The NYT Editorial Board: Repeal Prohibition, Again!

Repeal Prohibition, Again

It took 13 years for the United States to come to its senses and end Prohibition, 13 years in which people kept drinking, otherwise law-abiding citizens became criminals and crime syndicates arose and flourished. It has been more than 40 years since Congress passed the current ban on marijuana, inflicting great harm on society just to prohibit a substance far less dangerous than alcohol.

The federal government should repeal the ban on marijuana.

We reached that conclusion after a great deal of discussion among the members of The Times’s Editorial Board, inspired by a rapidly growing movement among the states to reform marijuana laws.

There are no perfect answers to people’s legitimate concerns about marijuana use. But neither are there such answers about tobacco or alcohol, and we believe that on every level — health effects, the impact on society and law-and-order issues — the balance falls squarely on the side of national legalization. That will put decisions on whether to allow recreational or medicinal production and use where it belongs — at the state level.

We considered whether it would be best for Washington to hold back while the states continued experimenting with legalizing medicinal uses of marijuana, reducing penalties, or even simply legalizing all use. Nearly three-quarters of the states have done one of these.

But that would leave their citizens vulnerable to the whims of whoever happens to be in the White House and chooses to enforce or not enforce the federal law.

The social costs of the marijuana laws are vast. There were 658,000 arrests for marijuana possession in 2012, according to F.B.I. figures, compared with 256,000 for cocaine, heroin and their derivatives. Even worse, the result is racist, falling disproportionately on young black men, ruining their lives and creating new generations of career criminals.

There is honest debate among scientists about the health effects of marijuana, but we believe that the evidence is overwhelming that addiction and dependence are relatively minor problems, especially compared with alcohol and tobacco. Moderate use of marijuana does not appear to pose a risk for otherwise healthy adults. Claims that marijuana is a gateway to more dangerous drugs are as fanciful as the “Reefer Madness” images of murder, rape and suicide.

There are legitimate concerns about marijuana on the development of adolescent brains. For that reason, we advocate the prohibition of sales to people under 21.

Creating systems for regulating manufacture, sale and marketing will be complex. But those problems are solvable, and would have long been dealt with had we as a nation not clung to the decision to make marijuana production and use a federal crime.

In coming days, we will publish articles by members of the Editorial Board and supplementary material that will examine these questions. We invite readers to offer their ideas, and we will report back on their responses, pro and con.

We recognize that this Congress is as unlikely to take action on marijuana as it has been on other big issues. But it is long past time to repeal this version of Prohibition.

Smoke weed, become the president.



The Public Lightens Up About Weed
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread28199.shtml
Juliet Lapidos New York Times

Come gather 'round people Wherever you roam And admit that the waters Around you have grown And accept it that soon You'll be drenched to the bone If your time to you Is worth savin' Then you better start swimmin' Or you'll sink like a stone For the times they are a-changin'.

NYT Editorial Board Calls For Legalization Of MJ
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread28198.shtml
Andrew Hart Huffington Post

Come writers and critics Who prophesize with your pen And keep your eyes wide The chance won't come again And don't speak too soon For the wheel's still in spin And there's no tellin' who That it's namin' For the loser now Will be later to win For the times they are a-changin'.



Come senators, congressmen Please heed the call Don't stand in the doorway Don't block up the hall For he that gets hurt Will be he who has stalled There's a battle outside And it is ragin' It'll soon shake your windows And rattle your walls For the times they are a-changin'.

Let States Decide on Marijuana
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread28197.shtml
David Firestone New York Times

Come mothers and fathers Throughout the land And don't criticize What you can't understand Your sons and your daughters Are beyond your command Your old road is Rapidly agin' Please get out of the new one If you can't lend your hand For the times they are a-changin'.

NY Times' editorial board has urged the U.S. Federal Government to end "prohibition" of marijuana - Nigeria Newsdesk

The line it is drawn The curse it is cast The slow one now Will later be fast As the present now Will later be past The order is Rapidly fadin' And the first one now Will later be last For the times they are a-changin'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrLk4vdY28Q

It goes like this
The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

 

This is huge news.

 

The New York Times Will Continue Drug Testing Despite Pot Legalization Stance
michael.calderone@huffingtonpost.co 07/27/2014

NEW YORK -- The New York Times came out in its Sunday editorial in support of legalizing marijuana, kicking off a six-part series to make its case.

But the editorial board’s new stance doesn’t mean incoming Times employees can partake. As Gawker recently noted, the Times is one of several big media companies that require prospective hires to take a drug test. A Times spokeswoman told HuffPost that the paper's policy for drug testing hasn’t changed, despite the editorial board's decision.

“Our corporate policy on this issue reflects current law,” the spokeswoman said. “We aren't going to get into details beyond that.”

The Times editorial board would like to see that current law changed, arguing that the federal ban on marijuana inflicts “great harm on society just to prohibit a substance far less dangerous than alcohol.” As with the earlier prohibition on alcohol, the Times is calling for repeal.

In a blog post on the series, editorial page editor Andy Rosenthal said that the paper's publisher, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., supports the board's decision, which "was long in the making."

The Times has called in the past for legalizing medical marijuana, but Rosenthal said the current position came “as more and more states liberalized their marijuana laws in open defiance of the federal ban” and it “became clear to us that there had to be a national approach to the issue.”

During a Sunday appearance on ABC News’ “This Week,” Rosenthal acknowledged that he's smoked pot in the past and indicated he wouldn't be bothered if colleagues do now.

"I’ve never asked the people that work for me whether they smoke pot, and I’m not going to ask," he said.

More @huffpost



Urine Testing Company

After his resignation, Turner joined with Robert DuPont and former head of NIDA, Peter Bensinger, to corner the market on urine testing. They contracted as advisors to 250 of the largest corporations to develop drug diversion, detection, and urine testing programs.

Soon after Turner left office, Nancy Reagan recommended that no corporation be permitted to do business with the Federal government without having a urine purity policy in place to show their loyalty.

Just as G. Gordon Liddy went into high-tech corporate security after his disgrace, Carlton Turner became a rich man in what has now become a huge growth industry: urine-testing.

This kind of business denies the basic rights of privacy, self-incrimination (Fifth Amendment) rights, unreasonable search and seizure, and the presumption of innocence (until proven guilty).

Submission to the humiliation of having your most private body parts and functions observed by a hired voyeur is now the test of eligibility for private employment, or to contract for a living wage.

Turner’s new money-making scheme demands that all other Americans relinquish their fundamental right to privacy and self-respect. ~jack herer



Barthwell and Bensinger dwr

It’s good to be reminded every now and then who some of the players are.

Last week’s ridiculous article in the Springfield, Illinois State-Journal Register: Guest Column: Marijuana not a safe or effective medicine by Peter Bensinger and Andrea Barthwell.

It’s full of the standard nonsense that has been trotted out time and time again to opposed medical marijuana. But let’s remember just who Barthwell and Bensinger are.

According to the article:

Peter Bensinger is former administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and former director of the Illinois Department of Corrections. Andrea Barthwell is former deputy director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

Of course, that leaves out a good portion of the story. Andrea Barthwell was a founder of Illinois Marijuana Lectures — a group that toured Illinois trying to sabotage medical marijuana efforts. I caught her lying about her sponsorships in that little enterprise and it was shut down. See Andrea Barthwell Caught Red-Handed.

Shortly after that, this crusader against medical marijuana went to work promoting… medical marijuana (Sativex). See Andrea Barthwell, Snake Oil Salesman.

Later, she created a group called The Coalition to End Needless Death on our Roadways, where she simply took annual traffic fatality figures from the NHTSA, made mathematically improper conclusions from that data, and distributed those conclusions in press releases, that were often printed uncritically by duped media sources, until I started contacting them and letting them know they were being duped. I also countered with my own site: End Needless Death with Truth, not Lies.

Wherever you find Andrea Barthwell, it appears the truth is beating a hasty retreat.

So let’s take a quick look at Peter Bensinger. What possible reason would he have to be a prohibitionist? Here’s one:

Two of the loudest anti-marijuana spokespeople are two elder drug warriors, Peter Bensinger (DEA chief, 1976—1981) and Robert DuPont (White House drug chief, 1973—1977), who run a corporate drug-testing business.

“Their employee-assistance company, Bensinger, DuPont & Associates, the sixth largest in the nation, holds the pee stick for some 10 million employees around the US. Their clients have included the biggest players in industry and government: Kraft Foods, American Airlines, Johnson & Johnson, the Federal Aviation Administration and even the Justice Department itself,” writes Kevin Gray for The Fix.

Former DEA administrator Peter Bensinger – who owns a drug testing company – lobbies for a federal crackdown on legal marijuana

“‘These are not just old drug war architects pushing a drug war model they’ve pushed for 40 years,’ says Brian Vicente, a Denver lawyer and co-author of Colorado’s Proposition 64, which legalized marijuana for recreational use. ‘These guys are asking Eric Holder to pursue prohibition policies that line their own pockets.’”

In addition to his profiteering from drug testing, it’s probably worth noting that he’s spent significant time connected to the prison industry, as a Board Member of Federal Prison Industries and as Director of the Corrections Department for the State of Illinois.



NeoCon Flicts of Interest Bush Barthwell & Drugs

The majority of prohibitionists profit on the drug war,
and that is their only motive.

More than Sixty Years of Suppression

Military/factory worker marijuana urine tests are only partially accurate and do not indicate the extent of your intoxication. They indicate only whether you have smoked or been in the presence of cannabis smoke or have eaten hempseed oil or any hempseed ffod product in the last 30 days. Whether you smoked or ate it an hour ago or 30 days ago—and sometimes if you haven’t smoked it at all—the test results are the same: Positive.

John P. Morgan, M.D., stated in High Times February 1989 (and in 1999 he still says), “The tests are far from reliable. Tampering and high rates of false-positives, false-negatives, etc. are common, and further these testing companies are held to no standards but their own.” ref

Urine Testing

Military/factory worker marijuana urine tests are only partially accurate and do not indicate the extent of your intoxication. They indicate only whether you have smoked or been in the presence of cannabis smoke or have eaten hempseed oil or any hempseed ffod product in the last 30 days. Whether you smoked or ate it an hour ago or 30 days ago—and sometimes if you haven’t smoked it at all—the test results are the same: Positive.

Public Humiliation

 “Don’t suspect your neighbor, turn him in.” Any hear say is to be reported. That which revolted us as children—the spectre of Nazis and Commies asking everyone to spy and inform on one another; Stalin’s secret police taking persons from their homes at night to administer stupefying drugs and extort information; a government spreading lies and creating a police state—has now become our everyday Amerikan reality.

Zero-Tolerance DUI Would Ensnare 'Sober' Med Patients

Diane Feinstein – the best argument for term limits

DAREyl SWAT Gates, LAPDog Perversions

"As someone who spent 35 years wearing a police uniform, I've come to believe that hundreds of thousands of law-enforcement officers commit felony perjury every year testifying about drug arrests."
- Joseph McNamara, former San Jose Chief of Police

Policing for Profit

Money Grubbing Dung Worriers

Forfeiture $quads

Prison Slavery: Still Used in the USA!

 

Why NYT's Call For MJ Legalization Is a Huge Deal
The New York Times editorial board made history Sunday, as the first major national paper to call for an end to marijuana prohibition. And how they did it is half the story -- with rare flash and panache, as well as the intellectual and moral substance to back it up.

The Times' editorial has the feel of legendary CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite coming out against the Vietnam War. They dropped a bomb on our country's disastrous war on marijuana with unprecedented force.

MMJ Opponents’ Argument at Odds with Research
Opponents of marijuana legalization are rapidly losing the battle for hearts and minds. Simply put, the public understands that however you measure the consequences of marijuana use, the drug is significantly less harmful to users and society than tobacco or alcohol.

But opponents still have one trick up their sleeves, and it's proven to be a powerful and effective one: the notion that relaxed regulations on marijuana will lead to a rise in marijuana use among children and teens. Florida voters, for instance, will decide whether to legalize medical marijuana this November. Organizations opposing the measure have built their campaigns around fears about underage use.

More to the point, the notion that medical marijuana leads to increased use among teenagers is flat-out wrong. A new study by economists Daniel Rees, Benjamin Hansen and D. Mark Anderson is the latest in a growing body of research showing no connection -- none, zero, zilch -- between the enactment of medical marijuana laws and underage use of the drug.



The New York Times says it

Editorial: Repeal Prohibition, Again

Yeah. This is pretty big.

The New York Times continues to nail it

Another great editorial: The Injustice of Marijuana Arrests

An extensive editorial about the destruction caused to our society by decades of arresting people for marijuana, including the exponential increase in enforcement and racial disparities.

And, while mentioning individuals who have ended up with horrific prison sentences for low-level crimes of marijuana, they also clearly help people understand just how offensive is that standard pathetic “nobody goes to prison for marijuana” argument that we hear from the Kevin Sabets of this world.”

Yes, the “nobody goes to prison for marijuana” crap is not only false, but it’s a distraction from the real issue.

Whoopi Goldberg: 'I Know the Good Parts of Marijuana'

It was Whoopi Goldberg against former assistant US Attorney Sunny Hostin over the question of legalizing marijuana on the July 28 episode of The View (see clip below).

Goldberg started the segment by saying how excited she was to read the New York Times editorial calling for the federal government to lift the ban on marijuana: "I was thrilled to see it. I'm very, very, very happy about this." continued