Conyers asks DEA why it's going after medical marijuana

[Newsjock]

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

A congressional leader, citing complaints from Bay Area mayors and lawmakers, wants the Drug Enforcement Administration to explain its increased use of "paramilitary-style enforcements raid" and property forfeiture orders against medical marijuana patients and suppliers in California.

With drug trafficking and violence from international cartels on the rise, "do you think the DEA's limited resources are best utilized conducting enforcement raids on individuals and their caregivers who are conducting themselves legally under California law?" House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., said in a letter to the agency.

He also noted the DEA's recent tactic of sending letters to hundreds of property owners who rent to medical marijuana dispensaries, advising them that they could be prosecuted and lose their property under federal law.

... The letter, dated April 29, was addressed to the DEA's acting administrator, Michele Lenonart. Agency spokeswoman Rogene Waite declined to comment on the questions Wednesday, saying only that "the federal government does not recognize medical marijuana. ... The DEA, of course, would be part of the federal government."

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/05/07/MN7C10IO0L.DTL&tsp=1

[Bush_MUST_Go]

1. Heartless bastards. The pharmaceutical lobbiests are loving it though.

All for the pharmaceutical lobbies

[Warpy]

2. Massive civil disobedience is what it will take

and California is leading the way with their extensive medical marijuana program. My own state, NM, has passed a law that covers medical pot from growers through distributors, although I don't know anyone receiving it yet. I imagine that will happen later this year when the first crop is harvested.

When enough states have this compassionate program, the DEA will have to change its focus to hard drugs or face being disgraced and completely disbanded.

The only thing that has ever overturned a nanny state morality law is massive civil disobedience. The laws might say on the books and be ignored, or like Prohibition, overturned when they're found to be totally unworkable in a population that doesn't want them.

[Fumesucker]

4. Define "hard drugs" please.. n/t

[Warpy]

13. Addictive substances

which are schedule I drugs like heroin and methamphetamine plus schedule II drugs like benzodiazepines, cocaine, barbiturates, Ritalin, and many others, including opiates and synthetic opiates.

Grass is called a soft drug because it is not physically addictive and there is no record of overdoses producing anything but long and restful sleep.

[Fumesucker]

16. Alcohol is addictive

As is nicotine..

Do you consider those "hard drugs"?

[Warpy]

17. I thought we were talking about official classifications

[Connonym]

24. you make an excellent point

in you your statement that benzos, coke, barbiturates and opiates are all LEGAL when used for medicinal purposes. To exclude marijuana from legal medicinal use is insane given that these other drugs have legal medical use. You have to wonder what the real agenda is behind trying to enforce the federal ban on medical use of marijuana. Why is it being singled out when other, more dangerous, addictive drugs can be legally prescribed? The real question here is why it's being singled out and why the DEA is so strongly opposed to it being legalized on a state level? When you throw in the legality of the use of other recreational drugs (i.e., nicotine and alcohol) it just further mystifies why marijuana is being singled out as illegal not only for recreational use but also for medicinal use. I have never seen a single argument that rationally explains these inconsistencies.

[Warpy]

31. That's because there is none

Pot laws were originally put into place by the liquor industry, which feared competition, and by conservatives, who feared black folks. Pot back then was the drug of choice of a lot of black folks, especially jazz musicians who were just starting to become mainstream, and all the moralists could think about was their star struck pure young daughters smoking pot and losing their heads and presenting them with black babies, didn't say much for the morals they'd been taught.

Nanny laws that restrict the behavior of consenting adults never work and need to be abolished. It's time to admit we've lost the war on drugs, declare defeat, and move on.

[glowing]

36. Don't forget the mexicans that were coming over the boarder back then

States were pushing for something to be done.. this was in part due to that as well....

[dysfunctional press]

29. in honor of the passing of albert hoffman- what about acid?

and other hallucinogens like peyote and psilocybin?

[paparush]

38. Cigarettes sure are addictive little buggers...

[GaVetRay]

8. Drug Legalization?

This is looking more like a Libertarian website when the
subject of illicit drugs is concerned.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

9. Look at it this way, Ray:

Think of all the tax dollars saved when we stop putting pot smokers in jail for inhaling the fumes of a burning plant.

Something tells me that cutting back on throwing hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens in prison for such a minor thing will also be good for our nation's soul.

[shanti]

18. uhh

did you take a wrong turn somewhere?

[ElboRuum]

27. Kinda thinking the same thing myself...

[uncle ray]

19. yup, we have some libertarian views here.

you'll also find some socialist views as well as communist views.

you got a problem with that?

any political ideology taken to the extreme can be bad, but aspects of all of the above are welcome to most progressives.

maybe you should explain why you think it is fine for sick people to be locked up for the rest of their lives over possession of a little herb?

[ljm2002]

40. Oh please...

...there are many, many people besides Libertarians who would like to put an end to this absurd and evil War on Some Drugs. The only thing this thread does w.r.t. Libertarians, is remind us that they actually do have one or two rational positions.

Oh -- and it also reminds us that most Democrats (never mind Republicans) still cling to the drug war for dear life -- it's similar to war policy, really, in that any Democrat who doesn't toe the line of current policy is branded as "soft on crime" (vs. being "soft on terror" if it's war policy). So, like Bill Clinton, they tend to enact even more severe drug laws just to show how "tough" they are.

Personally I am infuriated by the state of things right now, including the drug war. It is yet another means to enforce race-based justice, for one thing; it causes people to be incarcerated for nonviolent offenses; and worst of all, in my book, it makes it next to impossible for those who want to break an addiction, to get the help they need -- unless, of course, they can afford a swanky rehab center. Yes, there are programs for those of limited or no means -- I know people who have availed themselves. All I can say is, a lot of these programs are nearly as punitive as jail time, and they do not seem to have a primary goal of helping the person to free themselves from addiction. It is CRIMINAL what we are doing as a society, downright criminal.

[Uncle Joe]

49. I believe all non-violent drug addiction should be treated as a health and education issue,

not a criminal issue.

I believe criminalizing drugs does the following.

1. Disenfranchises selected American groups from participation in their government, thus weakening our democratic republic, skewing the justice system against those least able to defend them selves.

2. Feeds organized crime and police corruption with illicit revenues.

3. Strains the budget with ever increasing funds going toward an endless Orwellian war against the American People's freedom and privacy, eroding the Bill of Rights. This also takes much needed funds away from other vital programs, be they domestic infrastructure, educational, medical, foreign aid and even defense.

4. Feeds an ever growing privatized prison industry; of which they have only one motivation when it come to lobbying the people's representatives, that being more draconian laws, as more prisoners mean more profit for them. Currently the U.S., or land of the free as we like to call ourselves, has more prisoners than any other nation on the planet.

5. Causes financial hardship to those people addicted to drugs as they must pay black market prices for dangerous unregulated drugs, leading to more bankruptcy, family disintegration and death.

I believe taking all that in to account our foolish "War Against Drugs" mentality is a national security threat in and of it self.

[RadiationTherapy]

50. Do you have a suggestion or contribution?

Or are you a "drugs are bad, m'kay" type? Can you explain how drug use is more detrimental to our society than the current incarceration "solution"?

[KamaAina]

54. The Political Compass

http://www.politicalcompass.org

measures your political beliefs on two axes: economic and social. Thus there is such a thing as a left libertarian. Occupants of the lower left quadrant include Martin Luther King and Gandhi, as well as myself.

[Kaleko]

20. Massive civil disobedience is already happening worldwide.

I guess, we first need to outlaw bigotry to hide government profiteering before we get some sensible laws on the books :shrug:

[lligrd]

22. Legislatures With Guts Is What It Will Take

Legislatures willing to rid the books of ridiculous laws, only pass need laws and quit pandering to corporations.

[Warpy]

32. Quit pandering to nanny state moralists, you mean

Laws against the behavior of consenting adults just never work, but the moralists always think restricting the behavior of people they don't approve of will lead to some sort of Utopia.

Those laws only create hell.

[DemocratInSoCal]

3. I Know A Building Owner Who Got One Of Those Letters

Basically they threatened him every which way, so he had to close out their lease. Now the unit sits completely empty, when he was perfectly happy with them as tenants.

They always paid their bills, and caused no trouble. If you didn't know what it was, you wouldn't know by walking by on the street.

PATHETIC. FUCKING PATHETIC. It hardly pays to live in the outside world anymore.

[GaVetRay]

5. Medical Marijuana

Senor Conyers,
When you change the law concerning medical marijuana, maybe
the DEA will lay off. Meanwhile, shut the fuck up.

[MH1]

7. So, you're not so much for "states' rights" after all?

The states HAVE changed their laws.

Too bad you guys only like states' rights when it suits you. Or are states' rights gone the way of fiscal responsibility, and totally out the window now?

[dysfunctional press]

30. it doesn't matter if the states change their laws- the federal law is what needs to be changed.

nt.

[Pastiche423]

12. 1st - Senator Conyers is African American

not hispanic.

2nd - What the fuck do you think he's been trying to do?

3rd - Why don't YOU STFU?

[RadiationTherapy]

51. Brown is brown, quit nitpicking the guy!

Details, details.

[Pastiche423]

52. Tell it to GaVetRay

He's the one that thinks Senator Conyers is hispanic.

[RadiationTherapy]

55. I don't think he would care.

[ljm2002]

41. So our lawmakers should just shut up...

...if they disagree with a law or how it is being enforced? That about cover it?

Do you perhaps see any small bit of illogic in that position?

Oh, I get it. It's just *some* lawmakers, and *some* laws, where that rule kicks in. Got it.

[High Plains]

47. What a stupid comment!

Did you ever stop to think that calling the DEA on its actions, leading to hearings on the issue, is part of the process of changing the law?

Also, the DEA has many, many enforcement opportunities. It has been a priority of Justice Department leadership in this administration to go after medical marijuana providers. We don't even need to change the law to stop the raids. All we need is a change in leadership at Justice and the DEA. But yes, let's change the law.

[MadMaddie]

6. The war on Pot is ridiculous. They ar espending millions

going after Medical pot and yet the DEA isn't really focused on the jobs that need to be done.

I hope to God when a Dem gets into office that they gut every leadership poistion in all Government agencies. The Dem Nominee better be thinking about this now and sizing up candidates so they can get nominated and placed within the first year.

[ljm2002]

42. I also hope...

...they can clear out the infiltration at all levels of our government.

In the meantime, I don't hold much hope at all that any Democrats will rationalize our drug laws. Just like with war policy, they are afraid to touch it -- it's another third rail from their point of view.

Makes me ill actually. These people have long since lost any claim to representing the people of this country, they are just a bunch of Beltway insiders who bow and scrape for the monied and leave the rest of us to rot.

[izquierdista]

10. DEA in the crosshairs

They need some "Republican" reengineering:
1) Appoint Cheech Marin as the next administrator.
2) Implement a 20% across the board budget cut.
3) Outsource enforcement raids to Harold and Kumar.
4) Allow the Board of Directors of "Head Shops R Us" Inc. write up the National Drug Policy.

[ElboRuum]

26. Well, if we're going to outsource enforcement to Harold and Kumar...

We should be federally subsidizing White Castle.

[Lethe]

11. Ron Paul introduced a bill to do just that.

The same day Barney Frank introduced the bill to decriminalize marijuana.

And answer this question....why did it take a constitutional amendment to ban alcohol, but it only took a bill to make marijuana illegal?

[ljm2002]

43. You ask, "why did it take a constitutional amendment..."

"...to ban alcohol, but it only took a bill to make marijuana illegal?"

That's a question I've been asking for years. It makes no sense.

If anyone has the answer, I'd sure like to hear it!

Even more, if anyone knows how this inconsistency could be exploited to help change the laws, that would be even better!

[RadiationTherapy]

53. Because alcohol was a "lady's/gentleman's drug" (read: white person's drug)

and pot is a "savage drug" (read: brown person's drug)

I realize it isn't quite that clear cut, but the analogy holds. Perhaps I should have couched it in rich vs. poor terms.

[populistdriven]

14. 20 somethings ask Conyers why the FUCK he is going after filesharers

oh yea BET

[0rganism]

15. the question Mr. Conyers should be asking is WTF is pot still illegal at all?

As long as congress enables them, the DEA has every reason and right to go after illegal substances, as expected. Waite is quite correct -- the federal gov't doesn't have to follow state direction on these matters.

DON'T LIKE IT, MR. CONYERS? FUCKING STOP THEM BY LEGALIZING MARIJUANA POSSESSION AND GROWTH. COMPLETELY. IN ITS ENTIRETY. CASE CLOSED, PROBLEM SOLVED.

Oh, and y'all can pay off the national debt while you're at it by imposing a sales tax on what is, by some accounts, our #1 cash crop.

[Peace Patriot]

21. Good on John Conyers! It takes courage to buck the "war on drugs" war profiteers!

They are bad, bad dudes, and with the Bush Cartel in charge, even worse. My guess is the Bush Cartel is running cocaine into the U.S. from Colombia (and heroin from Afghanistan). The "war on drugs" is a fucking joke with this regime, and was probably NEVER intended to (and doesn't) stop massive traffic is truly dangerous drugs. It is a police state boondoggle, and a way to drive up the price on the street. We're paying Colombia $5.5 BILLION in military aid for fake drug interdiction, and what we're getting in return is THE SLAUGHTER OF UNION LEADERS, SMALL PEASANT FARMERS, POLITICAL LEFTISTS, HUMAN RIGHTS WORKERS AND JOURNALISTS! That's what our money is going for there--for political repression, to keep one of the most corrupt and murderous governments on the planet in gravy.

The criminals running our government have a BIG STAKE in keeping innocent and even helpful drugs like marijuana (or chewing coca leaves or drinking coca tea in the Andes) illegal, and it is truly the courageous national politician who takes even a small step like this (questioning medical marijuana busts) toward a saner policy.

What we are looking at IS "Prohibition." It is an exact replica of that tremendous MISTAKE, deja vu all over again, only writ larger, much larger. It is empowers the same kind of fascist police thinking and tactics; it creates the same kind of organized criminal networks; it reduces the citizenry to "perps" and "potential perps." It makes us all into slaves, whose pee can required of us on demand. It corrupts our government and political leaders in the same way as Prohibition did. It is NUTS!

But DO NOT underestimate the danger to politicians of opposing it--and I'm talking not just about their careers, but also their actually getting whacked for daring to challenge this police state boondoggle and massive, Bushite-supported drug trade, in any way.

[bean fidhleir]

25. I virtually never disagree with you on anything

but you're giving Conyers more credit than he deserves. This is just grandstanding on his part, part and parcel of his other empty gestures (e.g. impeachment "hearings"). As Organism said just above your post, if he wanted to do something real he'd back legalization.

[Peace Patriot]

45. I know well the many ways that John Conyers has failed us--from his 2004

election investigation (which downplayed the Bushite-controlled "trade secret" e-voting coup) to impeachment. I just happen to think--maybe because I've done so much research on South America, and have such knowledgeable DU compadres as Judy Lynn in the Latin American forum--that decriminalizing drugs is THE most dangerous position that a politician can take, bar one. It involves the entire police state, justice system, prison system and military boondoggle, pharmaceutical, big ag and pesticide corporations, and ruthless criminal networks throughout the western hemisphere and the Pacific. And Bush Cartel drug trafficking is more suppressed than torture, than shredding the Constitution, than slaughtering a million people in Iraq, or even than their complicity on 9/11, which is talked about, among the people anyway, fairly freely. They are STILL trying to launder Colombia's image--which is run by major drug traffickers, supported by $5.5 BILLION in U.S./Bush military aid, and where union leaders, small peasant farmers, political leftists, human rights workers and journalists have short lives. The U.S./Bush "war on drugs" in South America (and everywhere else) is a war FOR the big traffic and the drug routes. This is one of the reasons that they hate Hugo Chavez, Rafael Correa and Evo Morales--the leftist governments of Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia--so much, because they don't buy into the "war on drugs," and they do REAL illicit drug interdiction. They have tried to assassinate Chavez, to topple him with a military coup, to bring him down with an oil professionals' strike, to rig a recall election against him, to demonize him as a "dictator" (which he is not), and now they're trying to say he's a "terrorist"--and so is Rafael Correa! This is about oil and other resources, and about their hatred of leaders who do anything to benefit the poor--but it is ALSO about sane vs. insane anti-drug policy, and Bush's pal Uribe's criminal networks. And the same thing is going on in Mexico. The "war on drugs," under the Bush Cartel = drug trafficking.

So, when a national U.S. politician attacks medical marijuana drug busts, I am impressed. I really am. Nothing will come of it--no doubt--right away. But at least it's out there as a national issue, talked about by a major leader.

I also think that Conyers' failures are not entirely his own doing. They are Congress' failures, and the main leadership's failures, and the party's failures. Perhaps we blame Conyers more because we had higher expectations of him. Also, his hearings and reports HAVE done some good. At least the record on the 2004 election is official and is out there. And God knows that the election activists needed moral support and a forum. His hearings certainly increased vigilance over the voting system, especially the suppression of black and other minority voters. That he hasn't brought down the Bush Junta all by himself is too much blame for one man.

He can't do it without the leadership behind him. If he'd gone all out to get rid of the Bushite voting machines, we might have a decent Congress. That was a failure. But, in addition to Bush Cartel drug trafficking, there is one other topic that is verboten, by both party leaderships: the "trade secret" voting machines. Oh, they'll yammer about a "paper trail," etc, etc. But not about the 'TRADE SECRET' programming--the PRIVATE, PROPRIETARY, CORPORATE control of the very counting of our votes! I can't imagine he supports it. So his hands must be tied. It is a project of the warmongers of both parties.

We have suffered a fascist coup. I think the date was Oct. '02, when the "Help America Vote Act" was passed--providing a $3.9 billion boondoggle to spread these extremely riggable machines all over the country. In a coup situation, you see this kind of behavior--by Pelosi ("impeachment is off the table"), by Conyers (a list of high crimes and misdemeanors that would circle the earth, and still no impeachment), and by others. They are afraid. They are intimidated. They are making compromises that they think are good for the country, in a bad situation. Yes, to some extent they brought it on themselves, and some of them are collusive dirtbags--traitors to our democracy. But I don't think Conyers is collusive or traitorous. I think he is a REALIST--and we can measure just how bad things are by what he feels he cannot do. The limits of his power. What his hands are tied about.

So, berate him if you must. It's understandable. But, in the end, I don't think it's fair to heap so much abuse on him. Save it for the monsters who are torturing and slaughtering people, and spying on all of our leaders, and blackmailing them, and who have committed so many crimes. It's easy for us to demand courage and spine and principle. It's not so easy for people in the line of fire--people with Bushite bull's eye targets on their backs.

[bean fidhleir]

46. Well, how do you feel about the thesis that elected officials are obligated

to act in our interests no matter what it might cost them (i.e. are elected and paid to be statespersons, not political time-servers)?

I'm thinking in part of the Church hearings that exposed COINTELPRO. We had the equivalent of the South American fascist paramilitaries operating inside our national police force, on the orders of and supported by its director. Surely the most dangerous possible sitation: criminals operating under cover of federal law. Although no punishments were meted out to the criminals (that I know of), it did still broadly expose the facts to the light of day and create a permanent record. In doing that, it seems to me that Church came *much* closer to performing his office than Conyers has even considered doing. No?

[duhneece]

34. Amen

And the problem is complex. The pharmaceutical industry doesn't want to see cannabis decriminalized in any way shape or form.

The private prison industry donates to campaigns of elected officials who vote for mandatory minimums, sending non-violent drug offenders to private prisons which donate to campaigns...

I applaud Representative Conyers.

[Dark]

23. Fucking fascists.

And I don't throw that term around.

[spanone]

28. cause the insane bu$hies still want to fight the hippies....reefer madness

[Hydra]

33. I posit that the DEA is doing this

Because it's easy for them to bust these people, there's little risk to them and it makes them look like they are doing something while the CIA smuggles tons of drugs into the country.

I still feel like I live in f***ing wonderland these days.

[notesdev]

35. I second that

jack booted thugs picking out easy targets just like any other bully

[OKthatsIT]

37. They're going after their property...

The pressure and abuses going on right now against terminally ill patients and their families is just mindblowing.

[ljm2002]

44. Agree 100%...

...that, and it pisses them off to no end that the states are bucking them. It just rankles them right down to the bottom of their black-hearted authoritarian little souls.

[librechik]

48. absolutely true. Why mess with 40 years of profit and success?

and it works for the War Party, too!

These people will fight to the death to keep pot illegal.

In fact, we may have to wait till they die to see any changes.

[appal_jack]

39. I think that this is a worthwhile incremental step by Conyers

I agree with the other social-libertarian-democrats above that he whole 'War on Drugs' is a bunk concept, and that its implementation against medical mj is particularly odious. But I doubt that Conyers and his allies would be able to overturn the whole warped system during 2008 (while B*sh is still pResident), so Conyers gets my respect for taking a brave and worthwhile first stsp in this direction.

-app