The nation's drug war warriors (led by current and past DEA chiefs and drug czars) along with sideline apologists (timid politicians, blinkered editorialists), are resorting to a last-minute campaign of hair-afire hysterics in the effort to dissuade California's voters from voting Yes on Proposition 19. The initiative would, finally, sensibly, regulate, control and tax cannabis.
What's all the screeching about? The usual: marijuana is a gateway drug...law enforcement will not be able to detect or arrest people driving under its influence... employers will not be able to discipline or fire under-the-influence employees. Lies and red herrings, all. Also, they know Proposition 19 will pass if young, educated voters turn out.
But, what's the subtext? Why are anti-19 forces battling so frantically to defeat the smartest piece of drug reform legislation to come along since the repeal of alcohol prohibition?
Two words: money and identity.
The drug war, particularly the part that focuses, advertently or inadvertently, on adult possession of small quantities of cannabis, is spectacularly expensive. Billions of taxpayer dollars are "invested" annually as federal, state, and local police, courts, and corrections agencies target, investigate, arrest, charge, prosecute, and, in many jurisdictions, incarcerate Americans for possessing even a wee quantity of the weed. Add to this the ancillary costs, such as laboratory testing (necessary to charge even a petty pot case), probation and parole agent involvement, and the like, and you get a pretty good idea of just how financially dependent our criminal justice system really is on the preservation of marijuana prohibition.
(The most odious and ominous aspect to all of this is the effect of the rapidly expanding privatization of our prisons: corporations rake in profits with each and every prisoner. A parole violator re-imprisoned for possession of a joint is worth every nickel as much as a rapist.)
Then there's the identity piece, which doesn't get nearly as much play as it should. If I grow up in the criminal justice system, subjected to the steady drumbeat of drug war propaganda, there's a good chance I'll come to self-identify as a drug warrior. In other words, drug enforcement is not just what I do: It is who I am. Not to get too woo-woo here, but the prospect of ending the war against cannabis is for some drug warriors tantamount to excising a chunk of their egos. Which just might help explain why all those anti-19 superegos are in moralizing overdrive in these waning moments of the California campaign.
An evidence-based argument may be a weak match against something as knotty as one's core identity, but imagine California's criminal justice practitioners putting the public's money, plus their own time, imagination and egos behind a drive to end domestic violence, child abuse, drunk and drugged driving, and predatory street crimes. This is precisely the reasoning of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, whose thousands of members enthusiastically support Proposition 19.
It will happen. Marijuana will be legalized in California. This week will tell when it will happen. In the interests of public health and safety, human rights, personal liberties, and sound fiscal policy it makes far more sense that it happen next Tuesday, not the next election.
Follow Norm Stamper on Twitter: www.twitter.com/CopsSayLegalize
Also the claim that the "prison-industrial complex" relies on marijuana prohibition is false. There are no private county jails in CA and our state prison system is government-run.
In the Netherlands border city of Maastricht, city leaders are fighting to regain control over the coffee shops. Too many foreign tourists are showing up and causing problems. Also hard drug dealers and organized crime are coming into the city to prey on these tourists. Before we legalize marijuana, special attention needs to be paid to make sure the problems that happened to Maastricht don't happen in California cities.
It’s kind of sad to think that people would argue for continuing a failed policy in order to justify the effort already invested in advancing the same failed policy.
The war on drugs is a war against the poor and working class, liberals and minorities. By scaring people with lies and disinfo, they were able to steal some of our fundamental rights - the right to privacy, and the right to not incriminate yourself.
It is a civil war. On one side are fascist cops, who will kick down your door, steal everything you have for growing a few plants whose molecules can kill cancer. On the other side are millions of peaceful, happy pot smokers who did not believe the propaganda, but believed what they themselves experienced, and knew for a fact - that pot is safer than alcohol.
This civil war has had the effect of creating parallel universes- a large class of pot smoking citizens who had to conceal their usage from friends and coworkers who did not indulge. Go to the straight parties and pass on the beer and wine, have to wait til I got home to smoke a joint and relax. I don't enjoy the feeling of alcohol intoxication, no matter how chic the glass it is served in, no matter how expensive the bottle.
The issue is still this: does the government have a right to tell me what I can eat, drink or smoke? The answer is no. The federal government's duty is to defend our country, not tell us how to
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bingo!
Always great to hear a voice of reason from law enforcement. Laws that most people subvert should be repealed so our brave and dedicated police forces can work to uphold the ones people really need enforced.
The Feds have announced that if Prop. 19 is passed, they will ignore the will of the people of California and send in their agents to arrest people anyway.
Let them try. If they do, it will be the beginning of what I believe to be the inevitable break-up of the US.
CALIFORNIA INDEPENDENCE !
say it's not so..
Well Said Mr. Stamper!