the entire class was silent. I looked around and finally raised my hand.

There were three 4x8 green chalk boards in this room. I filled them with rather tiny print to present the proof. When I was done, he looked it over and pointed to something in the middle board and said, "you could have saved three steps here by doing this." I turned around and every jaw in the classroom was on the desk. And yes, I was stoned when I went to class - had a joint on the walk to campus.

I can't touch the stuff now. If it shows up in my piss stream (30 days, mind you), I'll get shut off from my oxycodone and Larazapam and I need those for pain - and yes, they're more effective than pot, but they do make you stupid. Pot doesn't.

[randome]

6. Conflating the 'war on drugs' with marijuana is disingenuous, IMO.

Unless you're advocating that heroin and cocaine be imported freely into the country.

Decriminalizing marijuana is definitely overdue, however.

[Gregorian]

7. It was all about forcing obedience. There's no way you can ever win that war.

If it really had been about drugs, then nicotine and alcohol would have been illegal as well.

I'm so tired of how slow society is to respond to injustice.

[mick063]

9. It is on my ballot in november

I suspect it may pass and i expect the Feds to combat it with much vigor.

But it will keep the issue in the fore front of public consciousness.