四 川 铁 FourRiverIron

Chicago City Council bans sale of synthetic marijuana

Chicago City Council bans sale of synthetic marijuana

By John Byrne Tribune reporter

3:36 p.m. CST, November 16, 2011

The Chicago City Council today passed a ban on the sale of products that mimic the effects of marijuana.

Ald. JoAnn Thompson, 16th, started pushing for synthetic marijuana to be outlawed after she found some being sold in a gas station in her South Side ward. Children can easily purchase the products, she said.

"Just about every station you go in has some form," Thompson said, holding up a packet of synthetic cannabis she said she purchased across the street from her office. "This is already rolled for you, so you don't have to buy rolling papers. Just pull it out, two for a dollar. Two for a dollar, and just start smoking."

"People wonder what's happening to our children. I'll tell you what's happening. This is what's happening," Thompson said.

The ordinance, which takes effect next month, does not make it illegal for people to possess the products. But stores selling them could be fined up to $1,000 or have their licenses revoked.

Synthetic marijuana already was outlawed by the state legislature, but Ald. Edward Burke, 14th, said new products being produced now skirt that ban by replacing illegal chemicals with legal ones. So the city ordinance outlaws any product that contains chemicals that mimic marijuana.

Quayle is a moron? Some people think so!!!!

"Do the research, moron!"

Source

Quayle: Gov. Brewer was right in removing chairwoman

by Ofelia Madrid - Nov. 10, 2011 09:18 AM

The Arizona Republic

U.S. Rep. Ben Quayle says he stands behind Gov. Jan Brewer's decision to remove the chairwoman of the Independent Redistricting Commission, the panel in charge of creating Arizona's congressional maps.

Quayle spoke Tuesday night before a group of about 200 at a town-hall meeting at Horizon High School in northeast Phoenix.

"The governor made the decision that the chairwoman engaged in gross misconduct, and it was the right decision," Quayle said. "That was the check that was put in the Constitution by the people."

Brewer removed Chairwoman Colleen Mathis last week, saying the Tucson independent was guilty of a "failure to apply the Arizona Constitution's provisions in an honest, independent and impartial fashion."

Attorneys for the commission have filed suit alleging that the governor and state Senate went beyond their authority to remove Mathis.

Quayle, a Republican, was elected in 2010 to represent Arizona's 3rd Congressional District, which includes Phoenix, Scottsdale and Paradise Valley.

He addressed a rumor that his mother, Marilyn Quayle, wife of former Vice President Dan Quayle, called Brewer and suggested that she oust Mathis.

"That is a lie," he said.

A proposed map would place Quayle on the edge of a competitive congressional district that stretches from north-central Phoenix through Tempe. He has hinted that he may move into a neighboring GOP-dominated district whose boundary is four blocks from his home.

Quayle fielded questions for about an hour after a PowerPoint presentation where he highlighted some federal bills, including one that would give more power to small-business owners and another that would allow states to opt out of the federal Affordable Care Act.

Phoenix resident Valarie Klein told Quayle the story of her son, who had a brain tumor removed two years ago. KidsCare, Arizona's version of Medicaid, paid all the bills. Before the tumor, her son was healthy, Klein said.

"How is it that you can allow 125,000 children not be allowed to have KidsCare?" she asked. "To continue to have a freeze on KidsCare when you never know when your child is going to have something happen to them?"

To remain on KidsCare, Klein said she cannot make more than $6,700 per year because her son's child-support payments are counted as income.

"I went from upper middle class to zero because the expenses to maintain my son are through the roof," she said. "Could you please tell me, sir, how would you live on $6,700 a year? Because I'm having a difficult time doing that."

Quayle explained that the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System is a state program, not federal.

"I'm sorry for all that you've been dealing with," Quayle said. "Obviously, AHCCCS and KidsCare is on the state side. . . . I do think we need to have proper health-care reform so that folks who do have pre-existing conditions and high-risk conditions can be part of a high-risk pool."

Klein urged him to have a conversation with the decision makers at the state level.

Proponents of medical marijuana also were in the audience. One person asked Quayle his thoughts on a bill that would reschedule medical pot as having medicinal benefit for sick people.

Quayle didn't think rescheduling marijuana was a good idea.

"What we have right now is a cartel system in Mexico that derives an enormous amount of their revenue from marijuana sales in the United States," he said. "If you reschedule marijuana, that will increase the demand for that product coming over. It will bring in more product."

Despite Quayle's request at the beginning of the meeting that audience members remain civil, many booed him and one man yelled out, "Do the research, moron!" after hearing Quayle's answer.

The congressman replied, "You can agree or disagree, but I hope we can continue doing this in a nice, neighborly manner."

1 in 5 of U.S. adults on behavioral meds

Source

Report: 1 in 5 of U.S. adults on behavioral meds

NEW YORK (AP) – More than 20 percent of American adults took at least one drug for conditions like anxiety and depression in 2010, according to an analysis of prescription data, including more than one in four women.

The report, released Wednesday by pharmacy benefits manager Medco Health Solutions Inc., found that use of drugs for psychiatric and behavioral disorders rose 22 percent from 2001. The medications are most often prescribed to women aged 45 and older, but their use among men and in younger adults climbed sharply. In adults 20 to 44, use of antipsychotic drugs and treatments for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder more than tripled, and use of anti-anxiety drugs like Xanax, Valium and Ativan rose 30 percent from a decade ago.

The statistics were taken from Medco's database of prescriptions and is based on 2.5 million patients with 24 months of continuous prescription drug insurance and eligibility.

The company said women are twice as likely as men to use anxiety treatments, as 11 percent of women 45 to 65 are on an anxiety medication. Women are also more likely than men to take antipsychotic drugs like Zyprexa, Risperdal, and Abilify, which treat disorders like bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. However, among men 20 to 64, use of the drugs has quadrupled over the last decade.

"There has been a significant uptick in the use of medications to treat a variety of mental health problems; what is not as clear is if more people — especially women, are actually developing psychological disorders that require treatment, or if they are more willing to seek out help and clinicians are better at diagnosing these conditions than they once were," said Dr. David Muzina, a psychiatrist and national practice leader of Medco's Neuroscience Therapeutic Resource Center.

Pharmaceutical companies have also sought and received approvals to market their drugs to larger groups of people.

Drugs for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder are prescribed to boys more often than girls, but adult women now take the drugs more often than men. ADHD prescriptions to adult women grew 2.5 times from 2001. However ADHD prescriptions for children have been declining since 2005.

That reflects a decline in prescriptions for psychiatric and behavioral drugs for children. Medco found that prescriptions of those drugs for children have dropped since 2004, when the FDA warned they were linked to suicidal thoughts when used in people under 19. The company said less than 1 percent of children use antipsychotics drugs, although the figure has doubled since 2001.

In the "diabetes belt" states of Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi and Alabama, about 23 percent of people are on at least one psychiatric or behavioral disorder drug. Diabetes is particularly widespread in those states and the condition is associated with higher levels of depression and anxiety disorders. The lowest rate of prescriptions was found in Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan, where less than 15 percent of people are using those medications.

Another drug tunnel found along Arizona-Mexico border

Another drug tunnel found along Arizona-Mexico border

by Daniel González - Nov. 22, 2011 10:50 PM

The Arizona Republic

The discovery of a new tunnel in Nogales being used to smuggle marijuana into the United States from Mexico shows how sophisticated drug-smuggling organizations are getting in trying to evade tighter border security and recent law-enforcement crackdowns.

The tunnel discovered Monday afternoon by the Border Patrol stretched 319 feet from Mexico into the United States, and had been chiseled through rock 20 feet underground.

The tunnel, which extended 100 feet into Mexico, was supported by 4x4 wooden beams and plywood, making it among the most sophisticated tunnels found in Arizona in recent memory, said Mario Escalante, a Border Patrol spokesman in Tucson.

"It's apparent we are making it a lot more difficult for them to operate so they are having to go through these types of extremes," Escalante said.

The latest tunnel was found in a residential area about half a mile west of the DeConcini Port of Entry in downtown Nogales, the same vicinity where another tunnel was discovered six days earlier, Escalante said.

The new tunnel opened inside a private residence on the U.S. side, and Border Patrol agents found 430 pounds of marijuana worth $215,000 inside the tunnel, Escalante said. He could not say how long it had been in use, but authorities found various tools, including saws, inside. It also had electricity, lights and water pumps.

Although large, the tunnel found Monday in Nogales pales in comparison to a 400-yard tunnel equipped with an electrical and ventilation system found last week in San Diego. That tunnel led from a warehouse in San Diego to an industrial building in Tijuana.

In recent years, the Department of Homeland Security has beefed up border security in Arizona by adding hundreds of Border Patrol agents, installing new types of fencing that allows agents to see across the border into Mexico and deploying sophisticated electronic and aerial surveillance.

"Confronted with these obstacles, these drug-smuggling organizations have resorted to going underground," said Ramona Sanchez, an agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration office in Phoenix.

Law-enforcement agencies in Arizona have also been working together to crack down on drug-smuggling organizations, said Elizabeth Kempshall, the Arizona director of the Southwest Border High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a federally funded regional drug-enforcement task force.

In October, federal and state officials announced they had broken up a major smuggling organization responsible for transporting more than $2 billion worth of narcotics through Arizona in the past five years.

"The efforts of drug law enforcement in Arizona, plus the buildup of the Border Patrol, is causing the drug cartels to seek new methods to get the drugs over the border in Arizona," Kempshall said.

The marijuana trade in Arizona is controlled by the Sinaloa cartel, Kempshall said.

"They can't just pick up their drugs and move to Texas because that's controlled by another cartel," mostly the Gulf cartel, Kempshall said.

Tunnels are expensive and time-consuming to build, "which shows how desperate they are to get the dope through our border here in Arizona," she said.

Typically, drug-smuggling organizations hire people to transport marijuana in backpacks through the desert or concealed inside vehicles and commercial trucks through official ports of entry, she said.

By building tunnels, smuggling organizations are able to move narcotics under the border, undetected, from stash houses in Mexico to stash houses on the U.S. side, where it is picked up and trucked into the country, she said.

"They'll tunnel and try to tap into the natural sewer system in Nogales, or they will try and tunnel into another residence on the U.S. side of the border," Kempshall said. "And that way, when they unload in the tunnels, they are in secrecy, and then they can load it into vehicles to transport it north."

She said the tunnels typically are dug the old-fashioned way: with picks and shovels.

"They have the money to bring in the expertise to build these tunnels," she said.

Border Patrol officials would not say how they discovered the latest tunnel, but Sanchez said they are often found with help from Mexican authorities.

Through August of the last fiscal year, the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector, which covers most of Arizona's border with Mexico, had discovered 12 cross-border tunnels, up from seven the entire year before.

Over the past four years, U.S. law-enforcement officials have discovered 75 cross-border tunnels, most of them in Arizona and California, Sanchez said.

L.A. councilman to propose ban on medical marijuana dispensaries

L.A. councilman to propose ban on medical marijuana dispensaries

November 23, 2011 | 12:01 am

With new medical marijuana dispensaries opening in Los Angeles in the wake of judicial decisions that created more legal confusion, Councilman Jose Huizar plans to introduce a motion to ban them until the state Supreme Court steps in to resolve the issue.

“This wasn’t an easy decision, but I think if we do nothing at this moment and stick our heads in the sand we would be irresponsible,” said Huizar, whose district includes Eagle Rock, a neighborhood with a high concentration of dispensaries. “We’re concerned if we do nothing, we’re going to be in an even worse situation than before our ordinance.”

The motion would be the second to propose an end to the city’s troubled attempts to regulate storefront marijuana sales. Council members Bernard C. Parks and Jan Perry introduced a motion last month to ask city officials to make recommendations on how to eliminate dispensaries.

Medical marijuana activists, many of whom have attended council meetings for years to cajole and berate the city into adopting a workable ordinance, will strenuously oppose a ban.

“If they do a complete ban, where are the patients going to get their medicine?” said Yamileth Bolanos, president of the Greater Los Angeles Collective Alliance. “Medical marijuana is going to stay in the city no matter what. [Huizar is] choosing to have the gangs and the cartels running it rather than having the very best operators that they can.” Los Angeles has struggled for years to control the number of dispensaries, which opened by the hundreds when the city failed to enforce its moratorium. The city’s efforts to put in place a medical marijuana ordinance it can enforce have been thwarted by court decisions.

The proposals for bans follow two key state appeals court rulings that have led Los Angeles and other municipalities -- even those friendly to medical marijuana -- to consider them.

In October, the court of appeal in Los Angeles ruled that Long Beach, which used a lottery to choose which dispensaries to allow, violated federal law because the city was, in essence, authorizing the distribution of an illegal drug. The decision, which Long Beach has appealed to the state Supreme Court, called into doubt whether cities and counties can adopt any regulations for controlling dispensaries, even zoning rules setting distances from schools.

And then this month, an appeals court in Riverside issued two decisions that were the clearest yet to find that state laws allowing marijuana for medical use do not prohibit dispensary bans.

Although Los Angeles City Atty. Carmen Trutanich would not discuss what advice he has given the City Council, he and his top lawyers have left little doubt where they stand on how to read the court decisions.

“I think it gives us the authority to prohibit but not to authorize,” Trutanich said. “We’re definitely going to have to step very cautiously. This is an area that is fraught with land mines, not only legal land mines but political land mines.”

Huizar’s motion would repeal the current ordinance, which would have chosen 100 dispensaries in a lottery, and impose a ban until it is clear the city can regulate the stores.

“As we stand now, we really have an unenforceable ordinance,” he said. “We’re back where we started.”

The motion would also put the city on record supporting cannabis cultivation by patients and caregivers.

It’s unclear whether Huizar will be able to win enough votes to pass a ban. Since the council began to debate the issue 6 1/2 years ago, the panel has never tilted toward prohibition and has always sought to find a legal way to allow medical marijuana stores.

But Huizar’s move also comes as Los Angeles appears to be experiencing another uptick in the number of dispensaries. The South Robertson Neighborhood Council is planning to host a town hall on the contentious issue after two dispensaries opened last month next to two others. All four of them are closer to a temple and an elementary school than allowed by city law.

“Having businesses that seem to be completely outside the jurisdiction of the city is maddening,” said Doug Fitzsimmons, the neighborhood council president. He said the neighborhood has long fought to stamp out illegal drug dealing.

“We feel that suddenly having all these dispensaries pop up right there is sliding back into the bad old days and something we need to fight as a community,” he said.

After the issue appeared on the neighborhood council’s agenda, Fitzsimmons said he was contacted by other neighborhood councils. “This is a widespread problem,” he said. “It’s getting worse. The current legislative and legal environment is just emboldening people to open businesses because, frankly, the city is overtaxed.”

But as a supporter of medical marijuana, Fitzsimmons was torn about outlawing dispensaries, noting that some are run responsibly.

“If this is the only legal option that the city has, I reluctantly support it, but it’s denying people, I think, the legitimate right to medicine.”

Mexico seizes $15 million said to belong to cartel

Source

Mexico seizes $15 million said to belong to cartel

November 22, 2011 | 2:34 pm

REPORTING FROM MEXICO CITY -- More than $15 million has been seized in an upper-class neighborhood of Tijuana, one of the largest cash seizures by Mexican forces in the nation's nearly 6-year-old drug war, authorities said.

The cash was found Friday in a vehicle searched by Mexican soldiers and marines in the Cumbres de Juarez district of the border city. Investigators believe the cache of U.S. currency belongs to the Sinaloa cartel led by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the Mexican government said in a statement posted Tuesday (link in Spanish).

The cash totaled $15.4 million. In addition, troops seized nearly 7 pounds of cocaine, four weapons, and jewelry. Another large cash seizure also apparently hit the financial network of the powerful Sinaloa organization when Mexican soldiers found more than $26 million in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa state, on Sept. 14, 2008.

In March 2007, Mexico's federal police seized $207 million in cash in the Mexico City mansion belonging to a Chinese-Mexican entrepreneur named Zhenli Ye Gon, in a case tied to allegations of methamphetamine production.

L.A. council to debate whether to outlaw medical pot stores

L.A. council to debate whether to outlaw medical pot stores

By John Hoeffel, Los Angeles Times

November 24, 2011

With more medical marijuana dispensaries opening in Los Angeles and recent court decisions stirring new confusion, the City Council plans to debate whether to outlaw the stores.

A ban would be a major about-face for the council, which has struggled to find a way to allow dispensaries, but under tight control. And it would be a serious setback for the medical marijuana movement if the state's largest city — and one of its most progressive — joins the scores of more conservative cities and counties that have prohibited storefront sales.

On Wednesday, Councilman Jose Huizar called on his colleagues to repeal the city's ordinance and to ban stores, delivery services and commercial cultivation until the state Supreme Court resolves the legal uncertainties. His motion is the second to propose an end to the city's troubled attempts to regulate marijuana. Council members Bernard C. Parks and Jan Perry introduced one last month.

"This wasn't an easy decision, but I think if we do nothing at this moment and stick our heads in the sand we would be irresponsible," said Huizar, whose district includes Eagle Rock, which has 15 dispensaries in a 1.2-mile radius, according to the neighborhood council. "We're concerned, if we do nothing, we're going to be in an even worse situation than before our ordinance."

Los Angeles has struggled for years to reduce the number of dispensaries, which opened by the hundreds when the city failed to enforce a moratorium. It's unclear how many dispensaries there are now, but 372 medical marijuana businesses have filed to pay the city's pot tax.

Since it began to consider the issue six and a half years ago, the council has never tilted toward prohibition. But frustration with another uptick in dispensaries could change that. Four council members support a ban, five oppose it and five are undecided, but open to the idea.

Council President Eric Garcetti said he would aim to have the council take the issue up next month.

"I think it's important that we get some council movement on this," said Garcetti, who has doubts about a ban but has not taken a position on it.

Los Angeles and other municipalities — even some friendly to medical marijuana — are now taking a look at bans because of several recent state appeals court rulings.

Last month, the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles ruled that Long Beach, which set up a lottery to choose which dispensaries to allow, violated federal law because the city was, in essence, authorizing the distribution of an illegal drug. The decision, which Long Beach has appealed to the state Supreme Court, called into doubt whether cities and counties can adopt any regulations for controlling dispensaries, even zoning rules setting distances from schools.

And this month, an appeals court in Riverside issued two decisions that were the clearest yet to find that state laws allowing medical marijuana use do not block bans on dispensaries.

Medical marijuana activists — many of whom have attended council meetings for years to cajole and berate the city into adopting a workable ordinance — turned out at Wednesday's council session and were roiling with outrage.

"Irresponsible, Mr. Huizar? Irresponsible to do nothing?" said an infuriated Yamileth Bolanos, the president of the Greater Los Angeles Collective Alliance. "For six years, this council has done nothing. We came and told you about the proliferation of the collectives in the city. This council did nothing. Irresponsible to do nothing? Yes, it was very irresponsible to do nothing. And today, calling for a ban is the most irresponsible thing you can do because you're turning over the distribution of medical marijuana to the cartels and the gangs in the city."

Although City Atty. Carmen Trutanich will not discuss what advice he has given the council, he and his top lawyers have made clear where they stand on how to interpret the court decisions. "I think it gives us the authority to prohibit but not to authorize," he said. "We're definitely going to have to step very cautiously. This is an area that is fraught with land mines, not only legal land mines but political land mines."

Huizar's motion, seconded by Councilman Mitch Englander, would repeal the current ordinance, which would choose 100 dispensaries in a lottery and restrict where they could locate. "As we stand now, we really have an unenforceable ordinance," Huizar said. "We're back where we started."

A ban is opposed by council members Paul Koretz, Tom LaBonge, Bill Rosendahl, Dennis Zine and Herb Wesson, the next council president, who said the city must strike a balance. Koretz said he has friends with AIDS who would be dead without marijuana.

"This is the easy way out," he said. "When people's lives are at stake, I don't think we should take the easy way out."

But other council members said they would weigh a temporary ban.

"I do think it affords us an opportunity to take a step back, take a clean look at it and reload, reboot, and try to come up with a policy that is going to work," Councilman Paul Krekorian said.

Huizar's move comes as concern over more dispensaries opening willy-nilly is again angering some city residents. Three neighborhood council leaders stood behind the councilman in a show of support when he announced his proposal at a morning news conference at City Hall.

The East Hollywood Neighborhood Council voted unanimously Monday to back a ban.

"The only other option is chaos, which is what we have," said Doug Haines, the chairman of the planning committee, who noted that new pot shops are opening in the area's vacant commercial buildings. "They're brazen. They don't in any way try to hide what they are doing."

Michael Larsen, the president of the Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council, said the area once had 24 dispensaries, which dropped to 10 when the city's ordinance took effect in June 2010, but five have opened since then.

"That's unacceptable," he said. "We don't want 15 Starbucks. We don't want 15 McDonald's. And we certainly don't want 15 illegal pot shops."

Larsen, who said he was not speaking for the neighborhood council, said a ban was "the only reasonable path" to end "this out-of-control farce" until the courts clear up the issue.

The South Robertson Neighborhoods Council decided to host a town hall on the issue after two dispensaries opened last month next to two others near a temple and an elementary school. "Having businesses that seem to be completely outside the jurisdiction of the city is maddening," said Doug Fitzsimmons, the council's president.

Fitzsimmons said he had heard from other upset neighborhood leaders.

"This is a widespread problem. It's getting worse," he said. "The current legislative and legal environment is just emboldening people to open businesses because, frankly, the city is overtaxed."

But, as a supporter of medical marijuana, Fitzsimmons was torn about banishing dispensaries, noting that some are run responsibly. "If this is the only legal option that the city has, I reluctantly support it, but it's denying people, I think, the legitimate right to medicine."

john.hoeffel@latimes.com

Medical Marijuana Industry Is Unnerved by U.S. Crackdown

Medical Marijuana Industry Is Unnerved by U.S. Crackdown

Jim Wilson/The New York Times

By ERIK ECKHOLM

Published: November 23, 2011

UKIAH, Calif. — An intensifying federal crackdown on growers and sellers of state-authorized medical marijuana has badly shaken the billion-dollar industry, which has sprung up in California since voters approved medical use of the drug in 1996, and has highlighted the stark contradiction between federal and state policies.

Federal law classifies the possession and sale of marijuana as a serious crime and does not grant exceptions for medical use, so the programs adopted here, in 15 other states and in the District of Columbia exist in an odd legal limbo. While federal agencies have long targeted Californians who blatantly reap illegal profits in the name of medicine, or who smuggle marijuana across state lines, the Justice Department said in 2009 that it would not normally pursue groups providing marijuana to sick patients, in accordance with state laws.

But in the last several weeks, federal prosecutors have raided or threatened to seize the property of scores of growers and dispensaries in California that, in some cases, are regarded by local officials as law-abiding models. At the same time, the Internal Revenue Service has levied large, disputed tax charges against the state’s largest dispensary, threatening its ability to continue.

In a hint of the simmering federal-state tensions, Kamala D. Harris, the attorney general of California, described in pointed terms the Oct. 7 announcement by four United States attorneys of their tough new campaign against many dispensaries, which they called commercial operations that violate the intent of California law as well as federal statutes.

“It was a unilateral federal action, and it has only increased uncertainty about how Californians can legitimately comply with state law,” Ms. Harris said in an interview. Since federal authorities do not recognize that marijuana can serve medical ends, she said, “they are ill equipped to be the decision makers as to which providers are violating the law.”

But Ms. Harris also described the state’s regulations governing medical marijuana as “vague and chaotic,” and she is working with legislators for more consistency and stronger controls.

The growing federal pressure, industry leaders say, could force the dismantling of some of the cooperatives that provide marijuana to more than 750,000 Californians who have obtained doctor “recommendations” to treat everything from cancer-related nausea to pain and anxiety. Within a few years, hundreds of collectives, large and small, have deeply embedded themselves in the state, paying more than $100 million in sales taxes, joining local chambers of commerce and better business bureaus, even appearing on “adopt-a-highway” signs.

Here in Mendocino County, which gladly cooperates with federal agents against the rampant criminal cultivation of marijuana, officials devised a permit and monthly monitoring system for small-scale growers supplying patient groups. The sheriff said this had eased his burdens and prevented diversion to the black market, and he praised the Northstone Organics Collective, run by Matthew Cohen, for scrupulous adherence to the rules.

But at 6 a.m. on Oct. 13, federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents with assault rifles and chainsaws raided Mr. Cohen’s property in the oak-covered hills north of Ukiah, cutting down the 99 hefty plants, 6 to 12 feet tall, that were meant to provide marijuana for 1,700 members.

“The federal and state laws exist in parallel universes,” said Thomas D. Allman, the Mendocino County sheriff, in his office in Ukiah. He is as tough as anyone on the illegal marijuana trade, he said, but “growing and using medical marijuana is a right of a California citizen.”

Now, he said, the 94 collectives that receive permits and plant tags from his office are frightened.

In Oakland, the state’s largest dispensary, Harborside Health Center, sells marijuana and derived products to more than 600 people a day, charging from $25 to $60 per one-eighth of an ounce, with a limit of two ounces per patient per week. Steve DeAngelo, the executive director, described that as “the maximum amount that a medical patient could legitimately consume in a week.”

Registered with the state as a not-for-profit cooperative, Harborside has 95,000 patient-members and 120 employees, takes in $22 million a year and is one of Oakland’s top 10 taxpayers, Mr. DeAngelo said.

In October, the Internal Revenue Service notified the center that it considered it a criminal drug-trafficking organization and said it could not deduct its rent, salaries, counseling and other operations as business expenses. It billed the center for $2.5 million in back taxes, which would destroy the company, said Mr. DeAngelo, who plans to fight the decision in court.

“We’re clearly breaking federal law every day, but we are faithfully following the laws of California and Oakland,” Mr. DeAngelo said. The Supreme Court has ruled that federal criminal law can prevail, but Mr. DeAngelo and others question the Justice Department’s priorities.

“Why is the federal government targeting legitimate, regulated enterprises?” he asked. “Is it better for patients to buy from a clean, safe store or from street dealers?”

Medical marijuana advocates accuse the Obama administration of going back on earlier promises not to go after groups abiding by local laws.

But federal justice officials say the real change is the proliferation of large, commercial enterprises, not their guidelines.

“A lot of the medical marijuana stores that claim to be nonprofit are making lots of money,” Benjamin B. Wagner, the United States attorney for the Eastern District of California, in Sacramento, said in an interview.

He added that prosecutors were skeptical about the medical needs of many buyers. “We’ve found in California that anybody can get a medical recommendation,” he said.

Since late September, in their broadest crackdown yet, federal prosecutors have sent letters to more than 100 registered dispensaries or their landlords throughout the state, warning that their property may be confiscated and that they could face prison if they do not shut down.

At the Oct. 7 news conference, André Birotte Jr., the chief federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, said that one strip mall in Orange County had eight stores selling marijuana. “This is not what the California voters intended or authorized,” he said.

Some of the dispensaries threatened by the federal government have shut down or are being evicted by fearful landlords.

Even many marijuana advocates agree that state laws governing medical marijuana are inadequate, largely leaving it to local officials to set rules for growing and selling that vary wildly by county. It is also an open secret that a share of doctor-approved buyers do not have plausible medical needs.

On Ocean Front Walk at Venice Beach, for example, touts compete to lure people into shabby clinics with names like Medical Kush Doctor, promising medical recommendations for $45.

“Why don’t they go after the bad actors?” asked Mr. Cohen, the Mendocino County grower. “I’m a strong advocate of tighter regulations.”

State Senator Mark Leno, a Democrat from San Francisco, is now working with Attorney General Harris to devise a state law that would establish more uniform and stringent rules for medical marijuana. But he condemned what he called the federal authorities’ “heavy-handed interventions.”

Even if the state tightens controls and pares back the industry, the central clash, between the federal war on drugs and California’s desire to offer medical marijuana, will remain.

Ms. Harris said she hoped that if the state improved oversight, federal officials would find other priorities. “I’m a career prosecutor,” she said, “and I know that everyone has a lot of obligations and limited resources.”

Official: More than 20 bodies found in Guadalajara

Official: More than 20 bodies found in Guadalajara

By E. EDUARDO CASTILLO

MEXICO CITY (AP) — More than 20 bodies were discovered early Thursday in vehicles abandoned in the heart of Guadalajara, Mexico's second-largest city and the site of the recent Pan American Games, an official said.

That the bodies were found early Thursday in three vehicles left near the Milennium Arches, one of the most recognizable landmarks in the western city, an official with the prosecutor's office in the state of Jalisco, where Guadalajara is located, told The Associated Press. He spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the information.

The arches stand less than a 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) from the Expo Guadalajara events center, the site of both Pan Am Games events and the Guadalajara International Book Fair, which opens Saturday and describes itself as the world's most important Spanish-language book fair. The fair's website said it was expecting more than 600,000 visitors from around the world.

Guadalajara was flooded with police and soldiers during the Pan American Games and was spared significant violence.

Security officials have feared in recent months, however, that Guadalajara could become the next takeover target of the Zetas drug cartel, which has been using paramilitary-style tactics and headline-grabbing atrocities in a national push to seize territory from older organized crime groups.

Guadalajara was long the home of the methamphetamine-trafficking arm run by Ignacio "Nacho" Coronel, a high-ranking commander in the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel, named for its Pacific Coast home state north of Guadalajara.

Less than 24 hours before the bodies were found in Guadalajara, 17 bodies were found burned in two pickup trucks in a strikingly similar attack in Sinaloa. Twelve of the bodies were in the back of one truck, some of them handcuffed and wearing bulletproof vests.

Luis Carlos Najera, public security secretary for the state of Jalisco, told reporters Thursday morning that a message had been found in one of the vehicles. He did not describe it further. Mexican drug cartels frequently leave threatening messages with the bodies of their victims as a way of sowing fear and taking credit for their actions.

Responding to a reporter's question, Carlos Najera told the Televisa television network that he believed the recent calm in Guadalajara was the result of the increase in security, not that drug cartels had struck a truce during the games.

In Guadalajara, factions of Coronel's operation have been fighting for control since he was killed in a shootout with federal police in July 2010. The factions include the New Generation and another group known as the Resistance.

The Zetas have taken over neighboring Zacatecas state in their push west, and are eyeing Guadalajara both for the meth trade and for extortion potential.

Analysts have said there are rumors that some factions fighting the New Generation are ready to join with the Zetas, a coalition that would form a potent threat to Sinaloa's methamphetamine operations.

7 bodies found on sports field in Mexican village

7 bodies found on sports field in Mexican village

AP – Wed, Nov 9, 2011

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Police say the naked bodies of six men and a woman have been found on an outdoor basketball court in northern Mexico.

Police say the bodies, which bore signs of violence, were found in a village outside the city of Durango. The victims were residents of the village. Investigators say they haven't yet determined a motive.

In Acapulco, police on Wednesday found the decapitated bodies of a man and a woman inside an abandoned taxi.

The Pacific port city has seen vicious drug-related following the 2010 arrest of suspected capo Edgar Valdez Villareal, a Texas-born man known as "La Barbie."

Overall, Mexico's drug war has claimed more than 35,000 lives since President Felipe Calderon launched it in late 2006. Others put the death toll at 40,000.

Security forces increase violence in Mexico drug war: report

Security forces increase violence in Mexico drug war: report

AFP – Wed, Nov 9, 2011

Mexican President Felipe Calderon's military crackdown on drug gangs has led to a dramatic increase in killings and abuses by the security forces, Human Rights Watch said in a report Wednesday.

"Instead of reducing violence, Mexico's 'war on drugs' has resulted in a dramatic increase in killings, torture and other appalling abuses by security forces," said Jose Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at the US-based watchdog.

"Neither Rights Nor Security," a 200-page report released in Mexico City, focused on five of the most violent states, claiming that security forces took part in over 170 cases of torture, 39 disappearances and 24 extrajudicial killings since Calderon took office in December 2006.

The report, based on more than 200 interviews with victims and officials, public information requests and government statistics, concluded that "virtually none" of the alleged abuses were being adequately investigated.

It criticized the use of military tribunals to try soldiers for rights abuses despite rulings by the Supreme Court and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights that they should be investigated in civilian courts.

It also called on judges to refuse to accept evidence obtained through torture.

Calderon agreed to set up a joint working group to analyze the report, after meeting with a delegation from Human Rights Watch, the presidency said in a statement.

Calderon deployed some 50,000 troops, as well as police and navy forces, to take on organized crime gangs shortly after he took office in 2006.

More than 45,000 deaths have been blamed on drug violence since then, while the report also cast doubt on Calderon's claims that 90 percent of those victims were criminals.

Human remains found in northern Mexico pit

Source

Human remains found in northern Mexico pit

AP – Mon, Nov 21, 2011

DURANGO, Mexico (AP) — Mexican authorities say soldiers have dug up the remains of seven people from a pit in the northern state of Durango.

Durango state prosecutors said Sunday troops found the remains in the town of San Juan del Rio, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) north of the state capital, the city of Durango. They gave no other details.

More than 400 bodies have been found in a series of clandestine graves in Tamaulipas and Durango states since April. They are believed to be a result of turf battles between drug cartels.

3 police officers found dead in Mexico border city

3 police officers found dead in Mexico border city

By OSCAR VILLALBA | AP – Mon, Nov 21, 2011

PIEDRAS NEGRAS, Mexico (AP) — Assailants kidnapped and killed three police officers in the Mexican border city of Acuna, authorities said Monday.

Acuna Public Safety Department said in a statement that the three were on patrol in the same unit when gunmen kidnapped them early Monday.

The officer's bodies were found an hour later in a residential area of Acuna, which is across the border from Del Rio, Texas. They had been shot and their hands were handcuffed, the police department said.

Authorities say the Zetas and the Sinaloa drug cartels are fighting each other to control smuggling routes in the state of Coahuila, where Acuna is located.

Last week, gunmen killed a federal prosecutor for the state of Coahuila when he was about to leave his home in the city of Torreon.

A day earlier, gunmen set a fire at the office of the Torreon newspaper El Siglo and fired shots at it. No injuries were reported.

Authorities in the neighboring state of Durango said soldiers dug up the remains of seven people from a pit.

Durango state prosecutors said troops found the remains in the town of San Juan del Rio, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) north of the state capital, the city of Durango. They gave no other details.

More than 400 bodies have been found in a series of clandestine graves in Tamaulipas and Durango states since April. They are believed to be a result of turf battles between drug cartels.

In Hidalgo, the home state of Zetas leader Heriberto Lazcano, state police chief Damian Canales said authorities detained eight local police officers for allegedly working for the Zetas.

Canales said six of those detained were officers for the town of Actopan and two for the state capital of Pachuca. He said they were detained after the arrest of the former police chief in the town of Arenal, who authorities allege was in charge of recruiting police officers to work for the Zetas.

Canales said the Pachuca city police officers told investigators the Zetas paid them about $360 a month.

Also on Monday, military authorities said soldiers in the border state of Chihuahua detained two police chiefs while they were meeting with an alleged drug trafficker.

Soldiers detained the police chief and a police officer for the town of Gran Morelos and the police chief for the town of Belisario Dominguez while they met with a boss for La Linea, a gang of hit men for the Juarez Cartel, the Defense Department said in a statement.

It said an anonymous phone call led the troops to the meeting in the town of Belisario Dominguez. Soldiers arrested two other men and seized three handguns and four automatic rifles, the statement added.

President Felipe Calderon has been pushing to clean up local and state police forces, whose officers are often corrupt or are coerced by threats into helping drug gangs.

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center refuses to give man liver transplant because he uses medical marijuana

I can understand a hospital refusing to give a heavy drinker a liver transplant, because alcohol destroys your liver, but it seems stupid to deny a person a liver transplant because they smoke medical marijuana, which from what I know is a harmless drug.

Source

Medical marijuana jeopardizes liver transplant

By Anna Gorman, Los Angeles Times

November 26, 2011

Norman Smith, who has been fighting cancer for two years, needs a new liver.

He was placed on the transplant list at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center last year but doctors removed him in February because he was using medical marijuana and failed to show up for a drug test.

To get back on the list, Smith, 63, has to spend six months avoiding medical marijuana, submitting to random drug tests and undergoing counseling. Meanwhile, he is still undergoing chemotherapy and radiation for the cancer, which recently returned after being in remission.

Smith asked Cedars-Sinai last week to reconsider and reinstate him now.

"It's frustrating," he said from his home in Playa del Rey. "I have inoperable cancer. If I don't get a transplant, the candle's lit and it's a short fuse."

Any delay could mean the "difference between life and death," said Joe Elford, an attorney with the medical marijuana advocacy group Americans for Safe Access, which is representing Smith and considering a lawsuit against the hospital.

There is no standard policy on transplants and the use of medical marijuana or other drugs, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing, which manages organ transplantation for the U.S. Instead, transplant centers make their own decisions on which patients are the best candidates for new organs.

More than 16,000 people are in line for livers nationwide and the average wait is about 300 days, according to the network.

"We have to do a prioritization, like you literally do on a battlefield — who can die and who can survive, because we don't have enough livers," said Dr. Goran Klintmalm, chief of the Baylor Regional Transplant Institute and an expert in liver transplantation. "As long as we have patients who die on the list waiting for organs … is it right to give [to] patients who have a history of drug use? You can discuss until the cows come home if it is social marijuana or medical marijuana."

Transplant doctors said one of the main concerns is compliance with a complicated regimen of post-transplant medications.

"If you are drunk or high or stoned, you are not going to take your medicine," said Dr. Jeffrey Crippin, former president of the American Society of Transplantation and medical director at Washington University in St. Louis.

Cedars-Sinai spokeswoman Sally Stewart said federal law prevented her from talking about Smith's case. But she said marijuana users can be exposed to a species of mold that can cause fatal disease among patients with compromised immune systems. They also run a risk of a fatal lung infection after transplantation, she said.

"We do not make a moral or ethical judgment about people who are smoking medical marijuana," she said. "Our concern is strictly for the health and safety of our patients."

At Cedars-Sinai, if patients who need a transplant initially test positive for marijuana, they can still be listed but must sign a statement agreeing not to use the drug. Then, if they fail a random drug test or don't show up for one, they are bumped from the list. "There have to be guidelines in order to give people the best chance at surviving a transplant," Stewart said.

UCLA Transplantation Services has an even stricter policy, requiring six months of sobriety before a patient can be listed. Dr. Douglas Farmer, a transplant surgeon and surgery professor at UCLA, said that drug and alcohol use is a "huge issue" and that patients on medical marijuana have also come to UCLA seeking transplants.

Farmer said, however, that many patients with medical marijuana prescriptions are not "legitimate" and transplant surgeons can't risk wasting a precious organ on someone who is going to continue abusing alcohol or drugs. "There are a significant number of people who come in for liver transplants who have a substance abuse history," he said. [There is a big difference between alcohol use and marijuana use! Alcohol destroys your liver, but marijuana doesn't]

Smith's oncologist, Dr. Steven A. Miles, refilled the prescription for medical marijuana to manage his patient's pain. Miles, who is in private practice and an attending physician at Cedars, said that missing the drug test didn't bode well for his patient's post-transplant compliance.

Nevertheless, Miles said his patient will die without a new liver. "Without a transplant, it is basically 100% fatal," he said. "It's just a matter of time."

Smith, a former precious metal trader, acknowledged that he didn't follow the rules. He said he used medical marijuana after having unrelated back surgery and weaning himself from the prescription pain pills. "I was in extreme pain and physical anguish," he said.

In April, he wrote a letter to the head of the liver transplant program at Cedars, Steven Colquhoun, asking to be relisted. In his response, Colquhoun wrote, "More than other organ programs, liver transplant centers must consider issues of substance abuse seriously since it does often play a role in the evolution of diseases that may require transplantation, and may adversely impact a new organ after transplant."

Smith, a recovered alcoholic, said he used marijuana recreationally in the past before getting a prescription for medical marijuana. He also has cirrhosis of the liver and previously had Hepatitis C. Smith said he stopped using marijuana in August and is attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings to satisfy his counseling requirement.

Smith is hopeful that he will get a transplant in time and that his fight will raise awareness for others with medical marijuana prescriptions. "That's why I am going through this challenge, at the very least to make it easier for the next guy," he said.

anna.gorman@latimes.com

Will Mexico use RICO laws against suspected drug dealers?

Of course this new tactic will not work and will just turn Mexico into a bigger police state, like the RICO laws turned the USA into a bigger police state!

Source

Mexico seeks to fill drug war gap with focus on dirty money

By Ken Ellingwood and Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times

November 27, 2011

Reporting from Mexico City— Tainted drug money runs like whispered rumors all over Mexico's economy — in gleaming high-rises in beach resorts such as Cancun, in bustling casinos in Monterrey, in skyscrapers and restaurants in Mexico City that sit empty for months. It seeps into the construction sector, the night-life industry, even political campaigns.

Piles of greenbacks, enough to fill dump trucks, are transformed into gold watches, showrooms full of Hummers, aviation schools, yachts, thoroughbred horses and warehouses full of imported fabric.

Officials here say the tide of laundered money could reach as high as $50 billion, a staggering sum equal to about 3% of Mexico's legitimate economy, or more than all its oil exports or spending on prime social programs.

Mexican leaders often trumpet their deadly crackdown against drug traffickers as an all-out battle involving tens of thousands of troops and police, high-profile arrests and record-setting narcotics seizures. The 5-year-old offensive, however, has done little to attack a chief source of the cartels' might: their money.

Even President Felipe Calderon, who sent the army into the streets to chase traffickers after taking office in 2006, an offensive that has seen 43,000 people die since, concedes that Mexico has fallen short in attacking the financial strength of organized crime.

"Without question, we have been at fault," Calderon said during a meeting last month with drug-war victims. "The truth is that the existing structures for detecting money-laundering were simply overwhelmed by reality."

Experts say the unchecked flow of dirty money feeds a widening range of criminal activity as cartels branch into other enterprises, such as producing and trading in pirated merchandise.

"All this generates more crime," said Ramon Garcia Gibson, a former compliance officer at Citibank and an expert in money-laundering. "At the end of the day, this isn't good for anyone."

Officials on both sides of the border have begun taking tentative steps to stem the flow of dirty money. For Instance, last year Calderon proposed anti-laundering legislation, after earlier announcing restrictions on cash transactions in Mexico that used U.S. dollars.

The evolving anti-laundering campaign could change the tone of the government's military-led crime crusade by striking at the heart of the cartels' financial empire, analysts say. But the effort will have to overcome a longtime lack of political will and poor coordination among Mexican law enforcement agencies that have only aggravated the complexity of the task at hand now.

"If you don't take away their property, winning this war is impossible," said Sen. Ricardo Garcia Cervantes of the Senate security committee and Calderon's conservative National Action Party. "You are not going to win this war with bullets."

++

The good news for Mexican and Colombian traffickers is that drug sales in the United States generate enormous income, nearly all of it in readily spendable cash. The bad news is that this creates a towering logistical challenge: getting the proceeds back home to pay bills, buy supplies — from guns to chemicals to trucks — and build up the cartels' empires without detection.

Laundering allows traffickers to disguise the illicit earnings as legitimate through any number of transactions, such as cash transfers, big-ticket purchases, currency exchanges and deposits.

Much of that money still makes its way back into Mexico the old-fashioned way: in duffels stuffed into the trunks of cars. But Mexican drug traffickers are among the world's most savvy entrepreneurs, and launderers have proved nimble in evading authorities' efforts to catch them, adopting a host of new techniques to move the ill-gotten wealth.

For example, Mexican traffickers are taking advantage of blind spots in monitoring the nearly $400 billion of legal commerce between the two countries. The so-called trade-based laundering allows crime groups to disguise millions of dollars in tainted funds as ordinary merchandise — say, onions or precious metals, as they are trucked across the border.

In one case, the merchandise of choice was tons of polypropylene pellets used for making plastic. Exports of the product from the United States to Mexico appeared legitimate, but law enforcement officials say that by declaring a slightly inflated value, traders were able to hide an average of more than $1 million a month, until suspicious banks shut down the operation.

The inventive ploys even include gift cards, such as the kind you get your nephew for graduation. A drug-trafficking foot soldier simply loads up a prepaid card with dollars and walks across the border without having to declare sums over the usual $10,000 reporting requirement, thus carrying a car trunk's worth of cargo in his wallet.

Tainted cash is almost everywhere. In western Mexico, a minor-league soccer club known as the Raccoons was part of a sprawling cross-border empire — including car dealerships, an avocado export firm, hotels and restaurants — that U.S. officials said was used by suspect Wenceslao Alvarez to launder money for the Gulf cartel. Alvarez was arrested by Mexican authorities in 2008 in a rare blow against laundering and remains in prison while fighting the charges.

Even the most unlikely street-corner businesses may be used to scrub money. A pair of tanning salons in the western state of Jalisco were among 225 properties seized from drug suspect Sandra Avila Beltran, the so-called Queen of the Pacific and one of the few women allegedly to reach upper cartel echelons.

Avila, arrested in 2007, is still behind bars on the money-laundering charges as she also fights extradition to the U.S., but she has been exonerated of organized-crime and weapons charges.

The salons, with their all-cash, high-volume turnover, were allegedly used to hide drug money. The chain, called Electric Beach, has outlets all over Mexico City.

++

Mexico's efforts against money-laundering are hobbled by staff shortages, a failure to investigate adequately and skimpy laws that have exempted from scrutiny a number of industries often used to clean dirty money, independent assessments by financial experts and academics have found.

Javier Laynez Potisek, Mexico's fiscal prosecutor, lamented during a September conference on money-laundering, "Our system allows someone to come in with a suitcase full of money and buy four armored pickups for 600,000 pesos [about $42,000], and we don't have a minimum requirement to identify or report them."

A 2009 report issued by the Financial Action Task Force, an international anti-money-laundering agency, noted that Mexican authorities had won only 25 convictions for money-laundering in the two decades it has been a crime. From the beginning of 2009 to mid-2010, as overall drug-war arrests soared, prosecutors won convictions of only 37 people for money-laundering.

Part of the problem is that only Mexico's Finance Ministry has had access to financial data crucial to potential money-laundering inquiries, and prosecutors have not been allowed to open their own money-laundering investigations without a complaint from finance officials.

There is also stubborn resistance among those who profit from their role as middlemen for big transactions.

One such group is notaries, who in Mexico have a function much like attorneys in the U.S. They handle nearly all real estate transactions and have battled a proposal that would require them to report how each purchase was paid for. Notaries say launderers would probably respond by skipping the paperwork altogether when buying cars and houses, only adding to the black-market economy.

"The only thing that worries us notaries is that [the proposed reporting requirements] would create an alternative market … that brings benefits to no one," said Hector Galeano, finance secretary of Mexico's notaries association.

Some observers suggest that one reason previous Mexican governments were slow to attack money-laundering was fear of harming the rest of the economy.

Edgardo Buscaglia, a scholar who studies organized crime, estimates that in a nation where three-quarters of all transactions are cash, drug money has infiltrated 78% of the sectors constituting the formal economy.

In Sinaloa, the prosperous coastal state considered the cradle of the Mexican narcotics trade, economist Guillermo Ibarra estimates that drug money sustains nearly a fifth of the region's economy, from fancy subdivisions dotted with "narco-mansions" to vast farms.

Sinaloa is a well-known produce grower; in fact, its license plate features a tomato. But it would take an awful lot of tomatoes to account for the kind of over-the-top opulence on display in the state.

++

The moves to turn the tide in dirty money have generally taken place out of public view. But they could mark an important shift in the drug-war strategy.

A year ago, a small group of Mexican officials and U.S. counterparts met and selected six money-laundering cases to investigate jointly in an experimental offensive. U.S. agents here say the first arrests, involving a network in the northern border state of Chihuahua, could come by year's end.

Separately, U.S. Customs officials familiar with sophisticated money-laundering techniques have begun training Mexican tax inspectors who will be assigned to ferret out launderers. In addition, nearly 500 individuals and Mexican companies, from mines to milk producers, have been placed on a U.S. Treasury Department blacklist for alleged laundering activities.

And the Mexican Congress, after years of government inaction on the issue, is weighing a series of legislative proposals based on Calderon's anti-laundering package that would make it more difficult to cleanse dirty money. In the meantime, the restrictions on the use of U.S. cash in Mexico appear to be altering the flow of drug-tainted dollars for the first time, officials on both sides of the border say.

Under the proposed legislation, a specialized unit added to the attorney general's office, with advice from U.S. officials, would be authorized to take the lead in money-laundering cases and inspect a wide variety of businesses in search of illicit profits.

In addition, the government nearly a year ago replaced the Finance Ministry official in charge of such cases with a veteran Washington-based diplomat, Jose Alberto Balbuena, who had spent many months working with U.S. financial officials and is said to have a better grasp of what's at stake and a good working relationship with top prosecutors.

To date, Mexican reporting requirements have applied only to banks. Under legislation approved by the Senate last year and now before the lower Chamber of Deputies, a range of other industries would also be required to report large cash or suspicious transactions using unexplained funds.

These include real estate, car dealerships, betting parlors, art galleries, notaries, and, possibly, religious institutions. Mirroring "know your customer" regulations in the banking world, the rules would require disclosure of cash purchases for more than 200,000 pesos, or about $14,000, of numerous goods and place a cap of 1 million pesos, or about $70,000, on cash purchases of real estate.

Law enforcement experts say the proposed legislation could fill a yawning gap in Mexico's crime fight.

"It's going to counteract the financial and economic power of the criminals," said Ricardo Gluyas, a professor at the National Institute of Criminal Sciences, which trains Mexico's organized-crime prosecutors. "The new law has teeth. It covers a broad spectrum."

One potentially powerful tool, an asset-forfeiture law that allows authorities to seize property and accounts of traffickers and launderers, was approved by Congress in 2008. A similar law made a big difference in crime fights in Colombia and Italy, allowing authorities in those countries to confiscate and resell properties of drug traffickers and Mafiosi.

"Without firing a shot, you can generate a lot more results by seizing the fortunes of the big capos," Gluyas said.

But critics say the Mexican asset-forfeiture law threatens the due-process rights of owners. So far, it has been little used: Courts had approved only two cases by late this summer, with more than a dozen pending.

Perhaps more than any other measure, the government's move last year to restrict bank deposits of U.S. cash appears to have slowed the entry of dollars to Mexico's financial system. Bank-account holders were no longer allowed to deposit more than $4,000 a month.

In response, traffickers and their launderers are shifting tactics, including keeping money in the United States, officials say. And U.S. officials say that since Mexico announced the new rules, more money appears to be going elsewhere, especially to the Caribbean and Guatemala, where officials have detected a surge in circulating U.S. bank notes.

"That's the big question," Balbuena said. "Where is the money?"

A possible explanation can perhaps be gleaned from an Oct. 5 incident: Customs inspectors in Tijuana stopped an armored car full of plastic bags stuffed with $915,000 in cash. There was no documentation for the money, law enforcement sources familiar with the discovery said.

But it wasn't headed into Mexico. It was headed north, into San Diego.

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

wilkinson@latimes.com

Cecilia Sanchez of The Times' Mexico City bureau contributed to this report.

Will cops execute suspected drug dealers with drones?

Idea of civilians using drone aircraft may soon fly with FAA

By W.J. Hennigan, Los Angeles Times

November 27, 2011

Drone aircraft, best known for their role in hunting and destroying terrorist hide-outs in Afghanistan, may soon be coming to the skies near you.

Police agencies want drones for air support to spot runaway criminals. Utility companies believe they can help monitor oil, gas and water pipelines. Farmers think drones could aid in spraying their crops with pesticides.

"It's going to happen," said Dan Elwell, vice president of civil aviation at the Aerospace Industries Assn. "Now it's about figuring out how to safely assimilate the technology into national airspace."

That's the job of the Federal Aviation Administration, which plans to propose new rules for the use of small drones in January, a first step toward integrating robotic aircraft into the nation's skyways.

The agency has issued 266 active testing permits for civilian drone applications but hasn't permitted drones in national airspace on a wide scale out of concern that the pilotless craft don't have an adequate "detect, sense and avoid" technology to prevent midair collisions.

Other concerns include privacy — imagine a camera-equipped drone buzzing above your backyard pool party — and the creative ways in which criminals and terrorists might use the machines.

"By definition, small drones are easy to conceal and fly without getting a lot of attention," said John Villasenor, a UCLA professor and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution's Center for Technology Innovation. "Bad guys know this."

The aerospace industry insists these concerns can be addressed. It also believes that the good guys — the nation's law enforcement agencies — are probably the biggest commercial market for domestic drones, at least initially.

Police departments in Texas, Florida and Minnesota have expressed interest in the technology's potential to spot runaway criminals on rooftops or to track them at night by using the robotic aircraft's heat-seeking cameras.

"Most Americans still see drone aircraft in the realm of science fiction," said Peter W. Singer, author of "Wired for War," a book about robotic warfare. "But the technology is here. And it isn't going away. It will increasingly play a role in our lives. The real question is: How do we deal with it?"

Drone maker AeroVironment Inc. of Monrovia, the nation's biggest supplier of small drones to the military, has developed its first small helicopter drone that's designed specifically for law enforcement. If FAA restrictions are eased, the company plans to shop it among the estimated 18,000 state and local police departments across the United States.

In the foothills north of Simi Valley, amid acres of scrubland, AeroVironment engineers have been secretly testing a miniature remote-controlled helicopter named Qube. Buzzing like an angry hornet, the tiny drone with four whirling rotors swoops back and forth about 200 feet above the ground scouring the landscape and capturing crystal-clear video of what lies below.

The new drone weighs 51/2 pounds, fits in the trunk of a car and is controlled remotely by a tablet computer. AeroVironment unveiled Qube last month at the International Assn. of Chiefs of Police conference in Chicago.

"This is a tool that many law enforcement agencies never imagined they could have," said Steven Gitlin, a company executive.

Plenty of police departments fly expensive helicopters for high-speed chases, spotting suspects and finding missing people. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said it recently bought 12 new helicopters at a cost of $1.7 million each.

Gitlin said a small Qube, by comparison, would cost "slightly more than the price of a police cruiser," or about $40,000.

Sheriff's Department Cmdr. Bob Osborne said that there's "no doubt" that the department is interested in using drones. "It's just that the FAA hasn't come up with workable rules that we can harness it. If those roadblocks were down, we'd want to use it."

Drones' low-cost appeal has other industries interested as well.

Farmers in Japan already use small drones to automatically spray their crops with pesticides, and more recently safety inspectors used them at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Archaeologists in Russia are using small drones and their infrared cameras to construct a 3-D model of ancient burial mounds. Officials in Tampa Bay, Fla., want to use them for security surveillance at next year's Republican National Convention.

But the FAA says there are technical issues to be addressed before they're introduced in civil airspace. Among them is how to respond if a communication link is lost with a drone — such as when it falls out of the sky, takes a nose dive into a backyard pool or crashes through someone's roof.

Frederick W. Smith, founder of FedEx Corp., the largest owner of commercial cargo jets, suggested using a fleet of package-laden drones led by a traditionally piloted plane that could keep an eye on the robotic aircraft.

"Think of it like a train where you have a locomotive and you put two or three or four or 10 cars — depending on what demand is — and the drones basically fly the exact same flight profile in formation," Smith said at a Wired magazine conference last year. "It's very efficient."

Drones could also be useful to real estate agents to showcase sprawling properties. Oil and gas companies want to utilize them to keep an eye on their pipelines. Even organizations delivering humanitarian assistance want to use drones.

Matternet, a Silicon Valley start-up, has proposed a network of drones to deliver food and medicine in isolated regions around the world that are now inaccessible because they have no roads.

But if the use of drones is so widespread in the future, it raises concern that they could fall into the wrong hands and be weaponized.

Small drones are not designed to carry weapons or explosive materials, and the extra weight makes the drones difficult to control, said Gretchen West, executive vice president of the Assn. for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, a robotic technology trade group.

"Also, because the technology on these systems are state of the art," West said, they are controlled by "rules that govern the larger systems, which prohibit the systems and technology from falling into the wrong hands."

Still, there are vast privacy concerns to be confronted by government officials, such as what kinds of surveillance should be allowed and who should be permitted to use these drones.

"It's important that the FAA is scrutinizing the safety of the technology, but they should also make sure Americans' privacy is maintained," said Catherine Crump, an American Civil Liberties Union staff attorney. "Having cheap, portable, flying surveillance machines may have a tremendous benefit for law enforcement, but will it respect Americans' privacy?"

Other countries appear to have safely harnessed the technology. Brazil uses drones to scour the Amazon rain forest for drug trafficking. Researchers in Costa Rica are sending drones into clouds of volcanic ash to help predict future eruptions. Argentina, South Korea, and Turkey buy small drone helicopters for overhead views of their land and for crop dusting from Guided Systems Technologies Inc.

For now, the Stockbridge, Ga., company deals primarily with foreign countries, which don't have restrictive rules against drones, because it can't sell the aircraft at home.

That all might change, said West of the Assn. for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International. The U.S. commercial market for drones has "untapped" potential, she said. The association estimates that 23,000 jobs could be added over the next 15 years if national airspace is opened to commercial drones.

"Industry is ready," she said. "We're all waiting to see what the FAA will do."

william.hennigan@latimes.com

Will SRP give your electric use records to the "drug war" police?

I wouldn't doubt it. They are a government agency. And the cops routinely use utility records to get search warrants on homes that use too much electricity because they MIGHT be growing marijuana.

On the other hand will the cops ask SRP for all the people that refuse to get these "smart meters" out of privacy concerns, The cops probably think anybody who refuses a "smart meter" is a criminal because they refuse share every detail of their lives with the government and therefor must be guilty of something?

Source

Arizona power fee may mirror 'smart meter' plan in Calif.

by Ryan Randazzo - Nov. 27, 2011 12:00 AM

The Arizona Republic

California utility regulators have proposed a $90 fee for people who don't want a so-called smart meter put on their home to measure electricity use, which could foreshadow what might happen as regulated Arizona utilities deal with the issue.

The Arizona Corporation Commission, five elected regulators who oversee utilities, called a special meeting in September to address the growing number of complaints they receive from utility customers concerned about the technology.

Arizona Public Service Co., Salt River Project and other utilities are installing smart meters on homes and businesses to collect energy-usage data remotely, without sending a meter reader each month to record the power used and then bill customers.

SRP officials earlier this month voted to charge customers $20 a month if they don't want a smart meter, which will help recover the cost of sending a meter reader to their home, spokesman Jeff Lane said.

SRP is not regulated by the commission, which would have to approve any fees APS charges for people to opt out of smart meters.

Smart meters use radio frequencies to transmit the data to the utility. They transmit information for about one second each day. Utilities can then share that information with customers, who can see exactly how much electricity they used the day before and, utility officials say, better manage their use.

Several people have complained to Arizona regulators that they don't want the devices on their homes because they are afraid they cause health problems or that tracking their energy usage is an invasion of privacy.

APS officials have been considering what to charge those people because they would require special service to continue sending meter readers to their homes to collect their billing information.

They also might not be able to participate in all of the utility's cost-saving rate plans. SRP customers who opt out of smart meters must use the most basic rate plan or its prepaid plan and can't use special time-of-use rates, Lane said.

"There is not a specific date (we expect to make a decision), but it is something we want to get done relatively soon," APS spokesman Damon Gross said.

California regulators proposed a one-time $90 fee with an additional $15 per month for Pacific Gas and Electric Co. customers who don't want smart meters. Low-income customers who pay lower rates won't get the up-front fee, but will be charged an additional $5 a month under the proposal.

PG&E had proposed a one-time fee of $270 plus $14 a month, with an exit fee of $130 for those who eventually decided they wanted a smart meter. The regulators rejected those suggestions.

Utility officials have worked to dispel myths about the devices, such as the perception that they track which appliances are being used at all times or that they cause illness. APS brought University of California-Los Angeles epidemiology professor Leeka Kheifetsto the commission in September to testify to the safety of smart meters.

She said that although the symptoms of people who say they are sensitive to radio frequencies and other electromagnetic radiation are real, there has not been any scientific connection between their symptoms and radio signals.

She said that in double-blind studies, patients making such claims have not been able to detect when they are exposed to radio frequencies and when they are not.

Miley Cyrus a pot head?

Source

Update: Rep Defends Miley Cyrus' 'Stoner' Comments As 'Sarcastic' & 'Taken Out Of Context'

Miley Cyrus came under fire on Sunday after a video showing the actress/singer joking about smoking marijuana at her birthday party made the rounds online.

However, a rep for Miley tells Access Hollywood that the 19-year-old star's remarks were in jest.

"The cake was a joke and Miley was being sarcastic," a rep for Miley told Access on Sunday. "It is being completely taken out of context."

In the video (obtained by The Daily), Miley can be seen laughing with friends before thanking revelers for a cake featuring the face of reggae icon Bob Marley, saying, "You know you're a stoner when your friends make you a Bob Marley cake -- you know you smoke way too much f***in' weed."

Earlier on Sunday, Kelly Osbourne, who threw the birthday bash for the former "Hannah Montana" star, was quick to defend her friend, taking to Twitter to tell followers the cake and subsequent comments were simply making light of Miley's highly-publicized salvia incident in 2010.

"Let me make something very clear after Miley Cyrus' salvia incident we started calling her bob miley as a JOKE!" Kelly Tweeted on Sunday. "The cake was also A JOKE! It makes me sick that Miley Cyrus' so called 'friends' would sell her out and lead people 2 believe she is someone that she is not!

"U guys if Miley Cyrus is not recording/filming/touring she is works everyday how could she possible do all that if she was a stoner! #think," she added.

Mexican trucker gets 16 years for drug tunnels

Source

Mexican trucker gets 16 years for drug tunnels

Nov. 28, 2011 04:53 PM

Associated Press

SAN DIEGO -- A Mexican trucker has been sentenced to nearly 16 years in prison for his role in two major drug tunnels along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Daniel Navarro apologized to his family at his sentencing Monday in San Diego. A prosecutor said the defendant was "right in the middle" of a scheme that involved gigantic amounts of drugs.

Authorities who raided the tunnels seized about 50 tons of marijuana.

Prosecutors wanted a much stiffer punishment. They said the 45-year-old was a key player in tunnels that linked warehouses in San Diego and Tijuana. The two tunnels were lit, ventilated and equipped with rail cars. in the

Navarro's attorney said the government overstated his involvement and asked for 10 years in prison.

U.S. blacklisting seems to have little consequence in Mexico

U.S. blacklisting seems to have little consequence in Mexico

By Ken Ellingwood and Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times

November 27, 2011, 7:16 p.m.

Reporting from Mexico City— The U.S. government has blacklisted more Mexican individuals and companies this year than any other single country or group — and that includes North Korea, Iran, Syria and Al Qaeda.

Three hundred Mexicans and 180 Mexican companies are on the so-called kingpin designation list, the Treasury Department's roster of people and entities suspected of laundering money for drug traffickers or working for them in other capacities. U.S. banks, companies and people are barred from doing business with them.

Among those recently listed is the La Numero Uno cantina in Mexico City, a bar-restaurant with stained-glass touches that lend it the look of a church.

A hand-lettered sign posted at the entrance warns patrons that it doesn't take American Express. It doesn't mention why: The establishment is suspected of helping launder money for a criminal network affiliated with Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the world's most-wanted drug capo, and legally off-limits to American Express and other U.S. companies.

More suspects from Mexico were listed in the first seven months of fiscal year 2011 than the two previous fiscal years combined, U.S. officials say.

The Obama administration hopes these sanctions will prove a deterrent to money launderers and others who serve traffickers, and thus cut into the cartels' staggering profits. But there is ample evidence that the sanctions have little impact.

The effort is modeled after what U.S. officials saw as the successful campaign against cartels in Colombia in the 1990s. Blacklisting Colombian entities eventually strangled traffickers' ability to invest in major businesses and use the national banking system. Being named on the U.S. Treasury blacklist came to be known as muerte civil, or civil death.

In Mexico, there is an essential difference. The sanctions list is not at all binding inside Mexico. Unlike Colombia, Mexico does not have laws that allow authorities to freeze assets of a person or company, or otherwise punish them, just because they appear on a U.S. blacklist.

"In Colombia it worked really well. We are not there yet in Mexico," said a senior U.S. Treasury official. "We put out the guidelines, we recommend they [the banks and authorities] consult the lists.… What we want is them to close the accounts. We know they are not doing that."

The list includes lawyers and accountants; horse farms, restaurants, boutiques, milk producers, construction companies and day-care centers; air and land transport fleets; entire networks of seemingly legitimate enterprises allegedly used to help conceal or smuggle billions of dollars of drug money raked in by Mexican cartels every month.

But the blacklisted businesses stay in business.

In December 2007, the U.S. blacklisted the companies and 10 members of the so-called Cazares Salazar Financial Network, which according to U.S. authorities is a booming money-laundering branch of the Sinaloa cartel run by Blanca Cazares, sister of one of the cartel's top chieftains, Victor Cazares.

Two years later, a Times reporter visited one of the blacklisted businesses, part of a chain of Blanca's boutiques in the Sinaloan capital, Culiacan, and found it very much open. Upon buying a piece of clothing, the reporter received a printed receipt; at the top was the name of one of Blanca's alleged accomplices, "designated kingpin" Jorge Patraca Ponce.

More recently, Treasury officials cite as a key success the blacklisting a year ago of a separate group, headed by Alejandro Flores Cacho. For the first time, U.S. officials shared intelligence with their Mexican counterparts before going public. This allowed Mexican authorities to gather the authorizations needed to actually seize or freeze some of the Flores Cacho assets named in the blacklist.

But the forfeiture amounted to no more than $2 million, U.S. officials said, a tiny fraction of the group's earnings.

U.S. authorities allege that Flores Cacho, a pilot, ran a vast air-cargo transport network to move drugs and money for Sinaloa cartel leader Guzman. Flores Cacho remains a fugitive.

Targets of the U.S. sanctions included 16 of Flores Cacho's associates, among them his wife and brother, and 12 front companies. Those included a flight school, hangars, a cattle farm and the La Numero Uno cantina, which on weekends dishes up paella and kid goat.

On a recent day, it was clearly in business. A few tables were occupied as soccer played on TVs arrayed above an expanse of rustic wooden tables. The manager on duty said the blacklist designation had done little to disrupt business — less, in fact, than a construction project on the street in front.

He said the money-laundering charges were "not true," and that owners hoped to persuade U.S. officials to take the cantina off the list.

If the sanctions have not yet had the effect of shutting down drug cartels' businesses, they do appear to have had an unexpected consequence: Several Mexicans who learned they were on the "designated kingpin" list found that their U.S. visas had been revoked, limiting their ability to travel and conduct business they claimed was legitimate.

They went to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City to protest their listing and try to revive their visas. U.S. law enforcement officials stationed at the embassy jumped at the chance to interrogate them, according to a person who participated.

And when the Americans finished asking questions, they telephoned investigators in the Mexican attorney general's office and alerted them they could pick up the alleged cartel associates as they walked out of the embassy. And that they did.

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

wilkinson@latimes.com

Times staff writer Brian Bennett in Washington contributed to this report.

Cops expect banks to help them in their "drug war"

Source

DIRTY MONEY

International banks have aided Mexican drug gangs

By Tracy Wilkinson and Ken Ellingwood, Los Angeles Times

November 27, 2011, 7:16 p.m.

Reporting from Mexico City— Money launderers for ruthless Mexican drug gangs have long had a formidable ally: international banks.

Despite strict rules set by international regulatory bodies that require banks to "know their customer," make inquiries about the source of large deposits of cash and report suspicious activity, they have failed to do so in a number of high-profile cases and instead have allowed billions in dirty money to be laundered.

And those who want to stop cartels from easily moving their money express concern that banks that are caught get off with a slap on the wrist.

Banking powerhouse Wachovia Corp. last year agreed to pay $160 million in forfeitures and fines after U.S. federal prosecutors accused it of "willfully" overlooking the suspicious character of more than $420 billion in transactions between the bank and Mexican currency-exchange houses — much of it probably drug money, investigators say.

Federal prosecutors said Wachovia failed to detect and report numerous operations that should have raised red flags, and continued to work with the exchange houses long after other banks stopped doing so because of the "high risk" that it was a money-laundering operation.

Wachovia was moving money on behalf of the exchange houses through wire transfers, traveler's checks, even large hauls of bulk cash, investigators said. Some of the money was eventually traced to the purchase of small airplanes used to smuggle cocaine from South America to Mexico, they said.

"Wachovia's blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance their operations," U.S. Atty. Jeffrey H. Sloman said in announcing the case last year, hailed at the time by authorities as one of the most significant in stopping dirty money from contaminating the U.S. financial system.

Wachovia paid the $160 million in what is called a deferred-prosecution agreement; no one went to prison, and the fines represented a tiny fraction of the money the bank had filtered. In court documents cited by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Wachovia acknowledged serious lapses.

In a similar case, another banking giant, HSBC Bank, is being monitored by U.S. regulators after a probe last year focused on bulk cash that the bank's U.S. branch received from Mexican exchange houses, money suspected to be drug proceeds.

One of the regulators, the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, said HSBC had "critical deficiencies" in its 2006-2009 reporting of suspicious activities and its monitoring of bulk-cash transfers.

The OCC issued a cease-and-desist order against HSBC, noting, "The bank's compliance program and its implementation are ineffective, and accompanied by aggravating factors, such as highly suspicious activity creating a significant potential for unreported money-laundering or terrorist financing."

After U.S. federal prosecutors issued grand jury subpoenas, some believed that regulators might try to use the HSBC case to set an example and prosecute individual bankers. Instead, HSBC agreed to strengthen its compliance program and has said it is cooperating with investigators, without acknowledging wrongdoing, part of a so-called consent order.

Bryan Hubbard, a spokesman for the OCC, said last month that "OCC examiners continue to monitor actions by the bank to correct deficiencies and comply with that [consent] order."

In Mexico, authorities say they have taken steps to control and monitor money-laundering. Banking regulations in force since 1997 require reporting and canceling of suspicious accounts, and additional measures last year that put limits on dollar deposits in banks further tightened the restrictions.

"We have been able to establish a system of prevention that is quite robust," Jose Alberto Balbuena, head of the Finance Ministry's Financial Intelligence Unit, said in an interview. "We have a much clearer picture today of what dollars are entering the financial system, where they came from, where they are."

The restrictions have also forced traffickers and their launderers to channel more money into other sectors, such as real estate and commerce, avoiding banks altogether. Mexican and U.S. officials are looking to plug those gaps.

Complicity by banks has a deep history that still resonates in Mexico.

Raul Salinas de Gortari, brother of former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, used a maze of accounts in New York-based Citibank and other U.S. banks to secretly transfer millions of dollars to Switzerland in the 1980s and '90s, when he was employed as a middle-ranking bureaucrat.

U.S. congressional investigators alleged that Raul Salinas' wife personally carried check after check to the bank, where Citibank executives asked no questions — despite rampant rumors that linked Salinas to drug lords, and even when Salinas was held on charges that he masterminded the assassination of a top politician. The Salinases claimed that they were victims of a political persecution, the Justice Department and Switzerland investigated, and there were calls for reform of banking secrecy laws.

No criminal charges of money-laundering or illicit enrichment were filed against Salinas. He is a free and wealthy man today. In 2008, Switzerland, which had frozen his bank accounts, returned most of the money.

wilkinson@latimes.com

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

US builds sea fence to stop Mexican immigrant wave

People will probably be cutting holes thru it and sneaking over it even while it is under construction.

Source

US builds sea fence to stop Mexican immigrant wave

AFPAFP – 7 hrs ago

The United States is building a barrier stretching 300 feet (90 meters) out into the Pacific to bar illegal immigrants from using a low-tide route to flood into southern California from Mexico.

The $4.3 million project will replace a dilapidated border fence with an 18-foot (nearly six-meter) high corrosion-proof barrier between Tijuana on the Mexican side and the US side south of San Diego.

"The project we are working on is to replace the existing fence," border patrol official Michael Gimenez told AFP, adding that the new structure will be a total of 1,200 feet (365 meters) long, of which 900 feet (274 meters) will be on land. It is due to be completed in March.

Immigrants have been able to come around the end of the old barrier using jet skis and surf boards, but also by walking along the shoreline at low tide to a beach on the US side of the border, he said.

The fence was also riddled with gaps. "We are replacing those portions, due to the corrosion, due to the salt air and the water corroding the existing pipes," Gimenez said, adding that the new wall should have a 30-year life span.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, hundreds of illegal immigrants would cross, lured by the distant San Diego skyline, according to the Los Angeles Times.

More recently, the beach has hosted demonstrations by critics protesting US illegal immigration policies, and a group of deported immigrants last year walked across the sand border in a symbolic protest.

Medical liquor made at town water plant

This government employee wasn't even arrested or fired for setting up a still to make illegal liquor at his government work site.

Source

Moonshine still found at town's water plant

Nov. 29, 2011 10:43 AM

Associated Press

GROTON, Mass. -- Something with a stronger kick than water was being produced at Groton's water treatment plant.

Town Manager Mark Haddad says a department employee set up a still and was making moonshine on town property.

Haddad tells The Sun of Lowell that "distilling apparatus" was discovered earlier this month inside the Baddacook Water Treatment Plant. The employee was placed on paid administrative leave and later decided to retire.

He did not disclose the former worker's name.

Haddad says the distilling equipment has been confiscated by police.

Police would not say whether they are investigating.

Selectman Peter Cunningham says the still was simply someone's "hobby" and there is no evidence the employee was drinking on the job. [ Wonder if Selectman Peter Cunningham would approve of water plant workers growing medical marijuana at work? Assuming they didn't take any hits during working hours???? ]

California's pot economy explored in 2 TV shows

California's pot economy explored in 2 TV shows

David Wiegand

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Discovery Channel

ALERT VIEWER Weed Wars: Reality series. 10 p.m. Thurs. on Discovery Channel.

POLITE APPLAUSE National Geographic Investigates: Marijuana Gold Rush: Documentary. 9 p.m. Fri. on National Geographic Channel.

It says a lot about how complicated the national debate on marijuana has become that, even together, two new documentaries airing this week barely cover certain aspects of the topic.

One of the challenges facing the producers of both "Weed Wars," a real-life series premiering Thursday on the Discovery Channel, and National Geographic Channel's "Marijuana Gold Rush," a one-off airing Friday, is that the national debate has intensified in just the past two months. On Oct. 7, the federal government's announcement of plans to crack down on medical marijuana dispensaries sent the billion-dollar industry into panic mode - the collective equivalent of swallowing the roach.

But even the perceived moment of clarity from the feds doesn't really help anyone sort out the issues - moral, financial, legal and medical - which have only become more complicated since California became the first state in the nation to legalize pot for medical use in 1996. Since then, 15 other states and the District of Columbia have legalized the sale of medical marijuana, but federal law still classifies the plant as an illegal substance, and the Supreme Court has sided with the feds.

The lack of resolution to the debate between the federal government and the states has not only enabled the industry to grow to such an extent that it rivals illegal drug sales, it has also further complicated the debate itself. The longer it continues, the higher the financial stakes become for revenue-starved local and state governments, and the more the quasi-legal medical pot industry becomes further entrenched in the states' economies.

What the two documentaries airing this week have in common is that they are largely about the financial side of the pot debate. "Weed Wars," whose producers, including Chuck Braverman, have filmed four episodes so far and may film more, focuses exclusively on Harborside Health Center in Oakland.

Said to be the world's largest legal dispensary of medical marijuana, Harborside does about $21 million of business annually and is one of the many legal dispensaries in California that contribute to the $100 million in sales tax the state gets from the pot business. And that doesn't count the amount assessed by the city of Oakland, an issue that consumes Steve DeAngelo, Harborside's executive director, and his staff in the first episode of "Weed Wars."

At issue in "Weed Wars" is whether the new tax imposed by Oakland has to be paid "in advance," as the city terms it, or retroactively for the previous year, which is how DeAngelo and his staff see it. When the law was passed, DeAngelo argues, the city promised the tax would not be retroactive. While his argument may have semantic logic, he learns again that you can't really fight city hall, something of which he's well aware after years of working as an advocate for legalization.

While it's enlightening to see how Harborside operates and to meet the people who make it work, like Harborside co-founder David Weddingdress (he long ago decided he was more comfortable not having to deal with trousers), the focus of "Weed Wars" is sometimes frustratingly narrow. Financial aspect

The financial aspect of the pot debate is viewed only through the lens of Harborside having to raise more than $1 million quickly in order to stay in business. Only by implication are we allowed to consider how much legalized pot already contributes to the economy and how much more it could contribute with better regulation. And as further evidence of how quickly the medical pot debate is ramping up, on Oct. 5 Harborside was hit with a $2.5 million bill in back taxes from the IRS, more than twice as much as it has to raise in the first episode of "Weed Wars" to pay Oakland.

Also by implication, though, we can't help but consider the validity of medical marijuana itself.

We could conclude that someone suffering from a chronic, terminal or debilitating illness may seem to have a justifiable reason to get medical marijuana, but we also meet Terryn, one of the Harborside clerks who looks at his nightly joint as a way of unwinding after a hard day's work.

One might argue that it's the same as having a perfectly legal martini after work. Yet, his mother, a psychologist, is still hoping her son will do something more substantial with his life. For his part, Terryn wants to settle down, but somehow he hasn't gotten around to it.

As we learn in "Marijuana Gold Rush," it doesn't take much to get a doctor's OK for medical pot. One doctor attending Mendocino's annual Emerald Cup pot growers' contest proudly announces he's never said no to anyone asking for a prescription.

While the nation debates medical marijuana, let's not fool ourselves into thinking it's only about something for "medicinal purposes," as they used to say with a knowing wink about hooch during Prohibition. The debate is really about decriminalizing marijuana altogether, with one side arguing that pot is no more harmful than booze and, more important in a time of stubbornly enduring recession, legalization can reap incredible financial rewards for all levels of government and even put people back to work. Prohibition parallels

Coincidentally, as we learned from the Ken Burns-Lynn Novick "Prohibition" documentary this year, economic reasons had much to do with the repeal of the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act in the previous century. They could have a similar impact on pot laws in this one.

Written and directed by Marc Shaffer, "Marijuana Gold Rush" is arguably the more informative of the two films because it looks at various levels of the pot business in Northern California to show how many people are actively involved in it as part of the "marijuana green rush." We meet "ganjapreneurs" Dhar Mann and Derek Peterson at the start of the film as they dive headfirst into creating a kind of Home Depot for pot growers called WeGrow. Their goal is to establish a business empire, and the fact that they don't quite pull it off has nothing to do with the commercial viability of their business plan.

We meet Wall Street investors who don't inhale themselves but are ready to pony up for what they see as an industry about to blossom, much as the liquor industry was during the final days of Prohibition. "Marijuana Gold Rush" also takes us to a factory outside London where GW Pharmaceuticals makes $45 million a year manufacturing pain killers like Sativex, created legally from marijuana plant extracts. It's all entirely above board, and the product has been proved to work and is manufactured for one purpose only, and that is to reduce pain. The intoxicating potential of the pot extracts have been all but nullified.

Sativex, a cannabinoid oral spray, could not be manufactured legally in the United States today.

Even if the feds weren't cracking down right now, it's not easy being legally green in the United States, we learn from Shaffer's film. Like any other business, there are taxes, workers' comp, payroll taxes, insurance and all kinds of other things the illegal pot trade doesn't have to deal with. In other words, despite the financial benefits to be reaped by legalization, even leaving aside the federal-state imbroglio, states haven't made it easy for pot growers to thrive. California focus

Both films focus on California because it was the first state to legalize medicinal marijuana sales and the industry is both larger and more sophisticated than it may be elsewhere in the nation. But in addition to the states that have already adopted some kind of medical marijuana legislation, the rest of the country is already at some level of discussion about the issue. The one thing that's clear from both films airing this week is that there isn't going to be either an easy or a quick resolution to the problem.

E-mail David Wiegand at dwiegand@sfchronicle.com

Dope dealing Sheriff Patrick J. Sullivan locked up in a jailed named after him.

Source

Former “sheriff of the year” arrested and sent to jail named after him

By Eric Pfeiffer

Every civil servant wants to experience his or her legacy firsthand--but not the way that onetime Arapahoe Sheriff Patrick J. Sullivan Jr. has. Sullivan, a nationally renowned law enforcement leader, was arrested on drug charges and is now being detained in the same Denver area jail that was named after him.

Sullivan, who was named the 2001 National Sheriff Association's "Sheriff of the Year," was arrested on suspicion of trafficking methamphetamines.

Local news station CBS4 began an investigation of Sullivan last month on a tip that he had agreed to meet a male informant, providing drugs in exchange for sex. He was subsequently arrested by the South Metro Drug Task Force and is currently being held on a $250,000 bond.

And in an incredible twist of fate, Sullivan now cooling his heels at The Patrick J. Sullivan Jr. Detention Facility, name in his honor.

"The allegations of criminal behavior involving Pat Sullivan are extraordinarily disturbing," said Grayson Robinson, Arapahoe County's current sheriff. "While the arrest of the former sheriff is very troubling, no one, and particularly a former peace officer, is above the law. This is the most shocking thing I've ever been involved with."

Sullivan, 68, has been retired for nine years, but had been serving as director of safety and security for Cherry Creek Schools.

"This is a very sad time for the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office and our community," Robinson said. The CBS4 report also found that for several years Sullivan has been posting bond numerous times for suspects held in drug cases at jail facilities across the state.

As recently as 2008, Sullivan was an active participant in state and local methamphetamine task forces, helping Colorado to draft a plan to deal with the surge in meth-related crime.

In 1995 President Bill Clinton named Sullivan to the National Commission on Crime Prevention and Control. According to a 1995 White House news release, Sullivan was a consultant to U.S. House Subcommittee on Crime and served on two advisory councils affiliated with the Department of Justice.

Killer mold too risky in U.S. war on drugs: report

Source

Killer mold too risky in U.S. war on drugs: report

Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Using fungi to kill coca and other illegal drug crops would be a risky tactic, as there is not enough data about how to control these killer molds and what effect they could have on people and the environment, according to a U.S. government study released on Wednesday.

The U.S. Congress asked scientists to look into whether some types of fungi, called mycoherbicides, could stem the flow of illicit drugs into the United States by killing the plants used to make cocaine, marijuana and opium.

But scientists from the National Research Council, one of the national academies of science that advises U.S. policymakers, said evidence about the fungi was sketchy and incomplete.

"There are too many unresolved questions regarding efficacy -- whether they'll really perform in real-time conditions, and whether they'll be safe to non-target plants," said Raghavan Charudattan, chair of the committee that prepared the report and professor emeritus in the University of Florida's department of plant pathology.

"We did not see any data where a high level of control could be achieved," he said.

Mycoherbicides are toxic fungi that have been used as an environmentally friendly alternative to chemical weedkillers. They can also be targeted to specific plants, and can reproduce themselves, staying in the soil for many years.

But using them on a large scale against illicit drugs has never been tested, Charudattan said. A fungus could kill anywhere from 10 percent to 60 percent of an infected drug crop. It could also fail completely because of too much rain or a drought.

PRACTICAL CHALLENGES

Available evidence also does not address the practical challenges of trying to infect drug crops abroad.

Farmers could easily sabotage any herbicide campaign by using fungicides to protect their crops or cultivate plants resistant to the fungi. Growers could also attack any low-flying aircraft used to spray their crops.

And it is unknown whether the fungi could morph into chemical compounds known as mycotoxins, which are harmful to people, Charudattan said.

Mycoherbicides could also only be used with the permission of a country's government, which has proven a challenge in the past.

Colombia, the world's largest producer of cocaine, refused to approve such fungi to kill its coca plants when the United States proposed it in 2000.

The U.S. government has pushed experimentation with fungal pesticides in Colombia and other parts of Latin America and Asia as a way to combat drug crops.

In the 1990s, the U.S. Department of Agriculture conducted research into the mycoherbicides as a replacement for the chemical fungicides that are sprayed from crop dusters on coca and heroin-poppy crops.

In the past, natural fungal epidemics have killed off poppy crops in Afghanistan and coca crops in Peru.

Congress required government scientists to further study mycoherbicides against illicit drugs as part of a funding bill for the White House drug czar's office in 2006.

(Reporting by Anna Yukhananov; editing by Eric Beech)

Governors Ask U.S. to Ease Rules on Marijuana

Governors Ask U.S. to Ease Rules on Marijuana

By MICHAEL COOPER

Published: November 30, 2011

The governors of Washington and Rhode Island petitioned the federal government on Wednesday to reclassify marijuana as a drug with accepted medical uses, saying the change is needed so states like theirs, which have decriminalized marijuana for medical purposes, can regulate the safe distribution of the drug without risking federal prosecution.

The move by the governors — Christine Gregoire of Washington, a Democrat, and Lincoln D. Chafee of Rhode Island, an independent who used to be a Republican — injected new political muscle into the debate on the status of marijuana, which has been raging for decades. Their states are among the 16 that now allow medical marijuana, but which have seen efforts to grow and distribute the drug targeted by federal prosecutors.

“The divergence in state and federal law creates a situation where there is no regulated and safe system to supply legitimate patients who may need medical cannabis,” the governors wrote Wednesday to Michele M. Leonhart, the administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Marijuana is currently classified by the federal government as a Schedule I controlled substance, the same category as heroin and L.S.D. Drugs with that classification, the government says, have a high potential for abuse and “no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States.”

The governors want marijuana reclassified as a Schedule II controlled substance, which would put it in the same category as drugs like cocaine, opium and morphine. The federal government says that those drugs have a strong potential for abuse and addiction, but that they also have “some accepted medical use and may be prescribed, administered, or dispensed for medical use.”

Such a classification would allow pharmacies to dispense marijuana, in addition to the marijuana dispensaries that currently operate in a murky legal zone in many states.

“What we have out here on the ground is chaos,” Governor Gregoire said in a telephone interview. “And in the midst of all the chaos we have patients who really either feel like they’re criminals or may be engaged in some criminal activity, and really are legitimate patients who want medicinal marijuana.

“If our people really want medicinal marijuana, then we need to do it right, we need to do it with safety, we need to do it with health in mind, and that’s best done in a process that we know works in this country — and that’s through a pharmacist.”

The state of Washington approved medical marijuana in 1998, with a ballot question that won 60 percent of the vote. But like many states, Washington soon found itself in a legal gray area. The Legislature tried to clarify things last spring, when it passed a law that would have explicitly legalized, regulated and licensed marijuana dispensaries and growers.

But the Justice Department warned the governor that growing and distributing marijuana was still against federal law, and said that “state employees who conducted activities mandated by the Washington legislative proposals would not be immune from liability.” Ms. Gregoire, while sympathetic to the goals of the bill, wound up vetoing much of it.

It was similar on the other side of the country, where Rhode Island had passed a law authorizing state-regulated marijuana dispensaries. This fall Governor Chafee announced that he could not go ahead with the plan because federal prosecutors had warned him that the dispensaries could be the targets of prosecution.

On Wednesday Mr. Chafee said that reclassifying the drug could help many people. “Patients across Rhode Island and across the United States, many of whom are in tremendous pain, stand to experience some relief,” he said in a statement.

Other groups have sought reclassification of marijuana in the past, and as recently as this past June the Drug Enforcement Administration denied a petition to do so, based on a review conducted several years earlier. But Ms. Gregoire and Mr. Chafee said the attitude of the medical community had changed since the federal government last reviewed the issue.

In 2009 the American Medical Association changed its position and called for reviewing the classification of marijuana, saying that the current classification was limiting clinical research.

Ms. Gregoire noted that many doctors believe it makes no sense to place marijuana in a more restricted category than opium and morphine. “People die from overdose of opiates,” she said. “Has anybody died from marijuana?”

TV: ‘Weed Wars’ and ‘DUI’

TV: ‘Weed Wars’ and ‘DUI’ — all the way up, then all the way down

By Hank Stuever, Published: November 30

Medical marijuana has been legit for 15 long years in California, and even though it has become a thriving industry, its very existence is somehow still greeted as news of the weird. Legal pot sales, which contribute a tidy sum to state and local tax coffers, are now thought to rival illegal sales there; several other states and the District of Columbia have since legalized medical marijuana or are in some stage of trying to.

You know what else about medical marijuana? It turns something that’s supposed to be illicit fun into something kind of boring. Potheads have never needed any help being uninteresting, but, as we learn Thursday night on Discovery’s new reality series “Weed Wars,” this business is just about as exciting as the gourmet cupcake trade.

The clients are certainly much the same — addicts who like to stand in long lines and make light of how delicious and irresistible they find the product. And the staff behind the counter at a medical marijuana emporium spend just as much time doing what in the cupcake business would be the equivalent of licking the frosting spoon.

Set in Oakland’s Harborside Health Center, which bills itself as the nation’s largest medical marijuana dispensary, “Weed Wars” does a fairly good job of explaining how such a business works. It works greeaaat, man.

Harborside is open every day of the year; customers line up each morning and sales continue apace till nightly close. Some customers still gamely perform the charade of describing for the camera and the sales staff the ailments that qualified them for a doctor’s cannabis prescription: insomnia, lower-back aches, stress . . . “We have some patients that come in here who, uhhh, have less clear medical issues,” observes Terryn, a salesman who works the counter and gives expert advice to customers about the effects, taste and other weed intangibles.

Steve DeAngelo, an aging boomer (and Silver Spring native and Montgomery Blair High School grad) who sports Sitting Bull braids and a sartorial panache, runs the place with the help of his brother and a determined cadre of employees, including an accountant named Luigi and a pants-averse co-owner whose legal name is Dave Weddingdress (he prefers wearing skirts).

“Weed Wars” often verges into infomercial territory as Harborside’s employees extol marijuana’s limitless benefits and make perfectly logical-sounding, Prohibition-era arguments for its legality. That said, “Weed Wars” is not particularly enamored with the finer points of the debate, the costliness of the drug war, or society’s thoughts on pot. It just wants to show some days (and daze) in the life of a business. Another of the show’s threads follows a determined marijuana grower — one of many who supply the store — as he tries to coax his latest bud harvest from the soil.

Harshly, the city passes a law that requires pot stores to pay a year’s worth of sales taxes in advance (a $1 million tab for Harborside), which introduces the only aspect of a “war” in “Weed Wars,” as DeAngelo and the gang suit up, scarf down a cannabis-packed energy bar or two (or three) and head off to fight city hall.

But perhaps the most interesting moment in “Weed Wars” comes when the cameras follow Terryn home. Though he excels at being a marijuana sales clerk, he would like to put his English and philosophy degree to some higher purpose, maybe write books, but never gets around to starting. He tries his hand at marijuana-growing, but his initial efforts fall prey to fungus. Terryn is the first to admit that his ambitions may be curtailed by the big doobie he fires up each night; his mother certainly thinks so, as she prods him to move past a life of weed. In these few simple scenes, “Weed Wars” undoes the case it was cogently attempting to make.

Whatever triumphant feeling it initially evokes, “Weed Wars” drags as the lackadaisical attitudes of both the suppliers and the customers begin to grate on a viewer’s nerves. Ever been in a room where everyone’s high but you? That’s this show.

‘DUI’

Oddly enough, one of the first people pulled over on the Oklahoma byways in TLC’s new “DUI” (also premiering Thursday) is a grandmother whose passengers have been smoking weed. She’s hauled in and given a drug test and made to wait until her family, who live in Arkansas, can scrape together enough money to pay the bail bondsman.

“DUI” is irresistible, picking up where “Cops,” “Jail” and other guilty-pleasure law-enforcement reality series usually don’t go. It is primarily interested in what happens to motorists after they fail a sobriety test. It follows them days and weeks into court appearances and the punitive phase of their charges.

What’s emphasized here are the disastrous financial and personal losses that come for everyday working folks arrested for DUI. Granted, they should never have been behind the wheel, but “DUI” is surprisingly uninterested in MADD-style scolding and more focused on legal process. It’s also refreshingly empathetic to everyone involved and therefore some of the best Christmastime TV you could watch — an excellent holiday reminder to anyone with a driver’s license.

Weed Wars

(one hour) premieres Thursday at 10 p.m. on Discovery.

DUI

(two 30-minute episodes) premieres Thursday at 9 p.m. on TLC.

Tempe, Mesa, and Las Vegas medical marijuana arrests

Six E.V. residents arrested in Tempe, Nevada marijuana investigation

Posted: Thursday, December 1, 2011 1:13 pm

By Mike Sakal, Tribune

Six East Valley residents were arrested Wednesday on suspicion of the illegal sale of marijuana after Tempe and Nevada police officers raided an herbal shop in Tempe and Mesa after a five-month investigation.

About 11 a.m. Wednesday, detectives from the Tempe Police Department's Special Investigations Unit coordinated with the Southern Nevada Cannabis Operation Regional Enforcement Task Force and the Las Vegas Police Department to serve warrants at Yoki A Ma (Your Herbal Solutions) at 1920 E. University Drive, Tempe, and at 4639 E. Virginia, Mesa, as well as the shop of the same name in Las Vegas, according to Tempe police.

The six arrested in connection to the investigation were: Craig Allen Scherf, 45; Nicole Dawn Scherf, 27; and Rodger Murray, 26, all of Chandler; Richard Ray Hagerman, 55, and Mark Siegezwki, 46, of Mesa; and Renee Bruggeman, 41, of Tempe.

During the execution of the search warrants, officers confiscated one pound of marijuana, four handguns, one rifle, one shotgun and $2,000 cash.

The investigation began in July when the Tempe Police Department received information from the City of Tempe Community Development Department that Yoki A Ma was operating without a license. Undercover Tempe detectives visited the business on a number of occasions and during the investigation discovered that the suspects were illegally selling/dispensing marijuana to medical marijuana card holders as a "gift" after receiving $65 to visit the business, according to police.

Craig Scherf submitted an application to the City of Tempe to operate as a medical marijuana dispensary. The permit was denied due to the business' proximity to a residential neighborhood.

372 medical marijuana shops file L.A. business tax paperwork

372 medical marijuana shops file L.A. business tax paperwork

December 1, 2011 | 12:12 pm

Los Angeles is home to more medical marijuana shops than any other city. That much is certain. And more are still opening. But how many there are is usually a guessing game.

Now, however, the city has a new number: 372. That’s how many filed forms with the city’s office of finance by the Oct. 31 deadline in preparation for paying the new pot tax.

But that’s probably not the total number of marijuana businesses in the city. That’s just the number that want to been seen as playing by the city’s rules.

Asha Greenberg, the assistant city attorney who has overseen attempts to shut down illegal stores, said she believes there are at least 500. “I do hear of new ones opening up every day, either from the police department or from irate neighbors,” she said.

In 2005, when the city first tried to figure out how many pot shops it had, the police department found four. A year later, police found 98. And a year after that, when the city required dispensaries to register to stay open during a moratorium, 186 did. About two years ago, city officials believe the number may have peaked at around 850.

In March, L.A. voters approved Measure M, which requires dispensaries to pay a 5% business tax on gross receipts, 10 times more than the next-highest business rate. Janice Hahn, who was then on the City Council, proposed the tax and estimated it would raise at least $10 million. Cannabis businesses will have to pay the tax for this year at the end of February.

The City Council, however, is expected to debate a ban on all dispensaries as soon as January. A recent appeals court decision raised doubts about whether the city has the power to impose significant public safety regulations, such as restrictions on locations. And the ruling also thwarted the city’s plans to cap the number of dispensaries at 100 through a lottery.

But a ban wouldn’t stop the city from collecting the tax from dispensaries that choose to ignore it. “There is considerable precedent around the country and at the state level for collecting taxes even on illegal businesses,” said Jane Usher, a special assistant city attorney.

Cops who are against the "drug war" are fired for their political beliefs!

Of course that is my main statement that the illegal and unconstitutional "war on drugs" is the cause of the problem, not the solution to the problem.

But this article is more about how cops who don't support the government's illegal and unconstitutional "war on drugs" are fired for their political beliefs.

"We all know the drug war is a bad joke, but we also know that you’ll never get promoted if you’re seen as soft on drugs" - Texas police officer who refused to give his name

Source

Police Officers Find That Dissent on Drug Laws May Come With a Price

Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

United States Customs and Border Protection agents waiting to inspect cars at Nogales, Ariz., an area where marijuana smuggling has been active.

By MARC LACEY

Published: December 2, 2011

PHOENIX — Border Patrol agents pursue smugglers one moment and sit around in boredom the next. It was during one of the lulls that Bryan Gonzalez, a young agent, made some comments to a colleague that cost him his career.

Looking for signs of smugglers near Nogales, Ariz., alongside the fence that now marks part of the nation's border with Mexico.

Stationed in Deming, N.M., Mr. Gonzalez was in his green-and-white Border Patrol vehicle just a few feet from the international boundary when he pulled up next to a fellow agent to chat about the frustrations of the job. If marijuana were legalized, Mr. Gonzalez acknowledges saying, the drug-related violence across the border in Mexico would cease. He then brought up an organization called Law Enforcement Against Prohibition that favors ending the war on drugs.

Those remarks, along with others expressing sympathy for illegal immigrants from Mexico, were passed along to the Border Patrol headquarters in Washington. After an investigation, a termination letter arrived that said Mr. Gonzalez held “personal views that were contrary to core characteristics of Border Patrol Agents, which are patriotism, dedication and esprit de corps.”

After his dismissal, Mr. Gonzalez joined a group even more exclusive than the Border Patrol: law enforcement officials who have lost their jobs for questioning the war on drugs and are fighting back in the courts.

In Arizona, Joe Miller, a probation officer in Mohave County, near the California border, filed suit last month in Federal District Court after he was dismissed for adding his name to a letter by Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, which is based in Medford, Mass., and known as LEAP, expressing support for the decriminalization of marijuana.

“More and more members of the law enforcement community are speaking out against failed drug policies, and they don’t give up their right to share their insight and engage in this important debate simply because they receive government paychecks,” said Daniel Pochoda, the legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, which is handling the Miller case.

Mr. Miller was one of 32 members of LEAP who signed the letter, which expressed support for a California ballot measure that failed last year that would have permitted recreational marijuana use. Most of the signers were retired members of law enforcement agencies, who can speak their minds without fear of action by their bosses. But Mr. Miller and a handful of others who were still on the job — including the district attorney for Humboldt County in California and the Oakland city attorney — signed, too.

LEAP has seen its membership increase significantly from the time it was founded in 2002 by five disillusioned officers. It now has an e-mail list of 48,000, and its members include 145 judges, prosecutors, police officers, prison guards and other law enforcement officials, most of them retired, who speak on the group’s behalf.

“No one wants to be fired and have to fight for their job in court,” said Neill Franklin, a retired police officer who is LEAP’s executive director. “So most officers are reluctant to sign on board. But we do have some brave souls.”

Mr. Miller was accused of not making clear that he was speaking for himself and not the probation department while advocating the decriminalization of cannabis. His lawsuit, though, points out that the letter he signed said at the bottom, “All agency affiliations are listed for identification purposes only.”

He was also accused of dishonesty for denying that he had given approval for his name to appear on the LEAP letter. In the lawsuit, Mr. Miller said that his wife had given approval without his knowledge, using his e-mail address, but that he had later supported her.

Kip Anderson, the court administrator for the Superior Court in Mohave County, said there was no desire to limit Mr. Miller’s political views.

“This isn’t about legalization,” Mr. Anderson said. “We’re not taking a stand on that. We just didn’t want people to think he was speaking on behalf of the probation department.”

Mr. Miller, who is also a retired police officer and Marine, lost an appeal of his dismissal before a hearing officer. But when his application for unemployment benefits was turned down, he appealed that and won. An administrative law judge found that Mr. Miller had not been dishonest with his bosses and that the disclaimer on the letter was sufficient.

In the case of Mr. Gonzalez, the fired Border Patrol agent, he had not joined LEAP but had expressed sympathy with the group’s cause. “It didn’t make sense to me why marijuana is illegal,” he said. “To see that thousands of people are dying, some of whom I know, makes you want to look for a change.”

Since his firing, Mr. Gonzalez, who filed suit in federal court in Texas in January, has worked as a construction worker, a bouncer and a yard worker. He has also gone back to school, where he is considering a law degree.

“I don’t want to work at a place that says I can’t think,” said Mr. Gonzalez, who grew up in El Paso, just across the border from Ciudad Juárez, which has experienced some of the worst bloodshed in Mexico.

The Justice Department, which is defending the Border Patrol, has sought to have the case thrown out. Mr. Gonzalez lost a discrimination complaint filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which sided with his supervisors’ view that they had lost trust that he would uphold the law.

Those challenging their dismissals are buoyed by the case of Jonathan Wender, who was fired as a police sergeant in Mountlake Terrace, Wash., in 2005, partly as a result of his support for the decriminalization of marijuana. Mr. Wender won a settlement of $815,000 as well as his old job back. But he retired from the department and took up teaching at the University of Washington, where one of his courses is “Drugs and Society.”

Among those not yet ready to publicly urge the legalization of drugs is a veteran Texas police officer who quietly supports LEAP and spoke on the condition that he not be identified. “We all know the drug war is a bad joke,” he said in a telephone interview. “But we also know that you’ll never get promoted if you’re seen as soft on drugs.”

Mr. Franklin, the LEAP official, said it was natural that those on the front lines of enforcing drug laws would have strong views on them, either way. It was the death of a colleague at the hands of a drug dealer in 2000 that prompted Mr. Franklin, a veteran officer, to begin questioning the nation’s drug policies. Some of his colleagues, though, hit the streets even more aggressively, he said.

Mr. Franklin said he got calls all the time from colleagues skeptical about the drug laws as they are written but unwilling to speak out — yet.

“I was speaking to a guy with the Maryland State Police this past Saturday, and he’s about to retire in January and he’s still reluctant to join us until he leaves,” Mr. Franklin said. “He wants to have a good last couple of months, without any hassle.

Time to boycott Burger King snitches!

Florida Burger King cashier calls cops on 'herb' smoker

Dec. 3, 2011 01:52 PM

Associated Press

DELTONA, Fla. -- Authorities say a central Florida man was arrested after jokingly trying to buy drugs at a Burger King drive-thru.

The Volusia County Sheriff's Office reports that 32-year-old Shawn Porter and a friend placed an order for "blunt and some herbs" at a Deltona Burger King Thursday night.

A cashier smelled marijuana coming from their car and jotted down the license plate of the car, and then a supervisor called 911.

A deputy located Porter's house by running the tag number and was waiting when Porter arrived home with a Burger King bag in his hand. The deputy reported finding 28 grams of marijuana in the car.

Porter was charged with drug possession. He was being held on $1,000 bond. It's not immediately known if he has an attorney.

Isn't the "war on drugs" insane in a sort of Alice in Wonderland way?

And no I didn't make up the title of

"D.E.A. Launders Mexican Profits of Drug Cartels"

Of course that is why I always include the URL of these articles so you can verify them.

Source

D.E.A. Launders Mexican Profits of Drug Cartels

By GINGER THOMPSON

Published: December 3, 2011

WASHINGTON — Undercover American narcotics agents have laundered or smuggled millions of dollars in drug proceeds as part of Washington’s expanding role in Mexico’s fight against drug cartels, according to current and former federal law enforcement officials.

The agents, primarily with the Drug Enforcement Administration, have handled shipments of hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal cash across borders, those officials said, to identify how criminal organizations move their money, where they keep their assets and, most important, who their leaders are.

They said agents had deposited the drug proceeds in accounts designated by traffickers, or in shell accounts set up by agents.

The officials said that while the D.E.A. conducted such operations in other countries, it began doing so in Mexico only in the past few years. The high-risk activities raise delicate questions about the agency’s effectiveness in bringing down drug kingpins, underscore diplomatic concerns about Mexican sovereignty, and blur the line between surveillance and facilitating crime. As it launders drug money, the agency often allows cartels to continue their operations over months or even years before making seizures or arrests.

Agency officials declined to publicly discuss details of their work, citing concerns about compromising their investigations. But Michael S. Vigil, a former senior agency official, said, “We tried to make sure there was always close supervision of these operations so that we were accomplishing our objectives, and agents weren’t laundering money for the sake of laundering money.”

Another former agency official, who asked not to be identified speaking publicly about delicate operations, said, “My rule was that if we are going to launder money, we better show results. Otherwise, the D.E.A. could wind up being the largest money launderer in the business, and that money results in violence and deaths.”

Those are precisely the kinds of concerns members of Congress have raised about a gun-smuggling operation known as Fast and Furious, in which agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives allowed people suspected of being low-level smugglers to buy and transport guns across the border in the hope that they would lead to higher-level operatives working for Mexican cartels. After the agency lost track of hundreds of weapons, some later turned up in Mexico; two were found on the United States side of the border where an American Border Patrol agent had been shot to death.

Former D.E.A. officials rejected comparisons between letting guns and money walk away. Money, they said, poses far less of a threat to public safety. And unlike guns, it can lead more directly to the top ranks of criminal organizations.

“These are not the people whose faces are known on the street,” said Robert Mazur, a former D.E.A. agent and the author of a book about his years as an undercover agent inside the Medellín cartel in Colombia. “They are super-insulated. And the only way to get to them is to follow their money.”

Another former drug agency official offered this explanation for the laundering operations: “Building up the evidence to connect the cash to drugs, and connect the first cash pickup to a cartel’s command and control, is a very time consuming process. These people aren’t running a drugstore in downtown L.A. that we can go and lock the doors and place a seizure sticker on the window. These are sophisticated, international operations that practice very tight security. And as far as the Mexican cartels go, they operate in a corrupt country, from cities that the cops can’t even go into.”

The laundering operations that the United States conducts elsewhere — about 50 so-called Attorney General Exempt Operations are under way around the world — had been forbidden in Mexico after American customs agents conducted a cross-border sting without notifying Mexican authorities in 1998, which was how most American undercover work was conducted there up to that point.

But that changed in recent years after President Felipe Calderón declared war against the country’s drug cartels and enlisted the United States to play a leading role in fighting them because of concerns that his security forces had little experience and long histories of corruption.

Today, in operations supervised by the Justice Department and orchestrated to get around sovereignty restrictions, the United States is running numerous undercover laundering investigations against Mexico’s most powerful cartels. One D.E.A. official said it was not unusual for American agents to pick up two or three loads of Mexican drug money each week. A second official said that as Mexican cartels extended their operations from Latin America to Africa, Europe and the Middle East, the reach of the operations had grown as well. When asked how much money had been laundered as a part of the operations, the official would only say, “A lot.”

“If you’re going to get into the business of laundering money,” the official added, “then you have to be able to launder money.”

Former counternarcotics officials, who also would speak only on the condition of anonymity about clandestine operations, offered a clearer glimpse of their scale and how they worked. In some cases, the officials said, Mexican agents, posing as smugglers and accompanied by American authorities, pick up traffickers’ cash in Mexico. American agents transport the cash on government flights to the United States, where it is deposited into traffickers’ accounts, and then wired to companies that provide goods and services to the cartel.

In other cases, D.E.A. agents, posing as launderers, pick up drug proceeds in the United States, deposit them in banks in this country and then wire them to the traffickers in Mexico.

The former officials said that the drug agency tried to seize as much money as it laundered — partly in the fees the operatives charged traffickers for their services and another part in carefully choreographed arrests at pickup points identified by their undercover operatives.

And the former officials said that federal law enforcement agencies had to seek Justice Department approval to launder amounts greater than $10 million in any single operation. But they said that the cap was treated more as a guideline than a rule, and that it had been waived on many occasions to attract the interest of high-value criminal targets.

“They tell you they’re bringing you $250,000, and they bring you a million,” one former agent said of the traffickers. “What’s the agent supposed to do then, tell them no, he can’t do it? They’ll kill him.”

It is not clear whether such operations are worth the risks. So far there are few signs that following the money has disrupted the cartels’ operations, and little evidence that Mexican drug traffickers are feeling any serious financial pain. Last year, the D.E.A. seized about $1 billion in cash and drug assets, while Mexico seized an estimated $26 million in money laundering investigations, a tiny fraction of the estimated $18 billion to $39 billion in drug money that flows between the countries each year.

Mexico has tightened restrictions on large cash purchases and on bank deposits in dollars in the past five years. But a proposed overhaul of the Mexican attorney general’s office has stalled, its architects said, as have proposed laws that would crack down on money laundered through big corporations and retail chains.

“Mexico still thinks the best way to seize dirty money is to arrest a trafficker, then turn him upside down to see how much change falls out of his pockets,” said Sergio Ferragut, a professor at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico and the author of a book on money laundering, which he said was “still a sensitive subject for Mexican authorities.”

Mr. Calderón boasts that his government’s efforts — deploying the military across the country — have fractured many of the country’s powerful cartels and led to the arrests of about two dozen high-level and midlevel traffickers.

But there has been no significant dip in the volume of drugs moving across the country. Reports of human rights violations by police officers and soldiers have soared. And drug-related violence has left more than 40,000 people dead since Mr. Calderón took office in December 2006.

The death toll is greater than in any period since Mexico’s revolution a century ago, and the current policy of close cooperation with Washington may not survive election-year politics in Mexico.

“We need to concentrate all our efforts on combating violence and crime that affects people, instead of concentrating on the drug issue,” said a former foreign minister, Jorge G. Castañeda, at a conference hosted last month by the Cato Institute in Washington. “It makes absolutely no sense for us to put up 50,000 body bags to stop drugs from entering the United States.”

Drug war threatens democracy

Source

Mexico's President Calderon says drug cartels threaten democracy

December 4, 2011 | 7:20 pm

REPORTING FROM MEXICO CITY -- President Felipe Calderon acknowledged Sunday that despite five years of battling drug cartels, criminals today pose "an open threat" to Mexico's democratic order (link in Spanish).

In a candid speech marking the start of his sixth and last year in the presidency (link in Spanish), Calderon said interference in elections by drug gangs "is a new fact, a worrisome fact." "It is a threat to everyone," he said.

He was apparently alluding to last month's local elections in Michoacan, Calderon's home state, where traffickers and their henchmen intimidated voters and told people whom to vote for. Those events have led to fears about further meddling in July's presidential vote.

Calderon defended his decision to deploy the military to fight the cartels and scolded "political forces" that don't have the "vision" to support the struggle.

"This is a problem, friends, that has been developing for decades and that is showing us its true face, a face of violence, a face of evil," Calderon said. Violence and insecurity, he added, "are one of the greatest challenges Mexico has faced in modern history."

Since Calderon took office in December 2006, more than 40,000 people have been killed in fighting with and among drug gangs, and thousands of Mexicans have gone missing or been forced to flee hometowns.

FAA head placed on leave after drunk driving arrest

Source

FAA head Randy Babbitt placed on leave after drunk driving arrest in Fairfax

By Mary Pat Flaherty and Ashley Halsey III

The head of the Federal Aviation Administration is on administrative leave after being charged with drunk driving Saturday night by Fairfax City police, according to the Department of Transportation.

FAA Administrator Jerome Randolph “Randy” Babbitt, 65, was arrested after being spotted driving on the wrong side of Old Lee Highway, according to the arresting officer.

Babbitt requested the leave and DOT officials are in discussions with legal counsel about Babbitt’s employment status, according to an agency statement. Neither the White House nor the Department of Transportation learned of Babbitt’s arrest until Monday afternoon, administration officials said.

Police pulled him over in the 3900 block of Old Lee Highway, about nine miles from his home in Reston at about 10:30 p.m. He was driving alone and cooperated with police, authorities said. Babbitt, 65, was taken to the adult detention center, where he was charged before being released on his own recognizance.

Deputy FAA Administrator Michael Huerta will take command of the federal agency, according to a statement from the Department of Transportation early Monday afternoon. The statement said the department had learned of the arrest just an hour earlier. Fairfax City police issued a press release on the arrest Monday morning.

(Manuel Balce Ceneta - AP) Babbitt was alone in his vehicle and was not involved in any accident, police said.

Babbitt did not return a call left with the FAA press office.

Babbitt was sworn in as the FAA’s 16th administrator in June 2009. He is a veteran pilot and flew for 25 years for Eastern Airlines, according to his official biography.

Babbitt’s arrest information was made public in accordance with a Fairfax City police general order that says the arrest of public officials, including federal officials, for “any criminal charge or serious traffic charge (e.g. driving under the influence, reckless driving)” will be released.

Babbitt faces a Feb. 2 court appearance, said Sgt. Joe Johnson, a Fairfax City police spokesman.

Fairfax Police do not release the blood-alcohol level of those charged, or the results of roadside sobriety tests, said Johnson. State law defines DWI as a .08 blood alcohol concentration.

Staff writer Ed O’Keefe contributed to this report.

'Saturday Night Live' mocks Miley Cyrus stoner story

Source

'Saturday Night Live' mocks Miley Cyrus stoner story

Dec. 5, 2011 02:14 PM

USA TODAY

"Saturday Night Live," with Steve Buscemi as host, mocked Miley Cyrus and last week's "stoner" story.

A giggling, Dorito-eating "Miley" (Vanessa Bayer) hosts her TV show, and this week Maya Rudolph made an appearance as Whitney Houston.

As Miley laughed, Houston showed off random vocal talents and talked drugs, telling Miley to stay "off of that crack rock." Billy Ray Cyrus (Jason Sudeikis) interrupts to say that Miley "was just using marijuana."

"What, that's it?" said Houston, shocked. "Weed's not a drug! ... I put weed in my cereal this morning! I smoke weed just to go to Target!"

Securing US border impossible

PROMISES, PROMISES: Securing US border impossible

Posted 12/6/2011 7:41 AM ET

By Will Weissert, Associated Press

AUSTIN, Texas — Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich have promised to complete a nearly 1,950-mile fence. Michele Bachmann wants a double fence. Ron Paul pledges to secure the nation's southern border by any means necessary, and Rick Perry says he can secure it without a fence -- and do so within a year of taking office as president.

But a border that is sealed off to all illegal immigrants and drugs flowing north is a promise none of them could keep.

"Securing the border is a wonderful slogan, but that's pretty much all it is," said Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute. "Even to come close would require measures that would make legal commerce with Mexico impossible. That's an enormous price for what would still be a very leaky system."

Perry, the longest-serving governor of a state that makes up roughly 65 percent of America's border with Mexico, already knows that. What he's actually pledging, clarifies spokeswoman Catherine Frazier, is achieving "operational control" of the border -- defined by the U.S. Border Patrol as areas where it can detect, respond to and interdict illegal activity either at the border or after entry into the U.S.

The U.S. Border Patrol says 873 miles of the border, about 44 percent, have been brought under operational control. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has said that "the border is better now than it ever has been."

Still, that means full control isn't even half met. And even getting this far required bolstering the ranks of the Border Patrol to the highest levels ever, from about 9,500 along the border in 2004 to 18,152 today. Immigration and Customs Enforcement also has a record number of agents on the border, and five Predator drones now patrol strategic parts of it, with a sixth coming by the end of the year. About 650 miles of fencing has been constructed, and 1,200 National Guard soldiers dispatched last year to Texas, California, Arizona and New Mexico have had their deployment extended through the end of the year.

Campaigning in Iowa last week, Gingrich signed a pledge to build a fence stretching the length of the border by the end of 2013. That may help him recover from a recent statement that illegal immigrants who have been established in the U.S. for many years should be allowed to remain in the country -- a position his opponents have likened to amnesty.

Perry has steadfastly opposed the fence, saying it would take 10 to 15 years to build, cost $30 billion and wouldn't work anyway. Instead, he wants to flood the border with more National Guard troops until the number of Border Patrol agents necessary to really secure the area are trained and deployed. He also wants to build strategic fencing in high-traffic areas and make better use of airborne surveillance. Perry claims that would mean full operational control by January 2014.

Romney, meanwhile, has publicly agreed with Perry that tackling larger immigration policy reform is impossible without first securing the border.

By some measures, U.S. authorities already have made strides toward that goal. The Pew Hispanic Center says the number of illegal immigrants in the United States peaked at 12 million in 2007, but then dropped by almost 1 million through 2009, and has largely held steady since then at about 11.1 million.

Border Patrol apprehensions of illegal immigrants have also fallen sharply. In fiscal year 2011, which ended Sept. 30, the Border Patrol captured 327,577 illegal immigrants on the southwestern border -- the lowest total in four decades.

The poor U.S. economy makes would-be illegal immigrants less likely to come, and those who do must contend with Mexico's drug war, which has seen cartel gunmen slaughter people heading north and dump their bodies in mass graves. Jeff Passel, the Pew Center's senior demographer, said the trip is now so risky that the number of illegal immigrants using pricey people smugglers has spiked.

"It's hard to separate the effect of the economy and increased enforcement," Passel said. "It's a lot harder physically to get across the border, but it's also more expensive and more dangerous, and you're faced with the prospect of having no job when you get here."

Spillover into the U.S. of Mexican drug violence is also difficult to measure. In terms of violent crime, El Paso, Texas, ranks among the safest cities in the U.S. -- even though it's across from violence-torn Ciudad Juarez. Drug crime aside, Rep. Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican who heads a Homeland Security subcommittee, said he's worried about cartels teaming with international terrorists.

"It's not secure," McCaul said of the border, "and anybody that lives down there, I think, will tell you that." U.S. intelligence officials counter that they know of no case in which a terrorist has sneaked across the border to plot actively against the U.S.

Carpenter, who has written extensively on the increasing brutality of Mexican drug cartels, called the presidential candidates' pledges to secure the border "mainly defensive."

"If you don't take a strong position on border security, you leave yourself open to allegations that you're soft on immigration or drugs," he said.

Michael Lytle, a former consultant on border security and counterterrorism, said it's hard to even conceptualize a fully secure border since the Arizona desert presents different challenges than the millions of commercial trucks rumbling north into Laredo, Texas, or than pedestrians streaming from Tijuana to San Diego. Tracking would-be terrorists also has little to do with stopping migrant workers sneaking into the U.S., or coping with well-armed drug smugglers.

"You can't look at it as 'the whole border,'" he said.

Lytle, an associate professor at the University of Texas at Brownsville, said a deployment of 15,000 National Guard troops could make an impact -- but it would be a hard sell for a Defense Department facing budget cuts.

"A troop surge there, would that seal the border? Probably not," Lytle said. "And even if it did, how long could you sustain that?"

Cost to catch one illegal immigrant along the Mexico border: $6,271

Government Accountability Office told Congress that it takes three people to do the job of one: two Guard soldiers to spot an illegal crosser and one federal agent to catch him.

Sounds like a jobs program for Border Patrol thugs!!!

Source

National Guard deployment on U.S.-Mexico border has unclear results

By William Booth, Published: December 5

HIDALGO, TEX. — President Obama’s decision last year to send 1,200 National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border may have been smart politics, but a growing number of skeptics say the deployment is an expensive and inefficient mission that has made little difference in homeland security.

Critics of the deployment include budget hawks, who say it is a waste of money, and residents here along the border, who say they are tired of seeing armed troops in their back yard.

State Department officials worry that the domestic use of U.S. troops increases the perception that the border is militarized, while Chamber of Commerce boosters say the National Guard presence sends the message that the American side of the border is a dangerous place, though it is not. Crime statistics show that the border is one of the safer regions in the country.

Most of the criticism of the deployment focuses on its costs and benefits. The 1,200 National Guard troops have helped Border Patrol agents apprehend 25,514 illegal immigrants at a cost of $160 million — or $6,271 for each person caught.

“As a mayor, I am not going to say we don’t want more security. But as a taxpayer? I would say something different,” said John David Franz, mayor of Hidalgo, in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley.

Proponents of the mission stress that the guardsmen serve as a deterrent to drug smugglers and illegal immigrants — a role that is impossible to measure in dollars.

Under pressure from governors in the southwestern border states, Obama ordered the deployment, dubbed Operation Phalanx, in July 2010 amid a federal showdown in Arizona over a controversial new law targeting illegal immigrants. Members of Congress — Democrats and Republicans alike — also pushed the president to deploy the Guard, saying they feared that spillover violence from Mexican drug cartels would overwhelm the 2,000-mile frontier.

While citizens might imagine the National Guard patrolling the muddy cane breaks along the Rio Grande in search of drug cartel incursions, many of the troops instead serve as stationary observers, a kind of neighborhood watch with M-16s, often perched 30 feet in the air in skyboxes, portable watchtowers the size of phone booths.

Other troops work the telephones and computers in back offices, as clerks in camouflage.

According to rules of engagement set by the Pentagon, Guard troops are not allowed to pursue, confront or detain suspects, including illegal immigrants, or investigate crimes, make arrests, stop and search vehicles, or seize drugs. Nor do they check Mexico-bound vehicles for bulk cash or smuggled weapons headed to the drug cartels.

“We are the eyes and ears, mainly. We do not have a law enforcement role,” said Maj. Gen. Hugo E. Salazar, head of the Arizona National Guard, who said that his 560 soldiers in Arizona mostly act as an “entry identification team,” watching the border fence.

When the Guard troops spot suspicious activity, they radio Border Patrol agents, who make the apprehensions and drug seizures.

“We don’t chase anybody,” Salazar said.

‘Staring at a fence’

Critics of the deployment say the Guard is doing less than ever. Not only is its role limited, but there are far fewer soldiers than the governors wanted. Under the George W. Bush administration’s Operation Jump Start, more than 6,000 troops were sent to the border between 2006 and 2008, at a cost of $1.2 billion, and they dedicated themselves to building miles of fence and roads.

“This deployment is different. The public perception along the border is that if they see the National Guard at all, they are sitting on a hilltop in lawn chairs, with pair of binoculars, staring at a fence,” said Adam Isacson, an expert in regional security at the Washington Office on Latin America, a think tank.

“With all due respect, the job of the National Guard is not being a Border Patrol agent or customs inspector,” said Monica Weisberg-Stewart, the owner of Gilberto’s Discount House in downtown McAllen, Tex., and chair of the Texas Border Coalition’s security committee.

“We don’t want to see them in McAllen,” she said. “No offense.”

Other residents are more positive. “There aren’t that many of them here, but I think they serve as one more deterrent for the bad guys,” said Hector Ruiz, an air-conditioning repairman in McAllen.

Because the Pentagon is concerned about force protection, the National Guard troops must always work in pairs, while Border Patrol agents often operate alone.

In an August report on the costs and benefits of an increased role for the Defense Department along the U.S.-Mexico border, the Government Accountability Office told Congress that it takes three people to do the job of one: two Guard soldiers to spot an illegal crosser and one federal agent to catch him.

“We pointed out that it is not a very efficient use of manpower,” said Davi D’Agostino, a director at the GAO.

Though there has been a spectacular surge in gruesome killings in Mexico, where more than 43,000 have died in drug violence since late 2006, there is little evidence of spillover into the United States.

The National Guard is working the border at a time when arrests of illegal crossers have fallen to historic lows and the number of Border Patrol agents has soared.

There are now 18,152 Border Patrol agents stationed along the southwestern border, up from 9,100 in 2001. Apprehensions of illegal crossers have fallen by two-thirds, from a high of 1.6 million in 2000 to 447,731 last year. This year’s tally is expected to be lower still, reaching levels not seen since the early 1970s.

‘Is this just politics?’

Border Patrol officials concede that their agents struggle with boredom and to stay awake.

“At a time when apprehensions have plummeted, it is increasingly hard to justify the Guard deployment,” said Doris Meissner, a former commissioner of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service and now a director at the Migration Policy Institute. “With such an enormous investment in our Border Patrol, it is a valid question to ask: Is this just politics?”

Proponents of the deployment point out that the National Guard is credited with helping law enforcement seize 83,629 pounds of marijuana in the past 16 months. That is about 2.6 percent of the tons of pot seized each year along the southwestern border.

During its deployment, the Guard has not assisted in any major seizures of heroin, cocaine or methamphetamine, nor has it been credited with helping take down cartel “kill teams,” cross-border kidnappers or major trafficking networks, according to information provided by the Customs and Border Protection agency.

“I would thank them warmly for their valuable service, send them home and invest the millions saved in better inspections at the ports, beefing up international efforts to target cartel leaders and getting the Treasury Department . . . into action” to go after cartel money launderers, said Terry Goddard, a former Arizona attorney general.

This summer, at the urging of congressional leaders, Obama extended the National Guard deployment until the end of 2011. Most political observers expect the administration to continue the mission through the 2012 election year.

LAPD commanders' personal information posted on website

If these pigs were busy arresting REAL criminals I wouldn't have a problem with them. But two thirds of the people in American prisons are not there for real crimes, they are there for victimless drug war crimes.

Source

LAPD commanders' personal information posted on website

By Andrew Blankstein, Los Angeles Times

December 8, 2011

Personal information about more than two dozen members of the Los Angeles Police Department's command staff was anonymously posted on a website, officials said Wednesday.

The LAPD is investigating who may be behind the site, which listed officers' property records, campaign contributions, biographical information and, in a few cases, the names of children and other family members.

In the last few months, hackers have tried to break into the servers of several public agencies including the LAPD, the Fullerton Police Department and the Bay Area Rapid Transit system.

Department officials said it appeared that the information was gleaned from public records, and there was no evidence that the LAPD's computer records had been breached.

The information was posted on a site that allows users to anonymously input data. This type of site has increasingly been used to post personal information of individuals who raise the ire of online activists. The practice is known as "doxing."

For much of Wednesday, most of the links to the site could not be accessed, but the information reappeared on a separate website late in the day.

LAPD Cmdr. Andy Smith said the department could not move to shut the site down because officials could not prove the data was illegally obtained.

"It's a creepy thing to do, but what they did doesn't appear to be against the law," Smith said.

Several postings were linked to from a publicly available Twitter account, where unnamed activists claimed responsibility for the document dump. Some of the posts reference the shadowy computer hacking group "Anonymous" as well as Occupy L.A., but no specific links to either could be established.

"We stand with OccupyLA," one of the postings reads. Another message refers to posted documents related to the Denver and Philadelphia police departments.

Los Angeles police say there has been a recent uptick in attempts to hack into the department's computers and website. None have been successful.

Sgt. Frank Preciado, who oversees the LAPD's online unit, said most of the attacks on department servers have come in the form of attempts to hack into, slow or lock up the department's public website. As for personal information, Preciado said computer hackers "would find zero other than names and email addresses."

Members of Anonymous advocate for civil disobedience by hacking into computer systems and releasing private and classified information.

Anonymous posted an online video listing the personal contact information — including the home address, home telephone and cellphone numbers and email address — of the UC Davis officer who used pepper spray on students last month.

In the video, the mysterious group directly addresses the officer, telling him to "expect our wrath" and threatening, "We are going to make you squeal," as footage of him dousing passive protesters is seen in the background.

Smith said the LAPD has warned officers to be careful about any personal information that they make available in the public domain, but such breaches represent a safety issue for all law enforcement.

"Of course there are concerns when officers' private information is disseminated on public websites," Smith said. "Part of our business is putting bad guys in jail, and they don't need to know personal information about our officers. We are very concerned for the safety of our officers and their families."

andrew.blankstein@latimes.com

"Daily Show" ask Florida governor to take drug test :)

Source

"Daily Show" pulls stunt on Florida governor

TALLAHASSEE, Florida (Reuters) - Florida Governor Rick Scott, who supports drug testing for state employees and welfare applicants, was asked on Wednesday to prove he was drug-free himself by urinating into a cup.

The request came from actor and comedian Aasif Mandvi of Comedy Central's satirical "The Daily Show".

Mandvi offered to have everyone in the room turn around, to give Scott privacy, as he asked him to "pee into this cup."

"You benefit from hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars over the year, so would you be willing to prove to Florida taxpayers that you're not on drugs?" Mandvi asked the Republican governor at a news conference.

Scott, without smiling or seeming to get the joke, said, "I've done it plenty of times," but then moved on quickly to questions from other reporters.

Scott, a 59-year-old former healthcare executive who became governor in January, is defending a law requiring drug tests for state employees and sponsored legislation requiring drug testing for welfare applicants.

San Francisco lab tech pleads not guilty to stealing cocaine

Source

Ex-SF lab tech pleads not guilty to cocaine charge

Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer

Thursday, December 8, 2011

A former San Francisco crime lab technician pleaded not guilty Wednesday to a federal charge of fraudulently making off with cocaine she was supposed to be testing, conduct her lawyer said was not even a federal crime.

Deborah Madden, 61, spent 29 years as a civilian employee of the Police Department laboratory at Hunters Point before resigning while under investigation in late 2009.

She told police in February 2010 that she had taken small amounts of cocaine from five evidence samples and brought it home for personal use. Her supervisor later reported that cocaine was missing from 11 samples Madden had tested.

The state attorney general's office decided not to prosecute Madden a year ago, saying there was insufficient evidence that she had stolen the drugs. But a federal grand jury indicted her Dec. 1 on a charge of obtaining illegal drugs by fraud or misrepresentation, punishable by up to four years in prison. She is free without bail.

After her arraignment Wednesday, defense lawyer Paul DeMeester said Madden was being prosecuted under an obscure and seldom-used law that doesn't apply to her alleged misdeeds.

He said the leading case interpreting the law, by a federal appeals court in 1995, overturned the conviction of a doctor who had siphoned morphine from a patient's intravenous medicine bag.

The court said the doctor might have been charged with stealing the drugs but couldn't be convicted of acquiring them fraudulently because he had obtained them legally to administer to the patient. That's equally true of Madden, DeMeester said.

"The drugs landed on her desk as part of her job," the lawyer said. "The feds are wasting precious tax dollars on a case that is without federal importance or connection."

The revelations about Madden, and an audit that found shoddy work at the crime lab's drug unit, forced the shutdown of the unit in March 2010 and led to the dismissal of hundreds of drug cases.

Madden pleaded guilty in June to a separate state charge of possessing cocaine in San Mateo County, where she lives.

E-mail Bob Egelko at begelko@sfchronicle.com.

Medical marijuana attorneys want judge to order Brewer to follow law

So it looks like Jan Brewers reason for not implementing the medical marijuana dispensaries is 100 percent bullshit!!!!

Source

Medical marijuana attorneys want judge to order Brewer to follow law

Posted: Thursday, December 8, 2011 12:07 pm

By Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services

Attorneys for would-be marijuana dispensaries asked a state judge Wednesday to order Gov. Jan Brewer to follow the law approved by voters and begin issuing licenses as the statute directs.

"I don't care whether she likes it or doesn't like it," Ty Taber told Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Richard Gama. "Her sole job and responsibility is to implement that act."

Assistant Attorney General Lori Davis did not dispute that last year's voter-approved law requires the state Department of Health Services to license about 125 dispensaries where certified medical marijuana users can obtain the drug. And she conceded that Brewer has, in fact, directed the Department of Health Services not to issue any of those licenses.

But Davis told Gama the governor has a good reason.

She said the Department of Justice has sent various memos to officials in Arizona and elsewhere warning that marijuana remains illegal under the federal Controlled Substances Act. More to the point, Davis said, those memos make it clear that there is no shield from federal prosecution for state employees who are administering local marijuana laws.

That, she said, could include going after state employees who help issue licenses to marijuana retailers under federal laws making it a crime to facilitate violation of federal laws. Davis said part of Brewer's job is to protect state workers from possible federal prosecution.

"It's no laughing matter for the employees that are having to put themselves on the line just to do their jobs, pay their bills, when there are no other jobs out there for them to get even if they wanted to," Davis said.

Davis said those concerns were exactly why Brewer, after directing that no dispensaries be licensed, filed a separate lawsuit in federal court asking for a declaration of whether state workers can, in fact, be prosecuted for just doing their jobs. The first hearing on that case is set for Monday.

But Taber told Gama that is irrelevant to the central question of whether Brewer has any authority in the first place to ignore a legally adopted statute.

"The governor needs to be told, by you, to do her job, just as it's for you to do your job in telling her what her responsibilities are if she will not live up to them," he said.

The law allows those with a doctor's recommendation to get a permit from the state to obtain up to 2 1/2 ounces of marijuana every two weeks. Davis told Gama state health officials already have issued nearly 16,400 such permits since the law took effect earlier this year and continue to process new applications.

But Brewer directed state Health Director Will Humble not to implement the rest of the law which sets up a system of non-profit dispensaries for people to get their drugs.

Davis told Gama if he does not throw out the challenge, the least he should do is wait to see what U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton rules in the state's own lawsuit seeking a declaration of immunity for its workers. Gama, however, appeared not too receptive to that idea.

First, Gama questioned whether Bolton will even allow the case to proceed. He said it appears the state wants an "advisory opinion" on the scope of the Controlled Substances Act, something federal judges are loath to provide.

And Gama said even if Bolton agrees to consider the matter, she really has little choice but to say that the federal law is valid.

But Davis said the state did not go to federal court to find an excuse to ignore the medical marijuana law. Instead, she said, it wants a determination of whether what state workers would be doing in issuing licenses is exempt.

One section of the federal laws says that officers of the state are not subject for liability if they are "lawfully engaged in the enforcement of any law or municipal ordinance relating to controlled substances."

Davis conceded what Congress probably had in mind is ensuring that undercover cops could not be busted for having drugs and that state court personnel who handle the evidence would not be arrested for possessing illegal drugs. But she said an argument could be made that the exemption is wide enough to cover the activities of state health department employees.

Gama seemed unconvinced any of that matters. He said he doubts the opinion of a single federal judge could block federal prosecutors from pursuing charges.

Anyway, he said, whichever side loses is likely to appeal. And Gama appeared uninterested in waiting for years while that process unwinds before he can rule on the question in his own court: Does Brewer have the power to unilaterally refuse to implement a legally approved law.

Brewer's refusal to license any dispensaries has not entirely thwarted the law.

One provision of the act says that certified marijuana users who live at least 25 miles from a dispensary can grow their own marijuana. With no dispensaries, that applies to everyone.

Several "cannabis clubs" also have sprung up around the state where medical cardholders can get free samples of the drug which have been grown or donated by other legal marijuana users. The law does allow such transfers if no money is exchange.

But the state, in a separate lawsuit, is trying to shut those down, saying the fact someone has to pay to be a member of the club or enter the premises amounts to the illegal sale of the drug.

US provided aerial surveillance of Jamaican raid

The article doesn't say it, but I think this guy was busted for drug war crimes and extradited to the US.

Sadly the American Empire expects every country in the world to participate in our evil drug war.

Source

US provided aerial surveillance of Jamaican raid

By HOWARD CAMPBELL

KINGSTON, Jamaica (AP) — A U.S. surveillance plane helped monitor the deadly 2010 raid by Jamaican security forces to capture a fugitive crime boss, the prime minister said, reversing earlier government denials.

A U.S. P-3 Orion aircraft provided aerial surveillance of the effort to capture Christopher "Dudus" Coke, Prime Minister Andrew Holness told reporters Thursday. The raid set off a fierce battle in a West Kingston slum that left more than 70 people dead.

Holness said the U.S. had no other role in the raid in the Tivoli Gardens neighborhood.

"We would want to reaffirm our position that the U.S. Government or its military did not participate in the operations in West Kingston," he said.

His statement came a day after Minister of National Security Dwight Nelson said at a news briefing that the U.S. had not provided any surveillance of the raid, denying a report in The New Yorker magazine.

Holness said that Nelson made the statement in error because Nelson was not aware of the details of the U.S. assistance. Previous government statements had also denied any U.S. role in the operation. The prime minister said the surveillance was coordinated between the Jamaican Defense Force and the "relevant government agency" in the U.S.

"The United States Government initially made an offer to provide surveillance and technical equipment," he said. "We accepted and followed the normal protocol of exchanging diplomatic notes to provide the government-to-government cover for such assistance."

Ocsar Derby, director of Jamaica's Civil Aviation Authority, said Friday that officials with the island's Defense Force had advised him the U.S. craft would conduct a surveillance mission.

"We made sure to keep other aircraft away from the area," he said.

The hunt for Coke in his West Kingston slum stronghold led to a confrontation that killed 73 civilians and three security officers over four days of fighting. He was captured by Jamaican authorities in June 2010 and extradited to the U.S., where he pleaded guilty in August to racketeering and assault charges. He faces up to 23 years in prison when he is sentenced.

Drug tests to get unemployment benefits?

While I am against all government welfare programs, unemployment insurance, technically is NOT a government welfare program. In Arizona and most states employees have to purchase unemployment insurance for a number of months before they can get unemployment benefits.

Source

Bill seeks to require drug screening for jobless benefits

December 9, 2011 | 11:31 am

Legislation introduced by Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) would require applicants for federally subsidized jobless benefits to fill out a drug screening questionnaire to determine whether they should have to take a drug test. Those identified as having a high probability of drug use would be required to pass a drug test.

"Drug screening as a condition of unemployment benefits safeguards valuable taxpayer dollars by ensuring job seekers are at their competitive best for re-employment and helps to reduce the nation’s debt by not using federal resources to enable an individual’s drug dependency,’’ Kingston said in a letter to colleagues seeking their support.

The proposal has already drawn partisan criticism:

“This is just another attempt to demonize the unemployed, most of whom have no job for no fault of their own," said Rep. George Miller of California, top Democrat on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. "Why doesn’t he propose to drug test executives at Wall Street banks? It was their actions that have been documented to have directly contributed to the recession and high unemployment rate in the first place.”

Kingston said he came up with the idea after an employer in his district told him that half his job applicants failed a drug test.

"While we need a safety net, taxpayers should not be on the hook to pay someone who renders themselves ineligible for work," he said in a statement. He said his proposal "incentivizes beneficiaries to ensure they are preparing themselves to re-enter the workforce.”

Under the legislation, applicants for unemployment benefits would be required to complete a drug screening assessment form approved by the National Institutes of Health, "to measure a person’s level of probability for drug abuse,’’ says a summary of the proposal on Kingston’s website.

Individuals screened as having a high probability for drug use would be required to pass a drug test in order to receive benefits.

States can deny unemployment benefits for jobless who are fired for willful misconduct, such as drug abuse. But existing federal law prohibits states from requiring unemployed workers to take a drug test as part of the initial application for unemployment insurance, said George Wentworth, senior staff attorney at the National Employment Law Project.

Wentworth said in an interview that there is "no reason to single out the unemployed as a particular category that is more likely to be abusing drugs. There is no justification for it. The vast majority of unemployed Americans have fallen on hard times and are looking hard for another job."

He said that state efforts to require drug testing for other forms of public benefits have proven costly.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott won passage of a state law this year requiring drug testing for welfare recipients, but the measure has been put on hold by a federal judge.

“With long-term unemployment at record levels, Congress should be focused on renewing federal unemployment benefits , not devising new ways to insult American families struggling to hold it together until they can find that next job,” Wentworth said.

Want to legalize drugs? Vote for Ron Paul!!!

While I have a few disagreements with Ron Paul, I would certainly vote for him. That is something would never do for any other mainstream Republican or Democrat. For my disagreements with Ron Paul see item number 2 in Nick Gillespie's article.

Last but not least if you want to end America's insane, unconstitutional war on drugs, Ron Paul is the man to vote for! Same goes for ending the the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and bringing home all the American troops stationed in 100+ countries around the world!

Source

Five myths about Ron Paul

By Nick Gillespie, Published: December 9

Ron Paul is the Rodney Dangerfield of Republican presidential candidates. The 12-term Texas congressman ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket back in 1988 and was widely seen as a sideshow in 2008, despite finishing third in the GOP field behind John McCain and Mike Huckabee. Why, despite a small but devoted set of supporters, does this 76-year-old obstetrician turned politician routinely get no respect from the media and GOP operatives? Let’s take a look at what “Dr. No” — a nickname grounded in his medical career and his penchant for voting against any bill increasing the size of government — really stands for.

1. Ron Paul is not a “top-tier” candidate.

At some point in the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, the mainstream media became more obsessed than usual with designating GOP hopefuls as “top-tier” candidates, meaning “people we want to talk about because we find them interesting or funny or scary.” Or more plainly: “anybody but Ron Paul.”

Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul said Thursday evening that Bush administration officials were gleeful after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks because it gave them a pretext to invade Iraq. (Dec. 9)

Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul said Thursday evening that Bush administration officials were gleeful after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks because it gave them a pretext to invade Iraq. (Dec. 9)

Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has been accorded top-tier status from the start, but otherwise it’s been a rogues’ gallery. As their numbers soared, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and pizza magnate Herman Cain enjoyed stints in the top tier, and former House speaker Newt Gingrich is now ensconced in that blessed circle.

Back in August, Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.) was designated “top tier” after winning Iowa’s Ames Straw Poll.Paul was not, despite losing to her by only about 150 votes. And when Paul won the presidential straw poll of about 2,000 attendees at the Family Research Council’s Values Voter Summit in Washington in October, the contest’s organizer pronounced him “an outlier in this poll.”

Yet Paul is doing increasingly well in national and state-level polls. He’s running in second place in Iowa ahead of the Jan. 3 caucuses and third in the New Hampshire primary — the first two contests for the GOP nomination. And now that Cain has dropped out, Paul’s stock is likely to keep climbing. The congressman is no less a top-tier candidate than anyone else in the race.

2. Ron Paul is a doctrinaire libertarian.

Yes, he once ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket and was accurately described by New York Times columnist Gail Collins last month as against “gun control, the death penalty, the C.I.A., the Civil Rights Act, prosecuting flag-burners, hate crime legislation, foreign aid, the military draft under any circumstances, campaign finance reform, the war on drugs, the war on terror and the war on porn.” But Paul parts company with many libertarians on many issues.

These include immigration, where he favors ending birthright citizenship and reducing the number of newcomers until the welfare state is dismantled. Paul says abortion law should be settled at the state level, but in Congress in 2005, 2007, 2009 and this year he introduced the Sanctity of Life Act, which would define life as beginning at conception.

In theory he supports free-trade agreements, but he votes against them, dismissing them as “managed trade.” He’s known for adding earmarks to spending bills he votes against, thus bringing home pork while maintaining his “Dr. No” credentials. As a result, says David Boaz of the libertarian Cato Institute, Paul is “an imperfect messenger” for libertarians’ small-government gospel.

3. Ron Paul’s call to “end the Fed” is crazy.

Paul’s 2009 “End the Fed” manifesto pretty much gives away the plot in the title. But the book sold well and drew respectful notices not just from folk singer Arlo Guthrie and actor Vince Vaughn, but also from the likes of media magnate and former GOP presidential candidate Steve Forbes. “History,” Forbes wrote in a review of Paul’s book, “will judge that Paul had it right when it came to the Fed and its often misbegotten monetary policies.” David Stockman, the former Republican congressman and Reagan budget director, has said that “our monetary system is out of control” and that Paul is the “one guy who understands it.”

Far more important is Paul’s bill to audit the Fed, which has been introduced three years in a row and hasn’t passed, but had more than 300 co-sponsors in the House in 2009. Paul introduced a new version in January that has 195 co-sponsors drawn from both parties. That sustained interest and the ongoing controversy over the Fed’s role in bank bailouts — and the fact that both the tea party and the Occupy Wall Street movement have cast a gimlet eye on Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke — strongly suggest that auditing the nation’s central bank is an idea whose time has come.

4. Ron Paul is anti-military.

Unlike his fellow, er, top-tier candidates Gingrich and Romney, Paul served his country in uniform, as an Air Force captain. However, his opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and his insistence that military spending can be cut without endangering U.S. lives, have led some to conclude that his foreign policy non-interventionism equals unilateral disarmament.

While Pentagon brass might oppose his defense cuts, troops seem to like what he is saying. According to his campaign’s analysis of Federal Election Commission reports from the third quarter of this year, Paul has raised more money from active military personnel than all other GOP competitors combined, and even more than President Obama.

Paul, who has said that “we can defend ourselves with submarines and all our troops back at home,” wants to radically change defense policy and withdraw troops from war zones and bases around the world. He is clearly against the military-industrial complex, but if soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen are opening their wallets to support his White House bid, he can’t accurately be branded “anti-military.”

5. Ron Paul has strong youth support because he wants to legalize drugs.

A medical doctor by training and a grandfather, Paul leaves no doubt as to whether drugs — and cigarettes and trans fat, for that matter — should be legal. “Why shouldn’t you have free decisions on what you eat, drink, smoke and put into your own body?” he told an audience of 1,000 University of Iowa students in October. Yet the devout Christian is no libertine, telling the same crowd, “You also have to assume responsibility for any bad choices you make, and you can’t go to your neighbor or to your government to bail yourselves out.”

Paul’s popularity among younger voters — he’s called a “rock star” on the college circuit — stems from the idealism of his politics. Kids rally behind his faith in the future, belief in the individual and confidence in bottom-up decision-making. He may look like Timothy Leary, the countercultural guru who famously held a Beverly Hills fundraiser for Paul’s 1988 presidential bid, but he’s not talking about turning on, tuning in and dropping out.

gillespie@reason.com

Nick Gillespie, the editor of Reason.com and Reason.tv, is a co-author of “The Declaration of Independents: How Libertarian Politics Can Fix What’s Wrong With America.”

Source

Ron Paul, spoiler?

By George F. Will, Published: December 9

On Oct. 12, 1948, the campaign train of Tom Dewey, the Republican nominee against President Harry Truman, pulled into Beaucoup, Ill., where, from the rear platform, he would speak to about 1,000 people. Before he began, the engineer mistakenly caused the train to lurch a few feet backward, frightening some but injuring none.

Dewey, however, hurt himself by angrily saying into the microphone, “That’s the first lunatic I’ve had for an engineer. He probably ought to be shot at sunrise.” Dewey’s “cold arrogance” (Truman biographer David McCullough’s description) reinforced the public’s impression of an unsympathetic and prickly politician.

Truman ran against a Republican-controlled Congress but won because Dewey was off-putting. And Truman won despite two splinter candidacies from his party — those of former vice president Henry Wallace on the left and South Carolina Gov. Strom Thurmond on the right. Each won 2.4 percent of the popular vote.

Because Thurmond’s support was regionally concentrated, he won 39 southern electoral votes. If Truman had lost two of three states — Ohio, Illinois and California (he won them by just 7,000 votes, 34,000 and 18,000, respectively) — no candidate would have won an electoral vote majority, and the House of Representatives would have picked the president. If Dewey had won all three, he would have been president.

So, small vote totals for independent candidacies can have huge potential consequences. Which brings us to Ron Paul.

When recently asked if he might mount an independent candidacy, he said: “I’m not thinking about it because, look, I’m not doing badly right now. . . . So we concentrate only on one thing: Keep moving up in the polls, and see how things come out in a month or two.”

He is in the top tier in Iowa and would alienate Republican voters if he indicated an interest in bolting the party next autumn. Nationally, his ceiling is low, but his floor is solid: His supporters are inclined to accept no substitutes because no other candidate espouses anything like his high-octane blend of libertarianism and isolationism.

Furthermore, he is now nationally known (he campaigned for the 2008 Republican nomination and was the Libertarian Party’s 1988 presidential candidate) and has a large base of small donors. His intense supporters probably could get his name on most states’ ballots. He is not seeking reelection to his House seat, so what has he got to lose?

Well, his candidacy might guarantee Barack Obama’s reelection, and this might hurt the career of his son Rand, the freshman senator from Kentucky. Other than that, however, Ron Paul may think what his ideology implies — that Obama is only marginally more mistaken than Paul’s Republican rivals, who do not wake up each day angry about the 1913 Federal Reserve Act.

So, assume three things. That Obama is weaker in 2012 than he was when winning just 53 percent of the vote in 2008. That Paul could win between 5 percent and 7 percent of the vote nationally (much less than the 18 percent that a recent NBC-Wall Street Journal poll showed were prepared to vote for Paul as an independent). And that at least 80 percent of Paul’s votes would come at the expense of the Republican nominee.

Based on states’ results in 2000, 2004 and 2008, and on states’ previous votes for third-party candidates, and on current polling about the strength of potential Republican nominees in particular states, it is plausible to conclude that a Paul candidacy would have these consequences:

●It would enable Obama to carry two states he lost in 2008: Missouri (11 electoral votes), which he lost by 0.13 points, and Arizona (11), which he lost by 8.52 points to native son John McCain.

●It would enable Obama to again win four states he captured in 2008 and that the Republican nominee probably must win in 2012: Florida (29), Indiana (11), North Carolina (15) and Virginia (13).

●It would secure Obama’s hold on the following states he won in 2008 but that Republicans hope to take back next year: New Mexico (5), Colorado (9), Nevada (6), Michigan (16), Ohio (18), Pennsylvania (20) and New Hampshire (4).

At a minimum, a Paul candidacy would force the Republican nominee to spend time and money in places he otherwise might be able to economize both. And a Paul candidacy would make 2012 much easier for Obama than 2008 was. Now, reread Paul’s words quoted above, particularly these: “right now” and “in a month or two.”

georgewill@washpost.com

Forced sterilizations in Nazi Germany? Nope, make that North Carolina!

Source

Thousands Sterilized, a State Weighs Restitution

By KIM SEVERSON

Published: December 9, 2011

LINWOOD, N.C. — Charles Holt, 62, spreads a cache of vintage government records across his trailer floor. They are the stark facts of his state-ordered sterilization.

The reports begin when he was barely a teenager, fighting at school and masturbating openly. A social worker wrote that he and his parents were of “rather low mentality.” Mr. Holt was sent to a state home for people with mental and emotional problems. In 1968, when he was ready to get out and start life as an adult, the Eugenics Board of North Carolina ruled that he should first have a vasectomy.

A social worker convinced his mother it was for the best.

“We especially emphasized that it was a way of protecting Charles in case he were falsely accused of having fathered a child,” the social worker wrote to the board.

Now, along with scores of others selected for state sterilization — among them uneducated young girls who had been raped by older men, poor teenagers from large families, people with epilepsy and those deemed to be too “feeble-minded” to raise children — Mr. Holt is waiting to see what a state that had one of the country’s most aggressive eugenics programs will decide his fertility was worth.

Although North Carolina officially apologized in 2002 and legislators have pressed to compensate victims before, a task force appointed by Gov. Bev Perdue is again wrestling with the state’s obligation to the estimated 7,600 victims of its eugenics program.

The board operated from 1933 to 1977 as an experiment in genetic engineering once considered a legitimate way to keep welfare rolls small, stop poverty and improve the gene pool.

Thirty-one other states had eugenics programs. Virginia and California each sterilized more people than North Carolina. But no program was more aggressive.

Only North Carolina gave social workers the power to designate people for sterilization. They often relied on I.Q. tests like those done on Mr. Holt, whose scores reached 73. But for some victims who often spent more time picking cotton than in school, the I.Q. tests at the time were not necessarily accurate predictors of capability. For example, as an adult Mr. Holt held down three jobs at once, delivering newspapers, working at a grocery store and doing maintenance for a small city.

Wealthy businessmen, among them James Hanes, the hosiery magnate, and Dr. Clarence Gamble, heir to the Procter & Gamble fortune, drove the eugenics movement. They helped form the Human Betterment League of North Carolina in 1947, and found a sympathetic bureaucrat in Wallace Kuralt, the father of the television journalist Charles Kuralt.

A proponent of birth control in all forms, Mr. Kuralt used the program extensively when he was director of the Mecklenburg County welfare department from 1945 to 1972. That county had more sterilizations than any other in the state.

Over all, about 70 percent of the North Carolina operations took place after 1945, and many of them were on poor young women and racial minorities. Nonwhite minorities made up about 40 percent of those sterilized, and girls and women about 85 percent.

The program, while not specifically devised to target racial minorities, affected black Americans disproportionately because they were more often poor and uneducated and from large rural families.

“The state owes something to the victims,” said Governor Perdue, who campaigned on the issue.

But what? Her five-member task force has been meeting since May to try to determine what that might be. A final report is due in February.

This week, the task force set some priorities. Money was the most important thing to offer victims, followed by mental health services.

How much to pay is a vexing question, and what North Carolina does will be closely watched by officials in other states. In a period of severe budget cuts and layoffs, money for eugenics victims can be a hard sell to legislators.

States began practicing eugenics in earnest in the United States in the 1920s and ’30s, driven by a philosophy of social engineering once so popular that President Woodrow Wilson, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. of the Supreme Court and Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, were ardent supporters.

Before most of the programs were closed down, more than 60,000 people nationwide had been sterilized by state order.

The reasons were chilling, reports from state records and interviews with survivors and researchers show.

There was a 14-year-old girl deemed low-performing and “oversexed” who came from a home with poor housekeeping standards. A man who raped his daughter at 12 signed her sterilization consent when she was 16 and pregnant. A mother of five was deemed to have a low I.Q.

Victims began filing a handful of lawsuits in the 1970s, but outrage has been slow to build. In 2002, The Winston-Salem Journal ran a series of articles on eugenics, prompting official apologies and initial legislative efforts aimed at compensating victims.

But nothing came of it until Governor Perdue, a Democrat, took up the cause. She has vowed to put money in the 2012 budget. The House speaker, Thom Tillis, a Republican, said in October that he, too, would work on a bill to compensate victims.

But how much to include? Is $20,000 per victim, a figure suggested by some, enough?

“How can you quantify how much a baby is worth to people?” asked Charmaine Fuller Cooper, executive director of the North Carolina Justice for Sterilization Victims Foundation, which is financed by the state. “It’s not about quantifying the unborn child, it’s about the choices that were taken away.”

The issues go deeper than just a dollar amount. The task force has to decide whether money should go only to those living or to the estates of the dead, whether a tubal ligation is worth more than a vasectomy.

One variable is how many people will actually sign up to get the money. The state estimates that about 3,000 victims of state-mandated sterilizations may still be alive. Of those, 68 have been verified in state records. But not all sterilizations were done through the state board. Counties had programs, as did private doctors who were part of the eugenics movement. Those people will not qualify for state compensation, Ms. Fuller Cooper said.

Still, her office in Raleigh receives about 200 calls a month. People who suspect they were part of the state program must send her a notarized letter. Then, their names have to be found among eugenics board records stored in dozens of cardboard boxes in the basement of the state archives. People have died or moved or use different names. It is needle-in-a-haystack work.

Some critics of the effort say the state is not working hard enough. Victims and others argue that names in the archives could be matched to drivers’ records.

But the state cannot just send letters to people’s houses suggesting they might have been sterilized against their will, Ms. Fuller Cooper said. Medical records are private. Husbands or adopted children could find out a long-buried secret. Old wounds could be laid open again.

Even people who call her office sometimes hang up abruptly when a spouse approaches, wanting to keep their terrible secret unless money is on the table.

“Until folks know what the state’s going to do, people aren’t going to take the risk and come forward,” she said.

One woman who submitted her name fears it will become public. In a recent interview in her small home in Lexington, N.C., she said she would be embarrassed if her co-workers at a local hospital knew her story.

Now 62, she was adopted but sent to a state school at 7 because her parents thought she was mentally deficient. She remembers being told as a teenager that she was getting an appendectomy. When she was 27 and started having uterine trouble, a doctor requested her records and discovered that she had been sterilized in an operation that had been botched, her medical records show.

“I tell you what,” she said. “I about hit the floor.”

She went to her mother, who said she was going to tell her before she got married. Welfare would have ended if she had not consented, her mother said.

She did marry, and her husband, who has since died, accepted the fact that they could not have children. Still, she was forever changed.

“I see people with babies and I think how much I would have loved to have a young one,” she said. “It should have been my choice whether I wanted to have a baby or not. You just feel like you were held back, like you never had any say in your life.”

She figures what she went through is worth at least $50,000 or $100,000. “Maybe I could retire,” she said.

Mr. Holt still remembers that October day. He thought he was getting an examination so he could leave the state home. He said he did not know he was giving up his chance to be a parent.

“The doctor told me I couldn’t go home unless I had an operation done,” said Mr. Holt, who was 19 at the time. “When I woke up I tried to walk, and I said: ‘This ain’t right. I don’t even remember them shaving me down there.’ ”

He went on to marry and divorce. Now recovering from a stroke and surviving on disability payments, he lives with relatives in a tidy trailer park in the middle of the state.

He thinks maybe $30,000 would be enough. Others want more. Elaine Riddick, 57, who also lives in Atlanta, was sterilized in 1967. She was 14 and had gotten pregnant from a rape. Social workers persuaded her illiterate grandmother to sign the consent form with an X.

She has become the most vocal proponent of payment, suing the state for $1 million. Her case was appealed to the United States Supreme Court, which refused to hear it.

For Nial Ramirez, 65, who was sterilized at 18 after she gave birth to her daughter, no amount could make it right.

A social worker from the Washington County Department of Public Welfare suggested that she get sterilized. Mrs. Ramirez said she did not understand that the procedure was permanent and thought she had no choice.

“They told me that my brothers and sisters were going to be in the streets all because of you,” she said. “It’s either sign the paper or mama’s checks get cut off.”

In 1973, with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union, she became the first person to file a lawsuit against the state eugenics board. It ended with a $7,000 settlement from the doctor, she said.

Now in a small apartment surrounded by the sound of the television and some of the 200 dolls she has collected through her lifetime, Ms. Ramirez remains angry. She does not want an apology, and she will not settle for the amounts being discussed.

“What would an apology do for me?” she said. “You don’t know what my kids were going to be. You don’t know what kids God was going to give me. Twenty thousand dollars ain’t gonna do it, honey.”

Nurse fired for using medical marijuana???

Sadly because of 90+ years of the "drug war" in American a large number of Americans have illogical, scientifically incorrect and irrational views on how drugs effect people. Most of these views were created by government lies used to demonize drug users and justify the governments evil, unconstitutional war on drugs. A good example is in high school I was shown the move "Reefer Madness" to teach me the effects of marijuana.

Because of that I can understand why the creators of Prop 302 made it illegal to fire people for the use of medical marijuana. And personally I think that for many jobs a person can do just as good job when they are using medical marijuana as when they are straight.

On the other hand from the Libertarian perspective I think that employees should have the right to hire and fire anybody they want to for any reason they want to. Even if the reason is irrational. It's their money and they should be able to spend it as they chose.

Source

Former hospice nurse says she was fired for using medical marijuana

Posted: Saturday, December 10, 2011 7:00 am

By Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services | 4 comments

The claim of a former nurse at a Cottonwood hospice could become the first case to test the limits on employers under the state's year-old medical marijuana law.

Attorneys for Esther Shapiro contend she was fired from Verde Valley Community Hospice because she is a medical marijuana user. They want Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Michael McVey to award her damages.

Repeated calls to the facility seeking comment were not returned.

Arizona is one of several states where voters have approved laws allowing those with a doctor's recommendation to obtain and use marijuana for medical purposes.

But the Arizona law contains something not in statutes elsewhere: an anti-discrimination provision. It says that an employer may not make decisions on hiring, firing or discipline based on the person's status as a registered marijuana user. The law even says that a positive drug test for marijuana from someone who is a registered user cannot be used against that employee unless the person either used, possessed or was impaired at the worksite.

Initiative backers say that was on purpose.

In one high-profile case, a Michigan man had a medical marijuana card under that state's laws to deal with the pain from sinus cancer and a brain tumor.

He was required to take a drug test after he sprained his ankle, as is company policy involving on-the-job injuries. Once the test came back positive for marijuana, he was fired.

That state does not have the same anti-discrimination provisions that are in the Arizona law.

The lawsuit claims that Shapiro was hired in July as a part-time nurse at its facility. A month later it became a full-time position.

During the orientation, Shapiro said she was informed by her supervisor that she would be required to submit to a pre-employment drug test. Shapiro, in turn, says she informed the supervisor as a registered medical marijuana card holder but did submit to the test.

The following day, according to Shapiro, the supervisor told her that the hospice's insurance carrier considered her to be too much of a liability because of her status as a medical marijuana card holder, firing her that day.

Her attorneys said they tried in September to explain that the firing violated the state's medical marijuana law. That, they said, went nowhere.

But 10 days later - and a full month after her firing, William Hayes, one of the facility's owners, submitted a complaint to the Arizona State Board of Nursing that an unspecified staffer had smelled marijuana on Shapiro, and that was the reason for the drug test. Her lawyers deny she was ever under the influence of the drug while on hospice premises or during working hours.

David Weissman, one of Shapiro's attorneys, acknowledged in the lawsuit that the medical marijuana law does allow a company to fire a medical marijuana user if "failure to do so would cause an employer to lose monetary or licensing related benefit under federal law or regulations." But Weissman said the hospice had no such evidence when they fired Shapiro.

Separately, Shapiro is suing Hayes for defamation for "intentionally and knowingly making false statements" about her to the nursing board and possibly to others.

Police employ Predator drone spy planes on home front

Source

Police employ Predator drone spy planes on home front

By Brian Bennett, Washington Bureau

December 10, 2011, 6:12 p.m. Reporting from Washington— Armed with a search warrant, Nelson County Sheriff Kelly Janke went looking for six missing cows on the Brossart family farm in the early evening of June 23. Three men brandishing rifles chased him off, he said.

Janke knew the gunmen could be anywhere on the 3,000-acre spread in eastern North Dakota. Fearful of an armed standoff, he called in reinforcements from the state Highway Patrol, a regional SWAT team, a bomb squad, ambulances and deputy sheriffs from three other counties.

He also called in a Predator B drone.

As the unmanned aircraft circled 2 miles overhead the next morning, sophisticated sensors under the nose helped pinpoint the three suspects and showed they were unarmed. Police rushed in and made the first known arrests of U.S. citizens with help from a Predator, the spy drone that has helped revolutionize modern warfare.

But that was just the start. Local police say they have used two unarmed Predators based at Grand Forks Air Force Base to fly at least two dozen surveillance flights since June. The FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have used Predators for other domestic investigations, officials said.

"We don't use [drones] on every call out," said Bill Macki, head of the police SWAT team in Grand Forks. "If we have something in town like an apartment complex, we don't call them."

The drones belong to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which operates eight Predators on the country's northern and southwestern borders to search for illegal immigrants and smugglers. The previously unreported use of its drones to assist local, state and federal law enforcement has occurred without any public acknowledgment or debate.

Congress first authorized Customs and Border Protection to buy unarmed Predators in 2005. Officials in charge of the fleet cite broad authority to work with police from budget requests to Congress that cite "interior law enforcement support" as part of their mission.

In an interview, Michael C. Kostelnik, a retired Air Force general who heads the office that supervises the drones, said Predators are flown "in many areas around the country, not only for federal operators, but also for state and local law enforcement and emergency responders in times of crisis."

But former Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice), who sat on the House homeland security intelligence subcommittee at the time and served as its chairwoman from 2007 until early this year, said no one ever discussed using Predators to help local police serve warrants or do other basic work.

Using Predators for routine law enforcement without public debate or clear legal authority is a mistake, Harman said.

"There is no question that this could become something that people will regret," said Harman, who resigned from the House in February and now heads the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, a Washington think tank.

In 2008 and 2010, Harman helped beat back efforts by Homeland Security officials to use imagery from military satellites to help domestic terrorism investigations. Congress blocked the proposal on grounds it would violate the Posse Comitatus Act, which bars the military from taking a police role on U.S. soil.

Proponents say the high-resolution cameras, heat sensors and sophisticated radar on the border protection drones can help track criminal activity in the United States, just as the CIA uses Predators and other drones to spy on militants in Pakistan, nuclear sites in Iran and other targets around the globe.

For decades, U.S. courts have allowed law enforcement to conduct aerial surveillance without a warrant. They have ruled that what a person does in the open, even behind a backyard fence, can be seen from a passing airplane and is not protected by privacy laws.

Advocates say Predators are simply more effective than other planes. Flying out of earshot and out of sight, a Predator B can watch a target for 20 hours nonstop, far longer than any police helicopter or manned aircraft.

"I am for the use of drones," said Howard Safir, former head of operations for the U.S. Marshals Service and former New York City police commissioner. He said drones could help police in manhunts, hostage situations and other difficult cases.

But privacy advocates say drones help police snoop on citizens in ways that push current law to the breaking point.

"Any time you have a tool like that in the hands of law enforcement that makes it easier to do surveillance, they will do more of it," said Ryan Calo, director for privacy and robotics at the Stanford Law School's Center for Internet and Society.

"This could be a time when people are uncomfortable, and they want to place limits on that technology," he said. "It could make us question the doctrine that you do not have privacy in public."

In North Dakota, Janke learned about the Predators last spring after local law enforcement was invited to a briefing on how two Customs and Border Protection drones based at the Grand Forks air base could assist police. He immediately saw advantages.

"We don't have to go in guns blazing," the sheriff said in a telephone interview. "We can take our time and methodically plan out what our approach should be."

Macki, head of the regional SWAT team, decided drones were ideal for spotting suspects in the vast prairie, where grassy plains stretch to the horizon except for trees planted to stem erosion from the winds.

"Anything where we need an advantage, we try to give them a call," said Macki, who declined to specify how often or where he has used the Predators. "We are very fortunate to have them in our area willing to assist us."

The first known use was June 23 after Janke drove up to the Brossart farm with a search warrant for cattle that supposedly had strayed from a neighboring ranch. The sheriff says he was ordered off the property at gunpoint.

The six adult Brossarts allegedly belonged to the Sovereign Citizen Movement, an antigovernment group that the FBI considers extremist and violent. The family had repeated run-ins with local police, including the arrest of two family members earlier that day arising from their clash with a deputy over the cattle.

Janke requested help from the drone unit, explaining that an armed standoff was underway. A Predator was flying back from a routine 10-hour patrol along the Canadian border from North Dakota to Montana. It carried extra fuel, so a pilot sitting in a trailer in Grand Forks turned the aircraft south to fly over the farm, about 60 miles from the border.

For four hours, the Predator circled 10,000 feet above the farm. Parked on a nearby road, Janke and the other officers watched live drone video and thermal images of Alex, Thomas and Jacob Brossart — and their mother, Susan — on a hand-held device with a 4-inch screen.

The glowing green images showed people carrying what appeared to be long rifles moving behind farm equipment and other barriers. The sheriff feared they were preparing an ambush, and he decided to withdraw until daybreak. The Predator flew back to its hangar.

At 7 a.m. the next day, the Predator launched again and flew back to the farm. The drone crew was determined to help avoid a bloody confrontation. No one wanted another Ruby Ridge, the 1992 shootout between the FBI and a family in rural Idaho that killed a 14-year-old boy, a woman and a deputy U.S. marshal.

This time, Janke watched the live Predator feed from his office computer, using a password-protected government website called Big Pipe.

Around 10 a.m., the video showed the three Brossart brothers riding all-terrain vehicles toward a decommissioned Minuteman ballistic missile site at the edge of their property. The sensor operator in Grand Forks switched to thermal mode, and the image indicated the three men were unarmed.

Janke signaled the SWAT team to move in and make the arrests. No shots were fired.

A search of the property turned up four rifles, two shotguns, assorted bows and arrows and a samurai sword, according to court records. Police also found the six missing cows, valued at $6,000.

Rodney Brossart, his daughter Abby and his three sons face a total of 11 felony charges, including bail jumping and terrorizing a sheriff, as well as a misdemeanor count against Rodney involving the stray cattle. All have been released on bail. Calls to Rodney Brossart were not returned Saturday. The family is believed to be living on the farm.

brian.bennett@latimes.com

Senate passes bill introduced by Rep. Giffords targeting smugglers

Senate passes bill introduced by Rep. Giffords targeting smugglers

Posted: Dec 9, 2011 9:31 AM

TUCSON - Legislation modeled after a bill introduced by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords last year, targeting drug smugglers using ultalight aircraft to bring drugs across the border, was passed unanimously in the Senate last night, bringing it one step closer to becoming law.

The Ultralight Smuggling Prevention Act of 2010, introduced by Rep. Giffords in May 2010, was passed by the house last year by a vote of 412 to 3, but it was not taken up by the Senate, according to a news release from Rep. Giffords' office. The bill would have amended the Tariff Act of 1930 to include ultralight vehicles under the aviation smuggling provisions, closing a loophole, as ultralights were not categorized as aircraft by the Federal Aviation Authority.

Earlier this year, Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico and Dean Heller of Nevada introducted the Ultralight Aircraft Smuggling Prevention Act of 2011, a companion bill in the Senate to the one introduced by Rep. Giffords. It was passed unanimously last night in the Senate, and will now be considered by the House. "Congresswoman Giffords has called this legislation a critically important tool in our nation's continuing fight to secure the border," said Pia Carusone, chief of staff to Giffords. "When she heard that her goal is closer to becoming law, the congresswoman was thrilled. We thank Senators Udall and Heller for working to pass the bill in the Senate after the congresswoman secured House passage last year. We hope the House will quickly approve the Senate bill so law enforcement will have the tools it needs to combat this threat."

"As traffickers adopt new techniques for bringing drugs across our borders, we must give law enforcement the tools they need to stay a step ahead of smugglers and fully prosecute them," said Udall, a member of the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control. "I commend my colleagues in the Senate for voting to fix these outdated loopholes and encourage the House to do the same without delay."

Iran Shows Downed Spy Drone

Source

Iran Shows Downed Spy Drone as U.S. Assesses Technology Loss

December 11, 2011, 7:20 AM EST

By John Walcott

Dec. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The unmanned RQ-170 Sentinel is still highly classified, yet since one came down in Iran five days ago, it’s a lot less secret.

Three U.S. defense officials said the plane the Iranians displayed on television yesterday appears to be the Lockheed Martin Corp. RQ-170 that controllers lost contact with on Dec. 4. The Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency have declined to comment on the matter.

Three U.S. intelligence officials said the greatest concern now is that the Iranians will give Russian or Chinese scientists access to the aircraft, which is designed to be virtually invisible to radar and carries advanced communications and surveillance gear.

Studying it may give two technologically sophisticated potential adversaries insight into the unmanned spy plane’s flight controls, communications gear, video equipment and self- destruct, holding pattern or return-to-base mechanisms, officials said. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the RQ-170 is part of a Secret Compartmented Intelligence (SCI) program, a classification higher than Top Secret, and because the investigation into the loss of the drone is also classified.

Reverse Engineering

In addition, they said, the remains of the RQ-170 could help the Russians, Chinese, Iranians or others develop Infrared Surveillance and Targeting (IRST) or Doppler radar technology that under some conditions are capable of detecting stealth aircraft such as drones and the new Lockheed Martin F-35s.

There also is a danger that the fallen Sentinel’s shape, special coatings, control surfaces, engine inlet and other unique qualities could help other countries develop or improve their own radar-evading aircraft, such as China’s J-20 stealth fighter.

“There is the potential for reverse engineering, clearly,” Air Force Chief of Staff General Norton Schwartz said yesterday during a taping of the television show “This Week in Defense News,” according to Air Force Times. “Ideally, one would want to maintain the American advantage. That certainly is in our minds.”

If the jet “comes into the possession of a sophisticated adversary, there’s not much the U.S. could do about it,” he said.

The intelligence officials said that Chinese or Russian access to the drone is a greater concern than a possible Iranian effort to reverse-engineer the RQ-170, which they said is unlikely given the drone’s special coatings and other materials.

Stealing Secrets

“Buy, Build or Steal: China’s Quest for Advanced Military Aviation Technologies,” a new report from the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University in Washington, says that stealth technology is a high priority for Beijing since “few things differentiate the lethality of an air force more than the level of technology in its most advanced aircraft.”

“China will likely rely more heavily on espionage to acquire those critical military aviation technologies it cannot acquire legitimately from foreign suppliers or develop on its own,” the report concludes.

Nevertheless, the Obama administration didn’t seriously consider bombing the wreckage or sending special operations forces into Iran to destroy or retrieve it because either would be an act of war, two U.S. officials said.

Hacking Claim

Reverse engineering the Sentinel or its components would be difficult and time consuming, the intelligence officials said. The most troubling prospect is that the Iranians’ second claim about how they brought it down -- by hacking into its controls and landing it themselves -- might be true, said one of the intelligence officials .

The official said the possibility that the Iranians, perhaps with help from China or Russia, hacked into the drone’s satellite communications is doubly alarming because it would mean that Iranian or other cyber-warfare officers were able to disable the Sentinel’s automatic self-destruct, holding pattern and return-to-base mechanisms.

Those are intended to prevent the plane’s secret flight control, optical, radar, surveillance and communications technology from falling into the wrong hands if its controllers at Creech Lake Air Force Base or the Tonopah Test Range, both in Nevada, lose contact with it.

Targeting Computer Networks

In recent years, one of the officials said, computer hackers thought to be part of extensive Chinese or Russian cyber espionage efforts have attacked the computer networks of numerous defense contractors, including Lockheed Martin; broken into two satellite ground stations and planted keystroke logging software in some military computers -- including some that are used to control some U.S. drones.

It isn’t known whether that malware has been found in RQ- 170 computers, or only in those used to control less advanced drones such as the Predator and Reaper, made by General Atomics Aeronautical of San Diego, that are used by the Air Force and CIA in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and elsewhere.

Two U.S. intelligence officials said that while the drones’ and other military and intelligence computer networks are kept separate from the public Internet, investigators have uncovered what they said are numerous instances when thumb drives containing Chinese and other malware have infected classified networks. Often, they said, such infections have spread quickly and proved very difficult to eradicate.

Television Debut

The drone made a 2 1/2 minute television debut yesterday on Iran’s state-owned Press TV channel. Two U.S. officials with knowledge of the RQ-170 program said that some details, including the seams on the drone’s fuselage, its access ports and its unusual air intake, appear to confirm that it’s genuine.

The official Iranian Republic News Agency reported that the Foreign Ministry protested the “violation of Iran’s airspace by a U.S. spy drone on Dec. 4,” the day Iranian forces claimed to have shot down the aircraft 140 miles inside the Iranian border from Afghanistan.

The RQ-170 was flying a reconnaissance mission inside Iranian airspace when its controllers lost contact with it, U.S. officials said.

The officials said that for three years the U.S. has been flying two types of unmanned surveillance missions over Iran and along the Afghanistan-Iran border from a 9,200-foot runway at a former Soviet airbase in Shindand in western Afghanistan’s Herat province.

In addition to monitoring construction and other activity at suspected Iranian nuclear facilities from high altitudes, the officials said, the CIA has been using drones to monitor cross- border traffic and Iranian support for insurgents.

The CIA, not the Air Force, flies the missions inside Iran so they are covert operations that the U.S. government can deny.

--Editors: Terry Atlas, Jim Rubin.

To contact the reporter on this story: John Walcott in Washington at jwalcott9@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva at msilva34@bloomberg.net

Federal judge tells Arizona to pick a side on medical marijuana issue

Federal judge tells Arizona to pick a side on medical marijuana issue

Posted: Monday, December 12, 2011 2:24 pm

By Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services | 0 comments

A federal judge chided Attorney General Tom Horne Monday, saying he was asking her to do his job: advising state agencies on the law.

U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton said the state wants her to rule whether Arizona can issue licenses to dispensaries to sell marijuana to medical users without its workers being prosecuted for violating federal laws which make any use of the drug illegal. Gov. Jan Brewer has refused to process applications for dispensaries until she gets an answer.

But Bolton said the state, in its lawsuit, does not argue that there is immunity for state workers under last year's voter-approved Medical Marijuana Act. Nor does it argue the state cannot legally implement the law.

"You don't come to court and say, ‘Well, this our best advice, you give it a shot,'" she told Assistant Attorney General Lori Davis.

Davis protested that the state finds itself in "an impossible position," being told by voters to license dispensaries but fearing that the workers who process the applications can be charged with helping facilitate the distribution of marijuana. She said Bolton should tell the state - and the governor - whether it's OK to proceed.

"That's what the AG is for," Bolton responded. "It's not the courts that give (legal) advice."

While Bolton did not issue a formal ruling on Monday, the judge essentially told Davis that she will throw out the case unless the state takes a side.

"What position does the state wish to take?" she asked Davis.

The judge noted the state has two legal theories.

Bolton said if Brewer and Horne believe federal law conflicts with the initiative, they don't need to be in court.

"That's just stating the obvious," the judge said.

The other is that state workers can issue permits to sell marijuana despite the federal law - and that Bolton should rule they are immune to federal prosecution.

"I don't have the power to grant immunity," the judge said.

But what clearly frustrated the judge was the absolute refusal of the state to make a decision between the theories.

"You have to take a side," Bolton told Davis. She said once that happens there will be a real legal dispute for her to resolve, with advocates on both side to argue the finer legal points.

"You can't just ask me to figure it out on my own," Bolton said.

The law approved by voters last year allows those with a doctor's recommendation to get a state permit allowing them to obtain up to 2 1/2 ounces of marijuana every two weeks. The state already has issued more than 16,000 of those permits.

That law also presumed that the source of those drugs would be about 125 state-licensed nonprofit dispensaries. But Brewer directed state Health Director Will Humble not to even accept applications.

"We are exposing our citizens and, more importantly, our state workers to threat of federal prosecution," Davis told Bolton in asking for a ruling. "We should not be required to go to the point of risking federal prosecution, of betting the farm."

Bolton indicated she might be willing to let the case continue - if Arizona picks a side.

The judge said the state could side with the backers of the law and would-be marijuana dispensary operators, in which case they would face off in court against the federal government. The alternative is siding with the Department of Justice that federal law prevails, in which case Arizona and the Obama administration would be on the same side against the proponents of medical marijuana.

Davis said after the hearing she would wait to see what the judge decides.

But Ezekiel Edwards, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing the backers of last year's initiative, told Bolton that, even then, she should toss the case. He said there is no credible threat that any state worker ever would be prosecuted simply for processing dispensary permits.

He also said the lawsuit is little more than a tactic by Brewer and Horne to delay implementing the voter-approved law.

The lack of dispensaries has not kept medical marijuana users from getting drugs. The law also says that medical marijuana users can grow their own drugs if they are at least 25 miles from a dispensary - and the lack of any dispensaries means that applies to everyone.

Judge - Pick a side in marijuana conflict

This article is from the Republic is pretty much the same as an article from the Tribune I posted yesterday.

Source

Judge to state: Pick a side in marijuana conflict

by Mary K. Reinhart - Dec. 12, 2011 09:40 PM

The Arizona Republic

U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton tore apart the state's medical-marijuana lawsuit Monday, saying Arizona has to pick a side in the conflict over state and federal law.

Bolton stopped short of dismissing the case, saying she would issue a ruling later. But she told Assistant Attorney General Lori Davis she would throw it out unless the state decides whether or not to support its own law.

"That's how lawsuits work," Bolton said. "The plaintiff takes a position."

Gov. Jan Brewer has asked the federal court to clarify whether U.S. drug laws override the voter-approved state law and, if not, whether state workers are immune from federal prosecution if they fully implement Proposition 203.

The lawsuit, filed in May, stalled the state's medical-marijuana dispensary-permit process. More than 16,300 people now have state-issued ID cards allowing them to use medical pot for certain debilitating health conditions, but would-be dispensary owners are on hold.

In pointed questioning of Davis, Bolton said the Attorney General's Office needs to do its job and give advice to state agencies, not leave it up to a judge.

"I'm used to having the plaintiff opposed to the defendant," the judge said. "You've got to advocate for one or the other, and you're not advocating for either."

Does the state believe federal laws forbidding the sale and use of marijuana trump the state's medical-marijuana law? Or does the state take the position, along with medical-pot advocates, that the federal law doesn't apply?

"You're going to have to pick at some point," Bolton said. "I won't make you do it today, in front of this audience."

Davis said the state is in an "impossible position," caught between federal drug laws that ban marijuana use and a voter-approved law that allows it. State employees could be prosecuted for doing their job if they implement the law, she said.

Bolton pointed out that they already are implementing the law, in part, by issuing thousands of permits allowing Arizonans to use and grow medical marijuana.

The judge said it's not enough to acknowledge that state and federal laws conflict. "That's just stating the obvious," she said.

Monday's hearing was on a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union. The U.S. Justice Department, a defendant in the case, also has filed to have the case dismissed.

Brewer and Attorney General Tom Horne said the lawsuit was prompted by federal prosecutors, including former Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, signaling a crackdown against the medical-marijuana industry. They said their chief concern was protecting state employees, though Burke and other U.S. attorneys said their focus was on large-scale trafficking, not patients or public employees who were complying with state laws.

But critics say it was a way to stop, or at least delay, marijuana dispensaries without angering voters, who approved the law in 2010.

ACLU Attorney Ezekiel Edwards said the lawsuit was premature and without basis. Federal prosecutors have never prosecuted a public worker for implementing medical-marijuana laws and have not threatened to do so.

"It is not the federal court's job to sit in the abstract and give advice on a state law," Edwards said.

Davis said she's hopeful that the judge will agree to resolve the conflict but conceded that it was unlikely. Short of an outright dismissal, Bolton could allow the state to amend its complaint, Davis said after the hearing.

Horne said he's waiting to see what Brewer wants to do. It was her choice, he said, not to take a position in the lawsuit.

Brewer spokesman Matthew Benson said the governor would wait for Bolton's ruling before deciding how to proceed.

Edwards said there was a simple solution: The state can fully implement the law and begin the dispensary-permit process.

In the meantime, he said, "all this does is obstruct the will of the voters and keep medicine from sick people."

Reach the reporter at maryk.reinhart@arizonarepublic.com

1 out of 15 high school kids smoke pot everyday?

Source

December 14, 2011, 10:00 am

Marijuana Use Growing Among Teenagers

By ANAHAD O'CONNOR

One out of every 15 high school students smokes marijuana on a near daily basis, a figure that has reached a 30-year peak even as use of alcohol, cigarettes and cocaine among teenagers continues a slow decline, according to a new government report.

The popularity of marijuana, which is now more prevalent among 10th graders than cigarette smoking, reflects what researchers and drug officials say is a growing perception among teenagers that habitual marijuana use carries little risk of harm. [Duh!!! It IS a lot safer then smoking cigarettes!!!] That perception, experts say, is fueled at least in part by wider familiarity with and availability of medicinal marijuana. ["That perception????" Again using marijuana is probably safer then using any other drug on the planet!!!!]

The long-running annual report, called the Monitoring the Future survey and financed by the National Institutes of Health, looked at more than 46,000 students. Over all, about 25 percent of 8th, 10th and 12th graders who took part in the study reported using marijuana in the past year, up from about 21 percent in 2007.

R. Gil Kerlikowske, the federal drug czar, said he believed the increasing prevalence of medicinal marijuana was a factor in the uptick. “These last couple years, the amount of attention that’s been given to medical marijuana has been huge,” he said. “And when I’ve done focus groups with high school students in states where medical marijuana is legal, they say, ‘Well, if its called medicine and it’s given to patients by caregivers, then that’s really the wrong message for us as high school students.’”

The report also revealed that a mixture of herbs and chemicals known widely as “spice” or “K2” that mimics the effects of marijuana has quickly gained popularity among teenagers. One in every nine high school seniors reported using it in the past year; most of them also regularly used marijuana. In another sign of the synthetic drug’s popularity, poison control centers received 5,741 calls about it through Oct. 31 of this year, almost double the number for all of last year. This was the first year the report asked students about their use of synthetic drugs.

Part of the reason synthetic marijuana had become so popular is that until recently, it was sold legally, often as “herbal incense,” in convenience stores and gas stations and on various Web sites. But in March, the Drug Enforcement Administration declared several chemicals in synthetic marijuana Schedule I drugs, banning them for a year. Congress is now considering legislation that would ban the substance permanently.

“If you talk to school superintendents and principals, they’ll tell you about their concerns that this stuff was being sold a block away from their schools,” said Mr. Kerlikowske. “High school students probably think it’s not dangerous. But we know from the calls to hot lines, emergency departments and poison control centers that this stuff really is dangerous. It just really wasn’t on parents’ radar screens.”

While interest in marijuana and synthetic marijuana has climbed, the willingness to try most other drugs has waned. The report found declines in the use of crack, cocaine, over-the-counter cough and cold medicines, sedatives, tranquilizers and prescription drugs like Adderall and the narcotic painkiller Vicodin. Some 1.7 percent of 10th graders and 2.6 percent of 12th graders reported using cocaine in 2011, for example, far fewer than in the 1980s or ’90s. About 5 percent of 12th graders reported using ecstasy in 2011, an increase of about 1 percent from the previous year.

Heavy drinking among high school students has also fallen over the past 20 years, the report found. From 1991 to 2011, the proportion of 8th graders who reported drinking in the previous 30 days fell by about half, to 13 percent from 25 percent. Among 10th graders, it has fallen by more than a third, to 27 percent from 43 percent, and among 12th graders by about a fourth, to 40 percent from 54 percent. The percentage of students who reported binge drinking fell by a third, to 13.6 percent from 20 percent.

About a third of teenagers said they consume energy drinks like Red Bull, with use highest among younger students. Ten percent to 20 percent of high school students reported drinking one or more energy drinks daily, down slightly from 2010.

U.S. Spy Plane Shot Video of Jamaican ‘Drug War Massacre’

Source

U.S. Spy Plane Shot Secret Video of Jamaican ‘Massacre’

By Spencer Ackerman

December 7, 2011

Somewhere in the bureaucratic bowels of the Department of Homeland Security is a videotape shot above the Tivoli Gardens neighborhood of Kingston, Jamaica on May 24, 2010. It could reveal whether the Jamaican security forces, acting on behalf of U.S. prosecutors, killed 73 members of a notorious crime syndicate or innocent civilians caught in house-to-house fighting. That is, if anyone in a position of power actually wants that question answered.

Over 500 Jamaican soldiers rushed into the teeming Tivoli Gardens neighborhood that day for what became known as Operation Garden Parish, a mission to capture the local mafia don, Christopher “Dudus” Coke. The mission was the result of heavy U.S. pressure: Coke had been indicted in U.S. federal court for running an international marijuana and cocaine ring. It would become one of the bloodiest days in recent Jamaican history.

What happened on May 24, 2010 garnered international headlines. But what no one knew until now was that circling overhead was a P-3 Orion spy plane, operated by the Department of Homeland Security. A lengthy investigation by journalist Mattathias Schwartz (a Danger Room friend) reveals that the Orion took footage of the hours-long battle. It has never been publicly revealed.

“I don’t know what’s on the video,” Schwartz tells Danger Room. “But given all these credible allegations of extrajudicial killings taking place on the ground, it must be released.” Schwartz’s investigation of what he describes as the “massacre” in Tivoli Gardens has just been published by the New Yorker, although it’s not yet online.

Coke is a brutal man. According to prosecutors, he used a chainsaw to kill a man believed of stealing his drug proceeds. But he was beloved in Tivoli Gardens as well as feared, as often happens in places where gangsters replace the governing machinery of failing states, and the neighborhood became his fortress.

That is, until May 24, 2010, when the American pressure on a Coke ally, Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding, became overwhelming. The Jamaican soldiers who carried out Operation Garden Parish, had to overcome roadblocks set up by Coke soldiers prepared for the raid. And more than that. “I fired my AK until my finger was numb,” reads a passage from a Coke gunman’s diary unearthed by Schwartz.

Then the Jamaican soldiers went inside Tivoli houses, killing people — most of whom, locals insist, were unconnected to Coke. Some of the killings occurred outside in the open air. An American citizen, 25-year old Andre Smith, was among the dead. According to Smith’s great aunt, Smith was ordered up her stairs by soldiers, although he was hiding to avoid the battle; his body was carried out in a sheet, suggesting an execution.

Schwartz recounts many such stories. Seventy-three locals and one soldier died. Soldiers took over a thousand others to detention centers for interrogations. Coke escaped the battle.

Above the melee was the P-3 Orion, filming the events of May 24 with its onboard cameras. A Jamaican photographer snapped photos of it. Schwartz filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Department of Homeland Security and confirmed its presence. “All scenes were continuously recorded,” a Homeland Security document Schwartz acquired confirms.

The video, said to have been screened in a joint U.S.-Jamaican operations center in Kingston, has never been released. Its contents are politically dangerous for a Jamaican government still reeling from Tivoli Gardens. (Coke was eventually arrested and convicted in New York; Golding resigned.) And the documents Schwartz acquired suggest that there might have been U.S. operatives on the ground during the raid, which the U.S. denies.

But there have been no charges brought against anyone involved in the massacre. A Jamaican detective, Gladys Brown, tells Schwartz, “Nobody is able to describe who saw and who did what. It’s very difficult to pinpoint one or two of these men who held a gun to the head and fired.”

The video can’t adjudicate every outstanding question about the Tivoli Square raid. It can’t see into houses to determine if soldiers executed unarmed civilians or defended themselves against Coke soldiers lying in wait.

But it might answer some of the questions about exactly how 73 residents of the neighborhood and one soldier died. “My belief is that the video could help identify exactly which members of the Jamaican security forces were where, and when,” Schwartz says. “Until the identities of these individuals are made known, and some court or other investigative body compels them to give public testimony, we will not have a final answer to these disturbing and credible allegations.”

Cops use trivial traffic violations to search for drugs

I suspect the Mesa cops are using trivial traffic violations as an excuse to pull over people and search them for drugs.

This guy was pulled over for not using his turn signals.

Source

Mesa police tase fleeing suspect

by John Genovese - Dec. 13, 2011 05:25 PM

The Arizona Republic - 12 News Breaking News Team

A 26-year-old suspected drug dealer was tased Monday after he ran from Mesa police through a Mesa neighborhood, authorities said.

According to police, the incident began about 9 a.m. when a Mesa officer watched a car, driven by Calvin Coleman, make a turn without signaling from a Circle K store at Center Street and University Drive. Court records state the officer had been told by several people that the car was known to transport drugs.

Authorities said the officer followed behind Coleman, eventually signaling him to stop after the 26-year-old turned down a nearby driveway.

Police said Coleman immediately exited the car, questioning the officer and appearing "nervous and verbally confrontational." Court records state Coleman then attempted to walk away, at which point the officer grabbed his shoulder and a struggle ensued. Coleman freed himself and began running into a neighborhood near Drew Street and University Drive, officials said.

Police setup a perimeter around the area and a K9 unit was called in.

According to court documents, the dog alerted to a storage shed behind a home near where Coleman was last seen.

Authorities said after several minutes, Coleman opened the door to the shed and again began running from police, jumping over several block walls.

Officers eventually tased Coleman after he refused to stop running.

Records state that cocaine, marijuana, and meth were found inside the car that Coleman was driving, and $1,000 in cash was found in his pocket.

While being questioned, Coleman told police he is bi-polar and doesn't remember what happened, later admitting that he has a drug problem and "does what he needs to do to survive."

Governor Blagojevich is a doper???

Of course if Blagojevich is a doper it's more of the old "Do as you say, not as I do" line from our government masters.

Source

Blagojevich seeks drug treatment in prison

By Cynthia Dizikes Tribune reporter

9:59 p.m. CST, December 14, 2011

Convicted former Gov. Rod Blagojevich wants to enroll in a substance-abuse program at a federal prison outside of Denver, a move that could shave up to a year off of his prison sentence.

Blagojevich’s legal team, however, has downplayed the request, briefly mentioning the drug program by only its acronym in court Tuesday, resulting in hardly anyone noticing among a throng of reporters. And then, a day later, the attorneys declined to comment at all.

But the move raises questions about whether Blagojevich suffers from a real substance-abuse problem or is simply angling to reduce his stiff 14-year sentence.

Two former associates of another convicted former Illinois governor, George Ryan, said Wednesday that they remember it didn’t take much to get into the Residential Drug Abuse Treatment Program — as little as regularly consuming five alcoholic drinks a week before they had been incarcerated.

“Any defense lawyer in town that’s worth their salt all know about this and they all try to get their clients in,” said Scott Fawell, Ryan’s former chief of staff who cut his sentence by about 8 months by completing the drug program at a federal prison in Yankton, S.D. “(A lot) of the people who go through the system now ask for it or attempt to get in. How many actually need it, I couldn’t tell you.”

U.S. District Judge James Zagel agreed this week to recommend Blagojevich for the counseling program at a low-security prison in Littleton, Colo., but the ultimate decision will be made by the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.

According to the agency’s guidelines, inmates must have “a verifiable substance-use disorder.”

“The bottom line is that we look for evidence that the inmate has a documented substance-abuse history before their arrest,” said Chris Burke, a spokesman for the Bureau of Prisons. “If that is five drinks a week and there is something to verify that beyond that inmate’s statement, that might qualify.”

At the Littleton facility, inmates are given an initial screening by medical and psychological staff on their arrival at the institution but are not screened for admittance into the substance-abuse program until three to four years before their release date.

Inmates must have a proven history of substance abuse within the 12-month period before their arrest.

But Burke acknowledged on Wednesday that as the program has expanded throughout the federal prison system, officials have grappled with more inmates attempting to enroll simply to reduce their sentences.

“As inmates become more aware of the program and what it offers, I think it has been more challenging for us to weed out those inmates who are just trying to game the system,” he said.

Under federal guidelines, Blagojevich would likely serve just under 12 years in prison. That could be reduced to 11 years if he is able to enroll in and successfully completes the nine-month program. He would also be eligible to spend his final six months in a halfway house.

If he is enrolled, Blagojevich would spend his mornings in small group therapy sessions and other educational activities. That means he would only have to work a prison job half a day.

Lawrence Warner, a close Ryan friend sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison in that scandal, took part in the program while doing his time at the federal prison camp in Littleton, adjacent to the low-security facility where Blagojevich hopes to go.

“It was a wonderful program,” said Warner, who added that he was admitted into the program for drinking problems he developed over the many years he was under investigation. “You had guys that would never speak and then they would have to speak in class. and all of a sudden you would see self-confidence come back in them.”

Fawell was admitted into the program at Yankton for similar problems.

Most of the inmates in the program, however, had drug problems like crack cocaine or heroin addictions, he said.

Fawell said he talked to one of Blagojevich’s attorneys recently about the substance-abuse program.

“Their criteria, the bar, is pretty low,” Fawell said. “If it’s available and you qualify for it, you’d be crazy not to take it.”

cdizikes@tribune.com

Governor Jan Brewer flip flops on medical marijuana position

I am certain tat all along Jan Brewer has wanted to keep medical marijuana illegal, so her position has not changed. This is just a change in her tactics. Because the Judge told her she had to take a position to keep her lawsuit going, she had now changed her position.

Source

Brewer to argue against part of pot law

by Ginger Rough - Dec. 14, 2011 09:40 PM

The Arizona Republic

Gov. Jan Brewer is altering her position on the state's medical-marijuana legal case. She will now argue that the portion of the law that authorized pot dispensaries is superseded by federal drug law.

Brewer's new tactic comes two days after U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton ripped apart the state's medical-marijuana lawsuit, saying that the state had to pick a side in the dispute and that it wasn't enough to merely acknowledge that state and federal laws conflict.

Brewer had asked the federal court to clarify whether U.S. drug laws override the voter-approved state law and, if not, whether state workers are immune from federal prosecution if Proposition 203 is fully implemented.

Brewer spokesman Matthew Benson said Wednesday that the Governor's Office homed in on the dispensary aspect because of ongoing concerns about state employees and whether they would be subject to prosecution.

"The governor believes that the distribution portion is pre-empted by federal drug law, so the state's legal filing will be amended to represent that," Benson said.

"The governor's primary concern has always been for the welfare of her state employees."

Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery, who has filed a motion to intervene in the case, said Wednesday that he will focus on the same tactic.

"We've seen what happened, just next door in California, with warnings to dispensaries and property owners that they are in violation of federal laws," Montgomery said.

"There is nothing preventing the enforcement of those same federal laws here in Arizona, and it would be very unwise for Arizona not to seek to have this reconciled in a ruling."

Montgomery said if the court determines that Arizona can implement the act without risk of prosecution, he will recommend that the county do so.

The state's lawsuit, filed in May, stalled the state's medical-marijuana dispensary-permit process.

More than 16,300 people now have state-issued ID cards that allow them to use medical pot for certain debilitating health conditions, but would-be dispensary owners are on hold.

Supporters of the new state law, including the American Civil Liberties Union, have filed a motion asking that the case be dismissed.

Republic reporter Mary K. Reinhart contributed to this article.

Iran executes victimless "drug war" criminals

Source

Iran executed hundreds for drug offenses, report says

Dec. 15, 2011 06:53 AM

Associated Press

LONDON -- Amnesty International says there has been a dramatic rise in the number of drug-related executions in Iran.

In its report Thursday, Amnesty said at least 488 people were executed for alleged drug offenses this year. The number represents nearly a threefold increase compared to the 166 executions in 2009, according to the rights organization.

Amnesty's Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director, Ann Harrison, called on Iran to halt such executions.

The organization also criticized Iran's justice system, saying that many of the suspects' trials were unfair and family members were given little to no warning of the executions.

Amnesty said some 4,000 Afghan nationals are thought to be on death row for drug offenses.

Paul’s ‘Ground Game,’ in Place Since ’08, Gives Him an Edge

And remember if you want to end the illegal and unconstitutional drug war, Ron Paul is one of the few real candidates who wants to legalize ALL drugs.

Source

Paul’s ‘Ground Game,’ in Place Since ’08, Gives Him an Edge

By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.

Published: December 16, 2011

ANKENY, Iowa — It was four years ago that Ross Witt, a soft-spoken electrical engineer at John Deere, overcame his natural discomfort with knocking on hundreds of his neighbors’ doors during dinnertime as a precinct coordinator for Ron Paul’s campaign.

But when Mr. Paul dropped out of the national race in June 2008, Mr. Witt did not stop, because, in a sense, neither did Mr. Paul: Mr. Witt and many other supporters here joined the Iowa branch of an independent political group Mr. Paul established after the race. They carried on his libertarian message, and picked local organizers. And when Mr. Paul announced that he was running for president this year, Mr. Witt and others jumped back onto his campaign, a force more motivated and efficient than before.

Alone among the Republican field, Mr. Paul, a Texas congressman, has a built-in network from 2008 that gives him a decisive organizational edge. Iowa Republicans say that advantage is an important reason some polls show him within striking distance of a victory in the Jan. 3 caucuses, with a battle-tested ground game poised to take advantage of a lack of passion for the rest of the candidates, a stark contrast to 2008, when evangelicals rallied around Mike Huckabee.

“This isn’t a year-and-a-half campaign,” Craig Robinson, a former Iowa Republican Party political director during the caucuses four years ago, said of Mr. Paul’s organization. “This is a five-year campaign.”

Mr. Paul’s support comes from loyal and relatively diverse backers, like college students attracted to his antiwar stance and his desire to end the federal ban on marijuana and other drugs, conservative populists suspicious of Wall Street who cheer his criticism of the Federal Reserve, and Tea Partiers who embrace his small government credo.

His consistent positions over the years also set him apart from other candidates bedeviled by charges of flip-flopping. But they could also undermine him, as his debate performance Thursday highlighted a rigid antiwar stance out of sync with many Republicans.

Mr. Paul’s campaign has grown more adaptable. Hundreds of college students are being recruited to travel on their own nickel to Iowa and New Hampshire, where the campaign will pay their food, housing and gas while they knock on doors and make phone calls. Paul backers hope the effort blunts the unfortunate timing of the Iowa caucuses during Christmas break, which could undermine turnout among his fervent student base.

At a recent University of Iowa rally that enthusiasm was on display. Mr. Paul praised the students, saying young people “seem to understand what liberty is all about so much better than some of those individuals that have been in Washington way too long, and they don’t have the vaguest idea what liberty is all about!”

The campaign developed an Internet-based phone-banking system that allows people around the country to make calls to Iowans from home using scripts tailored to identify supporters. It seems to be working: a New York Times/CBS News poll this month found that 60 percent of likely Republican caucusgoers said they had been contacted by the Paul campaign, the highest rate of any candidate, and about double that of Newt Gingrich. The true believers have also been coached not to be rude or dismissive to those who do not embrace the message, an issue during the last campaign.

“We don’t want volunteers arguing with them,” said Dimitri Kesari, deputy national campaign manager.

And Mr. Paul’s biting commercials have been running relentlessly on Iowa stations, winning raves and tearing into Mr. Gingrich, now his main rival here.

Even before all that started, Mr. Paul had a tactical edge, Republican activists say: a lot of his infrastructure stayed intact during the interim through his newly founded group, Campaign for Liberty. One senior Iowa Republican official described it “as a shadow campaign in waiting.”

The group became a bridge between campaigns, they said, keeping important supporters primed, a boost in a state where on-the-ground organization means everything.

“It became the continuous organizing force during the off years for the Paul message, sponsoring events when Paul showed up, and continuing to reach people who shared his views,” said Doug Gross, the 2002 Republican nominee for governor and Mitt Romney’s 2008 state chairman.

While polls suggest Mr. Paul may do well in Iowa and New Hampshire, the question remains whether he will be anything more than a spoiler, a candidate helping prolong what could be a drawn-out nominating battle.

In Iowa, however, his “ground game” could pack a punch and elevate his candidacy nationally. Unlike primary states where voters disappear behind a curtain to pull a lever, Iowa’s Republicans (and independents and Democrats willing to join the Republican Party for a day) will gather in about 1,800 caucuses to vote, sometimes by a show of hands. It is a social event, where neighbors lobby one another, making enthusiastic advocates like Mr. Witt a candidate’s most valuable currency.

On caucus night, Mr. Witt will lobby his neighbors all the way up to the voting, including a short speech. He will also run the caucus, as the precinct Republican chairman. He said many other Paul activists — perhaps even hundreds — are now also on hiatus from Mr. Paul’s independent group to play a role in the campaign.

Paul supporters say the independent group has never done anything to specifically benefit Mr. Paul that could run afoul of its status as a tax-exempt 501(c)4 organization. Senior campaign officials play down the group’s influence, suggesting not that many people have crossed over.

“I don’t think it is very high,” said Drew Ivers, Mr. Paul’s state chairman, who suspended his involvement with the group when he went back to the campaign, as he said others also did. He and Mr. Paul’s two state co-chairmen — along with two other Paul supporters — now make up 5 of 17 members on the state Republican central committee, a formidable presence in the party.

Other campaigns question whether Mr. Paul’s surge is all that it seems, arguing that Democrats and independents who respond favorably in polls are less likely to trudge to a Republican caucus on a cold night.

That said, they also believe Mr. Paul is set to do much better than his fifth-place 2008 showing. One rival campaign official cited what is fast becoming cliché: that bad caucus-day weather favors Mr. Paul’s highly motivated supporters, and could further help his finish.

“He’s praying for a blizzard.”

I suspect over half of these arrests are for victimless drug war crimes, or for the victimless crime of underage use of alcohol.

Source

One-third of young U.S. adults have been arrested: study

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Close to one in three American teens and young adults get arrested by age 23, according to a new study that finds more of them are being booked now than in the 1960s.

Those arrests are for everything from underage drinking and petty theft to violent crime, researchers said. They added that the increase might not necessarily reflect more criminal behavior in youth, but rather a police force that's more apt to arrest young people than in the past.

"The vast majority of these kids will never be arrested again," said John Paul Wright, who studies juvenile delinquency at the University of Cincinnati's Institute of Crime Science, but wasn't involved in the new study.

"The real serious ones are embedded in the bigger population of kids who are just picking up one arrest," he told Reuters Health.

Though violent crimes might be on the rarer end of the spectrum of offenses, the study's lead author pointed to the importance of catching early warning signs of criminal behavior in adolescents and young adults, saying that pediatricians and parents can both play a role in turning those youngsters around.

Robert Brame of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and his colleagues analyzed data from a nationally-representative youth survey conducted between 1997 and 2008.

A group of more than 7,000 adolescents age 12 to 16 in the study's first year filled out the annual surveys with questions including if and when they had ever been arrested.

At age 12, less than one percent of participants who responded had been arrested. By the time they were 23, that climbed to 30 percent with a history of arrest. For the full study in Pediatrics, see http://bit.ly/jsoh2P

That compares to an estimated 22 percent of young adults who had been arrested in 1965, from a past study.

"It was certainly higher than we expected based on what we saw in the 1960s, but it wasn't dramatically higher," said Brame.

Arrests in adolescents are especially worrisome, he told Reuters Health, because many repeat offenders start their "criminal career" at a young age.

POLICE MORE LIKELY TO ARREST

The researchers said it seems that the criminal justice system has taken to arresting both the young and old more than it did in the past, when fines and citations might have been given to some people who are now arrested.

"If (police) find kids that are intoxicated or they have pulled over someone intoxicated... now, nine times out of 10 they're going to make an arrest," Wright told Reuters Health.

"We do have to question if arrest is an appropriate intervention in all circumstances, or if we need to rethink some of the policies we have enacted."

He pointed out that young people who have an arrest on their record might have more trouble getting jobs in the future. It's one thing if that's because they were involved in a violent crime, he continued, but another if their offence was non-violent, like drinking underage or smoking marijuana.

"Arrest does have major social implications for people as they transition from adolescence to adulthood," Wright said.

While the report didn't ask youth why they had been arrested, Brame said that common offenses in that age group also include stealing, vandalizing and arson.

For most minor offenses, teens and young adults will get a term of probation or another minor penalty, he said. The most serious adolescent offenders and those with a prior record could be prosecuted as adults and end up getting a prison sentence.

Brame said that being poor, struggling in school and having a difficult home life have all been linked to a higher risk of arrest in that age group.

He and his colleagues wrote in Pediatrics on Monday that other warning signs of delinquent behavior include early instances of aggression and bullying, hyperactivity and delayed development.

Pediatricians might be able to recognize those warning signs more clearly than parents, and can point kids toward resources to help keep them out of trouble, such as counseling services, Brame said.

"We urge that parents who are concerned about their kids' well-being, that they get those kids in to see a pediatrician on a regular basis so the pediatrician can do the things they're trained to do."

(Reporting by Genevra Pittman; editing by Anthony Boadle)

When I was growing up only us kids smoked weed. Now even old farts are smoking pot. This 75 year old geezer got busted with 99 pounds of weed.

Source

Mesa man, 75, arrested in Nebraska pot case

Posted: Monday, December 19, 2011 1:02 pm

Associated Press

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. -- A 75-year-old Arizona man has been arrested on a drug charge after a traffic stop on Interstate 80 in south-central Nebraska.

A news release from the Nebraska State Patrol says William Reid, of Mesa, Ariz., was arrested on Friday night near Alda in Hall County.

The patrol says a trooper pulled over Reid for speeding. The patrol says a dog taken to the scene indicated there was marijuana in the rear of the car and that a subsequent search uncovered 99 pounds of baled marijuana in the trunk.

Reid was arrested on suspicion of possession with intent to deliver. He remains in custody. Online court records don't list his attorney's name.

Felipe Calderon, the man who cause Mexico's 40,000+ drug war murders is also a religious nut job!

One interesting thing is the Mexican Constitution is many times stronger the the US Constitution when it comes to separation of church and state. When I read it I figured the bandits that formed the Mexico government were also atheists.

Source

Mexico's president, first lady pray for peace at holy site

December 19, 2011 | 2:35 pm

REPORTING FROM MEXICO CITY -- President Felipe Calderon and First Lady Margarita Zavala on Sunday appeared with their children at Mexico's most revered site for Roman Catholics, the Basilica of the Virgin of Guadalupe, and prayed for peace in a public display of devotion.

Calderon, a year from the end of his term, attended Mass at the church less than a week after the feast day for Our Lady of Guadalupe, the deeply charged national symbol dating to the conquest of the Aztec empire and a unifying cultural icon today.

On Sunday, the first lady offered the third prayer of the Mass, saying, according to one report (link in Spanish), "In our family we have prepared this petition. We pray, Lord, for our dear Mexico. Give the Mexican nation the peace, hope and justice that it so needs."

Zavala also asked in prayer, "Touch with your love the hearts of the violent ones," a reference to the ongoing conflict embroiling the government, organized crime and paramilitary groups. News outlets later published photographs of the family crossing themselves in prayer.

The two are lifelong members of the conservative National Action Party, or PAN, which was founded partly as a haven for devout Catholics during the long and aggressively secular rule of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI.

Calderon has not shied away from referring to his religious ideology in public. Last year, he told U.S. journalist Charlie Rose in an interview that he expects to reunite with his father in heaven, in response to a question about whether the president thought his deceased father would approve of his government.

Calderon is the second PAN president to occasionally cross into religious territory while in office. His predecessor, Vicente Fox, sparked criticism in 2002 when he bowed and kissed the hand of Pope John Paul II during the pontiff's final trip to Mexico.

Sunday also marked the launch of campaigns of the three major parties in next year's presidential election and, in a way, the beginning of the end of Calderon's six years in office.

Since assuming the presidency in December 2006, amid chaos over disputed election results, the Calderon administration launched a military-led campaign against organized crime that has left at least 43,000 dead. Some peace activists here place the figure as high as 60,000.

Cardinal Norberto Rivera of Mexico City, speaking on Sunday, said there was a healthy separation of church and state in Mexico, and asked Mexicans to not give in to fear in face of threats from crime groups.

"Imagine if our president fell into fear," the bishop said.

The sharp division that once existed between Mexico's PRI-led governments and the Catholic Church has blurred in recent years, said George W. Grayson, a Mexico specialist at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.

Pope Benedict XVI is expected to visit Mexico for the first time next spring. He has already met presidential front-runner Enrique Peña Nieto during an audience at Vatican City in 2009.

Grayson noted that the church has had known ties to the country's drug cartels, most notably in the practice of some drug lords of funding construction or renovations of local churches. "So the church has contact, and maybe they can reach out and touch a capo's heart," he said.

"Marijuana is 100 times safer than alcohol or cocaine"

Not All Drugs Are Created Equal

Robert Gable

Robert Gable is an emeritus professor of psychology at Claremont Graduate University.

December 19, 2011

Twenty years ago, when my son was a teenager, his favorite recreational drug was ecstasy, or MDMA. He claimed that ecstasy was “as safe as alcohol,” and that there was nothing to worry about. Of course, I did worry.

My worry eventually led to a decade-long research project that compared the relative risk of 20 different recreational substances. Here’s the way scientists usually make comparisons of the risk (acute lethality) of various drugs:

No drug is good for teenagers. But when it comes to the chances of immediate death by chemical toxicity, marijuana is about a hundred times safer than alcohol.

First, determine the “effective” dose of the drug. In the case of alcohol, for example, two 12-ounce beers or two 1.5-ounce shots of 80-proof vodka will give a normally healthy teenager a substantial buzz. The beer or the vodka each contain about 33 grams of ethyl alcohol.

Second, determine the “lethal” dose of the drug. Again, in the case of alcohol, hospital records show that people who die from an alcohol overdose have usually ingested about 330 grams of alcohol — equivalent to 20 shots of vodka.

Third, divide the lethal dose by the effective dose. This gives the “safety margin” of the drug. For alcohol, the safety margin is 10 (330 divided by 33 equals 10). In other words, it takes 10 times as much alcohol to kill you as it does to give you a buzz. Note: All such calculations are very rough estimates, and severe toxic reactions can occur at much lower doses depending on the health of the individual.

Based on my research, the safety margin of recreational substances as normally used is: 6 for heroin; 10 for alcohol; 15 for cocaine; 16 for MDMA; 20 for codeine; and 1,000 for LSD or marijuana. Cigarettes have little immediate risk of death because most of the very lethal nicotine is destroyed in the smoke. The long-term risk of addiction and cancer from cigarettes is well known.

No drug is good for teenagers. But when it comes to the chances of immediate death by chemical toxicity, marijuana is about a hundred times safer than alcohol or cocaine.

The Law Adds to the Harm

Source

The Law Adds to the Harm

Joseph D. McNamara

Joseph D. McNamara, retired police chief of San Jose, Calif., is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Updated December 19, 2011, 8:22 PM

The appearance of any new study indicating an increase in marijuana use by youth is always a prelude to a renewed government surge in America’s war on drugs. But let’s be realistic about our options. It's not as though tough enforcement keeps kids away from marijuana. Usage goes up and down no matter what we do. By keeping marijuana illegal, we nudge youngsters into contact with real criminals engaged in the drug trade. Then we bust kids, giving them a criminal record.

We should be asking: Is the drug war worth fighting? Is there such a thing as victory?

We shouldn't, of course, recommend to kids that they get high on pot instead of drunk on booze or blasted on coke, but recognizing that they may not be the perfect children that we were, the following facts speak for themselves: No one ever died from using marijuana, unlike alcohol or cocaine. Marijuana tends to mellow people, but we know alcohol and cocaine excites some into violence. Driving under any of these drugs is a no-no, but cocaine and alcohol are more likely to produce speeding and reckless driving than marijuana is. Both the law and common sense clearly show that a designated driver is the way to travel.

The scare tactics — raising alarms about youngsters falling under the evil spell of marijuana and tumbling down the slippery slope to a lifetime of degradation and crime — are used to ward off hard questions. The real policy question is not how to save kids from the bogeyman scare scenes depicted in "Reefer Madness," the government's ludicrous 1930s film advocating a ban on marijuana. Instead we should be asking: Is the drug war worth fighting? Is there such a thing as victory? Are the methods we employ worse than the supposed evils they are meant to prevent?

Alcohol prohibition from 1920 to 1933 taught the federal government that it pays to emphasize the “protect our youth” angle. This intimidates many from daring to question some of the corruption and unnecessary deaths and injuries resulting from violent drug enforcement. Even I, a former anti-drug warrior, am hesitant to risk being attacked as encouraging kids to think any drug use is harmless and cool. Yet I have joined thousands of former hard-charging cops, prosecutors and judges in an organization called Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, which unequivocally states that people can cure past drug excess, but can never cure the damage of a conviction and a youthful trip into the world of crime and the criminal justice system.

Border enforcement: Fewer Guard troops, more aerial surveillance

I wonder, since the Obama is pretending to end the Iraq war, will he change his focus and use those troops in the US, as part of the evil "war on drugs"?

Source

Border enforcement: Fewer Guard troops, more aerial surveillance

by Daniel González - Dec. 20, 2011 12:12 PM

The Arizona Republic

The Pentagon in January will reduce the number of National Guard troops stationed along the Southwest border, where they have helped the Border Patrol prevent illegal immigrants and drug smugglers from entering the U.S. since the summer of 2010.

Instead, the Pentagon will add aircraft to beef up aerial surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities as part of a new border strategy announced by Pentagon and Department of Homeland Security officials Tuesday.

The deployment of the additional aerial surveillance and reconnaissance, along with additional Border Patrol agents, will enable the Pentagon to reduce the number of guard troops on the border, the Pentagon said in a statement.

The increased aerial surveillance will for the first time include both helicopter and fixed-wing aircraft with the ability to operate over various landscapes.

In addition to deterrence, the aircraft will provide greater capability to spot illegal border activity from the air, and relay that information to Border Patrol agents on the ground, the Pentagon said.

The aircraft will also help Border Patrol agents to respond faster to illegal activity by allowing agents to reach rugged terrain or areas without roads more quickly, the Pentagon said.

Since 2010, about 1,200 National Guard troops, have been stationed on the Southwest border, including roughly 560 in Arizona.

In fiscal 2011, apprehensions on the Southwest border fell 32 percent to 340,252, an indication that fewer people are crossing the border illegally, the officials said.

Cop gets drunk for police class, gets DWI charge

Cop gets drunk for police class, gets DWI charge

Dec. 19, 2011 09:16 AM

Associated Press

WYCKOFF, N.J. -- Authorities say a northern New Jersey police officer was charged with drunken driving just hours after he purposely got drunk during a police academy class on alcohol's effect on reaction times, balance and motor skills.

Wyckoff police tell The Record newspaper that 31-year-old Joseph Gaeta, who serves with the Midland Park police, was charged after the all-terrain vehicle he was driving crashed Thursday afternoon.

Gaeta -- who was off-duty at the time -- was hospitalized with significant facial injuries.

Officials say Gaeta took part in a DWI class at the Bergen County Police Academy. He was given controlled amounts of alcohol during the class, allowing officers to see his response to sobriety tests while sober and after he was drunk.

Another officer drove Gaeta home after the class.

Gilbert Green Cross center helps medical-marijuana applicants

Gilbert Green Cross center helps medical-marijuana applicants

by John Stanley - Dec. 21, 2011 11:14 AM

The Republic | azcentral.com

Although the status of medical marijuana remains a bit hazy in Arizona, facilities that help people apply for patient cards continue to spring up -- including in Gilbert.

The Green Cross Patient Center opened in Gilbert nearly two months ago in a small strip mall on the southern side of Baseline Road, between Gilbert and Lindsay roads.

Owner and director Charles "Chuck" Hall made it clear that the facility is not a dispensary and that there is no marijuana on site. "We are here to help patients get a doctor's recommendation and to help them with the paperwork," he said.

He's also fighting stereotypes.

"We don't have any Rasta posters on the walls, or pictures of Bob Marley," Hall said. "This is a medical facility, and marijuana is a safe alternative to some very bad medicines that hurt people."

According to Hall, the majority of their patients are people in their 40s and 50's who are seeking relief from chronic pain. Nearly all have tried traditional remedies; many are wary of using potentially addictive pills.

Casey Roberts, a mechanic and assistant manager at a nearby auto shop, was one of Green Cross' first customers.

Roberts said he has a number of medical conditions, including pain from an extensive facial reconstruction he underwent after suffering a broken jaw and crushed eye socket in the boxing ring.

"I hate taking pills," he said. "I just refused, and put up with the pain. But I found that marijuana helped."

Roberts said his doctors had no problem prescribing pain pills, but were reluctant to prescribe medical marijuana. After a couple of run-ins with the law, he was prepared to move to a state where he could get medical marijuana legally.

Then he discovered Green Cross.

"I had heard about these places but never paid too much attention to them," Roberts said. "But I thought if there was one in Gilbert, and as tough as Gilbert police are on things like this, then it had to be legit."

The 1,200-square-foot clinic has a reception area/waiting room, with a couple of sparsely-furnished offices and an examination room with a sphygmomanometer (to measure blood pressure) and a tripod-mounted camera.

Patients meet with Dr. Jack Manning, who reviews their medical history, conducts a short examination and discusses what treatments the patient has tried and how medical marijuana may or may not help.

If Manning writes a recommendation, staff at the clinic helps the patient fill out forms, takes photos to go with the application and files the request. Applications can be filed only online.

Green Cross charges $150 for its services. (In addition, the Arizona Department of Health Services charges $150 for the cards, which must be renewed annually.)

Patients may file their own forms, but Hall said a lot of doctors are reluctant to make recommendations for medical marijuana.

"We can do two things here," Hall said. "We have a doctor who is compassionate and we also do the paperwork. And when bureaucracy goes bad, we take care of it for you."

Currently the clinic sees about 10 patients a week. The reason it's so slow, Hall said, is that there's still so much uncertainty about the law.

He hopes to raise awareness of the clinic, as well as increase its patient load, by giving presentations at the center on some of the legal issues surrounding medical marijuana, its proper use, which strains are better for what afflictions, and other related topics.

One of the reasons they located in Gilbert, Hall said, was because of its favorable demographics. Contrary to stereotypes, its customer base isn't the stoner crowd.

"(Medical marijuana) is for the soccer mom who doesn't want to take Percocet," Hall said. "She can take a tincture in her tea instead of hiding in the back room, smoking a fat doobie."

Although the main reasons people come in is because of chronic pain and cancer, medical marijuana has been touted as helpful for those with glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C, Crohn's disease, muscle spasms and other afflictions.

Manning, an osteopath who has lived in Arizona more than 40 years, works two days a week at the Gilbert Green Cross center and two days at the north Phoenix center. He also works at another clinic in Flagstaff on Sundays.

He estimated that he recommends medical marijuana for about 90 percent of the patients who request it. Although that may sound like a lot, he said he has seen few people trying to game the system. Part of the reason for that, he thinks, is that the center requires medical records.

About 16,400 cards have already been issued to people in the state, according to the Arizona Medical Marijuana Program's website.

The Arizona Department of Health Services, which issues the cards, has no affiliation with Green Cross or any other third party vendors, said DHS spokeswoman Laura Oxley. Nor does the department track how many people apply on their own or how many use a vendor.

"Our experience has been that people who aren't as familiar with using a computer sometimes have questions," Oxley said. "Our recommendation then is to find someone to help, whether that's a grandchild or a neighbor or someone else."

She added that patients should always be careful about sharing personal information and that it's important that the person applying for the card includes a direct email address in case any problems comes up.

Hall knows a lot of people view the center skeptically.

"Preconceived notions are hard to get over," he said. "I understand that. But if someone you know is coming back from cancer and can't find relief, then your opinion can change real quick." Green Cross Patient Center

When: 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesday-Friday.

Where: 2401 E. Baseline Road, Gilbert.

Details: 480-420-6582, greencrosscenter.com.

Information about Arizona's medical marijuana program: azdhs.gov/medicalmarijuana.

More than $10M in pot found in Tucson home

From the article it sure doesn't sound like the cops had the required "probable cause" to either get a search warrant or break into the home.

Source

More than $10M in pot found in Tucson home

Dec. 21, 2011 02:44 PM

Associated Press

TUCSON - Authorities say more than $10 million worth of marijuana has been found in a Tucson home along with cocaine and rifles.

The Pima County Sheriff’s Department deputies responded to 911 calls of suspicious activity at a home near Catalina Highway on Tuesday night.

Deputies discovered 1,051 bales of marijuana, weighing about 21,000 pounds.

The Arizona Daily Star says body armor, assault rifles and 16 kilos of cocaine also were discovered at the home.

Nobody was in the residence when deputies arrived and no arrests have been made.

Caffeine inhaler a dangerous 'club drug,' senator says

Last but not least it sounds like this New York Democrat senator Charles Schumer, is a government tyrant who wants to used the "Drug Laws" to wage war on the American people much like police state thug Harry J. Anslinger who was responsible for beginning the war on drug.

Source

Caffeine inhaler a dangerous 'club drug,' senator says

by Anna Edney - Dec. 22, 2011 08:28 PM

Bloomberg News

WASHINGTON - Breathable caffeine dispensed from canisters that fit in jeans pockets and are allowed in carry-on luggage is a "club drug" that may be dangerous to teenagers, a New York senator said Thursday.

Democrat Charles Schumer wrote Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Margaret Hamburg asking her to review the safety and legality of the AeroShot Pure Energy caffeine inhaler, a yellow and gray canister of caffeine powder and B vitamins resembling a tube of lipstick. The inhaler is set to hit store shelves in New York and Boston next month.

AeroShot will be sold over the counter with no age restrictions and is touted for its convenience and zero calories. If taken with alcohol, the mixture may have effects similar to caffeinated alcohol drinks tied to hospitalizations in the past, Schumer said. Doctors say it may carry neurological and cardiovascular risks.

"The product is nothing more than a club drug designed to give users the ability to drink until they drop," Schumer said.

The FDA will review information about the product, Doug Karas, a spokesman for the agency, said in an e-mail. The agency will respond directly to Schumer on the issues he raised.

Last year, at Schumer's urging, the FDA stopped sales of caffeinated alcoholic beverages after they were linked to hospitalizations and deaths.

The inhaler is sold online by Cambridge, Mass.-based Breathable Foods Inc. and the Lab Store in Paris. AeroShot advertising in Europe focuses on drinking and partying, Schumer said in a statement, adding that he is concerned it could be a health hazard to teens.

The inhaler was created by David Edwards, a professor at Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, who also invented inhalable chocolate.

Government hospitals dope up patients to control them

On the other hand our government masters routinely use drugs to control and pacify people they have locked up in schools, mental hospitals and prisons.

More of the old "do as I say, not as I do" double standard from our government masters.

Source

In Treating Disabled, Potent Drugs and Few Rules

By DANNY HAKIM

Published: December 22, 2011

After she was moved into a state-run group home, the 26-year-old woman, who is severely mentally retarded, started gaining weight, drooling, breaking out in pimples and pulling out her hair, leaving a bald spot the size of a softball on her head.

Her mother, Debra Strignano, suspected that someone had increased her daughter’s medication without her family’s consent.

When she asked for a copy of a consent form she had once signed for her daughter, she discovered it had been altered, tripling the daily dosage of Clonidine, which is used to control attention deficit disorder. The drug, and four others her daughter was taking, have myriad potential side effects, including rapid weight gain, skin rashes and drowsiness.

In response to questions from The New York Times, state officials said they would investigate how the consent form was changed and whether Katie Strignano was receiving the appropriate dose of medication.

“Everything with them is, let’s sedate the kid instead of trying to solve the problem,” Ms. Strignano said. “They want to dope her up; they want her to sit there like she doesn’t exist.”

Tens of thousands of powerful pills created to treat serious mental illnesses like schizophrenia are given to developmentally disabled people in the care of New York State every day.

But a review by The Times of previously unreleased records, as well as interviews with state employees, clinicians, family members and outside experts, reveals that the psychotropic medications, which alter the brain’s chemistry, are often dispensed sloppily, without rigorous or regular review, by general practitioners with little expertise in the area.

And low-level workers at state group homes are frequently given discretion to increase the medication “as needed,” despite their lack of significant training.

Psychologists who have worked inside the system describe a culture in which the drugs are used to control the disruptive behavior of the developmentally disabled — people with conditions like autism, Down syndrome and cerebral palsy — an approach increasingly discredited in the field.

The problem is that people with mental retardation, because of their condition and diminished intellectual capacity, commonly exhibit symptoms similar to those seen among people who have impulse control, anxiety or attention deficit disorders.

Psychiatrists and psychologists interviewed by The Times said those symptoms were best treated through therapy and one-on-one guidance of the developmentally disabled. But state records indicate that the doctors are often instead treating them with the psychotropic drugs, which do not address their underlying problems and can be harmful.

“It’s a mistake,” said Dr. Andrew Levitas, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey who specializes in developmental disabilities. “Using antipsychotics to suppress behavior is an old practice used by people who aren’t acquainted with the advances in the field.”

The Times review found that 4 of the top 10 medications or supplements given to the developmentally disabled in the state are psychotropic, according to Medicaid records. In fact, developmentally disabled residents of group homes in New York are more likely to be given Ativan, an anti-anxiety drug that has a tranquilizing effect, than multivitamins, the records show.

Concern about drug use was one of the most frequently raised issues in inspection records reviewed by The Times; in the last five years, all nine state residential institutions for the developmentally disabled have been repeatedly cited by Health Department inspectors for failing to provide proper oversight of psychotropic drugs.

The drugs can have serious consequences. Risperdal, the second most frequently prescribed, was developed to treat psychotic disorders and has been approved for controlling aggression among people with autism. But its side effects can be extreme, including breast growth in adolescent boys, which in a small number of cases require mastectomies.

And even the use of the drugs to control behavior is questionable. A 2008 study published in the medical journal The Lancet found that psychotropic drugs like Risperdal were less effective at treating behavioral outbursts than placebos.

Dr. Roy Q. Sanders, who is the medical director of the Marcus Autism Center in Atlanta and has worked in New York, said, “I tell people all the time that the medications are really blunt tools when it comes to making substantial differences in behavior in developmentally disabled individuals.” Enlarge This Image Nathaniel Brooks for The New York Times

Jessica Strignano brushing her sister Katie's hair at home on Long Island. Katie Strignano, 26, began pulling her hair out after a change in her medication.

Abused and Used

To be sure, the issue is a complicated one: developmentally disabled people are more likely than the general population to suffer from mental illness.

But the records examined by The Times show that some developmentally disabled residents received psychotropic drugs without ever getting a clear diagnosis of mental illness. Even among those who have a mental illness, the records indicate that the state’s use of the drugs can be overly aggressive.

During the last few months, as The Times has sought information about the state’s use of medications, the Office for People With Developmental Disabilities has acknowledged that there are problems, and began to develop sweeping guidelines for the use of medication. The new rules say medications “shall not be used for disciplinary purposes” or “as a substitute for supervision.”

“We know that less intrusive techniques work,” said Courtney Burke, commissioner of the Office for People With Developmental Disabilities, which oversees thousands of group homes and larger state facilities.

Ms. Burke said her agency was developing software to track the use of psychotropic drugs better and was creating a position, a chief of pharmacy, to oversee how drugs are used. New regulations, she added, would “help move the system to one that does not rely on medication or physical intervention.”

The Clinician’s View

Diana Valitutto, a former state psychologist, said she resigned from the Office for People With Developmental Disabilities in 2004 after concerns she raised about the use of psychotropic medications were ignored.

While she said she believed drugs were justified at times, she added, “from my experience, they don’t make genuine permanent changes in behavior, they simply control the client for the time being.”

State law says that “no medication shall be used for the convenience of staff” and that “special attention shall be given to those individuals receiving psychotropic medication.”

But oversight is limited. Although psychotropic drug use is supposed to be regularly reviewed, records show those reviews are seldom rigorous. The bar is higher in Massachusetts, for example, where state officials must have the approval of a judge to use drugs classified as antipsychotic.

“It’s worked well to protect people with mental health and cognitive impairments over the years,” said Marianne Meacham, general counsel at the Department of Developmental Services in Massachusetts. “It’s somewhat burdensome, but it’s definitely an important protection.”

In New York, Ms. Valitutto grew so worried about the overuse of drugs that she went to the Commission on Quality of Care and Advocacy for Persons With Disabilities, a state oversight agency, with examples of residents on what she believed were overly aggressive regimens of psychotropic medications.

“I saw people being medicated to control behavior to such a degree that to me it was obviously and clearly affecting their health, their safety, their quality of life, their ability to participate in the daily activities of living, and in some cases threatened their lives,” Ms. Valitutto said.

Ms. Valitutto said there was little consistency in how drugs were used: In central New York, she said, they were dispensed carefully and ethically. But that was not the case in the Albany area. A retired state psychologist who was approached independently by The Times vouched for Ms. Valitutto’s professionalism and offered a similar account, saying the residents in that region were often treated with multiple medications from the same class, a practice discouraged by the medical establishment.

“We would always go to drugs,” the psychologist said. “Once you get a client on a lot of medications, it’s hard to know what’s working and what’s not, and it’s hard to get them off.”

The commission, which declined to comment, never took any action on the concerns brought forward by Ms. Valitutto, and she resigned.

A Chronic Problem

Every year, the State Health Department inspects New York’s nine large residential facilities for the developmentally disabled. A review of 2,000 pages of inspection records found repeated violations of basic protocol for drug treatment at all of them.

Abused and Used

A resident at Bernard Fineson, a state institution in Queens that is perennially cited for violating drug administration policies, was on a drug diet of Risperdal, Ativan and the antiseizure medication Depakote, but inspectors wrote that “there is no evidence of a team review regarding justification for the current medication regime.” A resident at a Hudson Valley institution was on seven psychotropic drugs, along with Benadryl; inspectors worried that “there was no process evident that evaluated the risks of the untreated behaviors against the risks of the medication.”

At an institution in Broome County, inspectors reviewing the records of several patients could not even figure out what behavioral problems were being treated with drugs like Depakote, lithium, Thorazine and Zoloft.

The nonprofit facilities overseen by the state are not much better.

During a recent six-year period, Living Resources, a nonprofit organization in Albany that cares for about 300 people, was cited for 11 violations related to misusing drugs to control inappropriate behavior. That is the most of any nonprofit provider in the state in that period of time, according to inspection data analyzed by The Times.

“We have a lot of people that we care about and care for,” said Fredrick W. Erlich, the Living Resources chief executive officer, adding, “We are going to make mistakes.”

In search of alternative approaches, state officials are now studying the practices of the ARC of Delaware County, a small nonprofit group serving the developmentally disabled in the Catskills. The group has a policy banning what they call “pharmacological restraints,” or the use of drugs for reasons beyond treating medical problems.

“We’re not antimedication, but we believe people need the least amount to take the edge off so they can be available for teaching, and ultimately as they learn, those medications get reduced and eliminated,” said George Suess, chief executive of the ARC of Delaware County. He added that his residents “are functioning, they are learning, they are not zombied out, sitting in a corner like vegetables.”

A Sister’s Keeper

Taraneh Vargha’s sister was on so many psychotropic medications at her group home in the Finger Lakes region that her hands would shake, her body temperature fluctuated, her heart raced and her chest ached. She had tardive dyskinesia, a disorder characterized by involuntary repetitive movements that is common among people on high dosages of antipsychotic medications.

The sisters are both Iranian-born American citizens and members of the Bahai faith, whose members have been persecuted in Iran since the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Ms. Vargha’s sister received a number of shifting diagnoses over the years, including autism-related disorders, mild mental retardation, post-traumatic stress, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

At the same time, state officials conceded in records obtained by The Times that they did not really know what her diagnosis was; assessing her has been complicated by the fact that Ms. Vargha’s sister is far more fluent in Persian than English.

Despite confusion about her diagnoses, there has been clear concern expressed in state records about the volume of drugs she was being given. None was more prevalent than Geodon, an antipsychotic made by Pfizer. Ms. Vargha protested after her sister, 47, was given as much as 360 milligrams per day; the maximum dosage recommended by the Food and Drug Administration is 160 milligrams.

In a statement, Easter Seals, which operates a clinic that prescribed the medication to Ms. Vargha’s sister, said the choice to provide such a high amount of Geodon was “not uncommon” and done “with close monitoring.” It added, “We do not believe the dosage prescribed was a mistake, but that it was done consistent with appropriate protocols.”

The Times asked Dr. Levitas about such a dosage.

“It is not only not accepted, it is dangerous,” he said, adding, “I’ve never seen Geodon used at that dose before.”

The Office for People With Developmental Disabilities reviewed the case after being approached by The Times and is referring it to the Commission on Quality of Care. “What we have found,” the office said, “is sufficiently concerning that we have determined an independent, external review is necessary.”

“The Geodon is well above (i.e. 3x above) the typical upper level for this med. This is of great concern,” says a report in August 2008, drafted by an oversight committee in the Finger Lakes division of the Office for People With Developmental Disabilities. “This is a very large dose of Geodon,” said another report from September of that year. And yet it continued. A review by the Health Department said the Geodon dosage in 2009 was “excessive and much above the F.D.A.’s limits.”

Geodon dosages were drawing scrutiny from federal prosecutors at the same time. In 2009, Pfizer paid $301 million to settle allegations by the Justice Department that company representatives marketed the drug for unapproved uses and encouraged doctors “to prescribe the drug at substantially higher than approved dosages.”

Like all psychotropic medications, Geodon has potential side effects, like anxiety and weight gain, and far more serious risks, including vision problems. And Ms. Vargha’s sister was also taking four other psychotropic drugs, each with its own potentially damaging consequences.

Ms. Vargha fought for years before her sister’s dosages were reduced. “Why on earth would we give psychotropic medications to a population that is already vulnerable and struggling to use their brain?” she wrote in a letter to the state this year. “Why do we want to numb and dumb them more?”

Three months ago, increasingly desperate, Ms. Vargha, 56, removed her sister from the group home, and took her to her house.

When a reporter visited Ms. Vargha’s home recently, her sister was disoriented and briefly mistook the reporter for an Iranian policeman. At night, she walks the hallways, speaking Persian.

“She’s getting better, she’s eating now a bit, but she doesn’t sleep,” Ms. Vargha said. She hopes to get her sister back on her feet soon and move her into a group apartment in Rochester — where she hopes her sister can regain some sense of herself.

“My sister came with so much hope to this country, America, the land of freedom,” she said. “When she became a citizen, she put both arms up and said, ‘I love this country.’ ”

She added, “I want her to experience what she believed in.”

Taxpayers roasting on an open fire ...

Vin Suprynowicz

Taxpayers roasting on an open fire ...

Posted: Dec. 25, 2011 | 2:02 a.m.

The nation's "Forests Are Severely Damaged By Marijuana Grow Sites," reads the headline on the Dec. 7 news release from the U.S. Forest Service.

Marijuana cultivation sites in 20 states on 67 national forests "have caused severe damage," said Forest Service Director of Law Enforcement David Ferrell. In California alone, the service has cleaned up and restored 335 sites, removing 130 tons of trash, 300 pounds of pesticides, five tons of fertilizer and nearly 260 miles of irrigation piping, the agriculture cop testified.

"Natural vegetation and wildlife are killed as growers use liberal doses of herbicides, rodenticides and pesticides, some of them banned in the U.S.," Mr. Ferrell told whatever staff members were filtering in and out of the room. "These chemicals can cause extensive ... damage to ecosystems. Human waste and trash ... are widespread. Winter rains create severe soil erosion and wash the poisons, this waste and trash into streams and rivers -- including congressionally designated Wild and Scenic Rivers."

No! Not the Wild and Scenic Rivers!

"It is incumbent on the agency to do what is necessary to ensure that the resources we manage are protected and visitors as well as employees are safe," Mr. Ferrell told the fearless drug warriors.

I'm glad to hear it.

I then proceeded to read the rest of the news release, seeking word on how precisely the Forest Service now plans to join the battle to nip this problem in the bud by seeking re-legalization of marijuana cultivation on private lands -- land the owners would have an obvious incentive to keep in better shape so they can plant again the following year -- since it's clear to everyone the only reason people run the risk of having their crops regularly seized and destroyed on Forest Service land is because this popular medicinal plant has been absurdly banned from private cultivation for 80 years.

Why? Because of racist propaganda back in the early 20th century that "the devil's weed" was widely used by black and Hispanic males to seduce white women, and because Harry Anslinger's Prohibition boys needed a new mission after that great saint of progressivism, Franklin Roosevelt, re-legalized alcohol (the far more dangerous drug favored by white folks) back in 1933.

And ... nothing. Instead, the Forest Service "will continue to enhance partnerships with other federal, state, local and Tribal agencies in a cooperative effort to investigate and eradicate marijuana cultivation and other narcotic activities occurring on Forest System lands," Ferrell said.

So, at a time when the federal government seeks bankruptcy in a lemming-like cliff dive, the agency simply wants more money to do what's been failing so spectacularly for years. In fact, pot farming on public lands is one of America's few remaining billion-dollar growth industries!

Why does the service keep destroying every million-dollar harvest it stumbles on, rather than earn some return for the Treasury by selling the herb at market rates to legitimate medical patients holding legitimate physician recommendations in states that have legalized those uses? Such patients now suffer without that medicine because both federal and local law enforcement agencies flout those laws, busting even those who seek to distribute high-quality cannabis products free of charge (as I see our local sheriff's deputies busted another marijuana dispensary last week, right here in River City).

So what If the ninth and 10th amendments guarantee us freedom from federal intervention with our medical liberties? We've got federal payrolls that need growing.

Fund more failure!

-- -- --

You know that big copper-roofed facility you can see from the Spaghetti Bowl? It's the Downtown Transportation Center, a huge, tile-floored facility built with millions of city and federal tax dollars back in 1987. It has been a dark spot in downtown Las Vegas since the Regional Transportation Commission opened a new transit center at Casino Center Boulevard and Bonneville Avenue, near the Unnecessary New City Hall.

Talk about bad planning and a huge waste of taxpayer dollars. I'll bet some heads rolled over that fiasco! Let's just Google "Las Vegas scandal over abandoning high-priced downtown bus terminal."

Not a word. I guess it's pretty far down the list of fiscal missteps in a city that lost millions of dollars using eminent domain to drive out thriving small downtown businesses to create NeoFlopolis and its adjacent White Elephant Parking Garage, not to mention turning over the perfectly good "old" City Hall to a shoe company. (There's a money-maker!)

Anyway, I now read in the newspaper that some folks hope to set up a farmer's market in the not-so-old abandoned bus station. Our reporter was there, a week back, as Kerry Clasby, one of the organizers, reached into "a basket of specialty produce that included cauliflower, artichokes and heirloom tomatoes" and "peeled open an organically raised tangerine to share with a small group."

Lucky thing Southern Nevada Health District inspector Mary Oaks wasn't on scene to order that "unlabeled" produce doused with bleach, as she did at the Quail Run Farm out in Overton a few months back.

Farmers markets are a great idea. I wish Ms. Clasby and her associates well. Unfortunately, I've talked to lots of entrepreneurs over the years who had high hopes for ventures in downtown Las Vegas -- until the meter maids and the code enforcement guys showed up.

They end up waxing nostalgic about the days when all a businessman had to worry about were roving Apache war parties and the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang.

Who needs a search warrant when the hotel manager will let you in

Source

Police find mound of heroin, $1,500 in cash in Tinley Park hotel room

By Ashley Rueff TribLocal reporter Friday at 3:01 p.m.

Tinley Park police found 91 grams of heroin, scales, sleeping pills and plastic bags often used to package and sell narcotics inside a hotel room at Comfort Suites, 18400 Spring Creek Dr., at about 2 p.m. Dec. 19.

Police were called to the hotel because of suspicious circumstances when employees noticed a large amount of people coming and going from the room Dec. 18 and 19, according to a police report.

When no one answered the door, the hotel’s general manager opened the door for a well-being check while accompanied by police. From the door, officers saw a baseball-sized mound of a white powdery substance on a desk. It later tested positive for heroin, according to the report.

Other drug paraphernalia was also found lying around the room, in drawers and in closets. A picture removed from the wall was found lying on a desk with a razor blade, said the report. The picture frame’s glass appeared to have been used to cut the heroin.

A total of 91 grams was recovered from the room, along with sleeping pills that appeared to be cut up to mix with the heroin. Police said $1,544 in cash was also found in the room’s safe.

Using a license plate number taken by hotel employees, police arrested a 50-year-old Tinley Park woman in the 17100 block of 71st Avenue at about 8:15 p.m. Dec. 19 with three hypodermic needles and a small bag of heroin. The woman said she went to the hotel earlier that day to purchase heroin.

Cmdr. Pat McCain declined to comment on the case because it is an ongoing investigation.

Pot clubs turning to delivery

Pot clubs turning to delivery

With feds threatening storefronts, couriers become alternatives

David Downs, Special to The Chronicle

Monday, December 26, 2011

Medithrive, a cannabis dispensary in San Francisco's Mission District that was forced to close last month, has re-emerged as a delivery-only service, part of a growing trend in California's billion-dollar medical marijuana industry that's recently come under attack by federal authorities.

Threats of property forfeiture, fines, lawsuits and raids this winter have made brick-and-mortar locations less enticing to pot entrepreneurs. Hundreds of storefronts have closed amid the new federal crackdown. Delivery services remain, offering a lower-profile, albeit more dangerous, alternative.

"It just makes sense. When you have a storefront, you're on the map. You don't have those issues with a delivery service. No one's going to know about it," said William Panze, an Oakland defense attorney who represents Northstone Organics, a delivery service based in Ukiah (Mendocino County).

California has struggled with cannabis distribution since voters in 1996 gave qualified patients a medical defense for breaking state marijuana laws. Then in 2003, state Sen. Mark Leno's SB420 granted patients the right to collectively cultivate and distribute marijuana.

Under those laws, San Francisco created a dispensary licensing process in 2005 that led to an estimated 24 clubs and one delivery-only service. There are thought to be several hundred thousand Californians with a doctor's recommendation for marijuana.

Cities such as Los Angeles and San Diego chose the opposite path and tried to ban shops with limited success. But the storefront enforcement climate led to the proliferation of fly-by-night mobile services.

Indeed, the number of storefront dispensaries and mobile operators are inversely correlated, Los Angeles Assistant City Attorney Asha Greenberg said.

Federal action

On Oct. 7, four U.S. attorneys declared a crackdown on the medical marijuana industry, alleging profiteering and exports to other states. Hundreds of warning letters went out to dispensary landlords across the state.

More than two-thirds of San Diego storefront dispensaries closed within weeks, watchers said. Dozens closed in Sacramento County. At least three San Francisco clubs have closed, and one in Oakland moved.

Jack Gillund, spokesman for the U.S. attorney for the Northern District, said his office would not comment on storefront pot clubs being replaced by delivery services.

Medithrive's return as a delivery service echoes the behavior of operators in Southern California. San Diego has about 100 delivery listings. Orange County has 50 and Los Angeles about 100, according to data from leading dispensary locator WeedMaps.com.

"My sense is they're switching out of brick-and-mortars, or just going to the black market," said Justin Hartfield, WeedMaps founder.

"It's like water," Greenberg said. "You close off one pathway, and it morphs and goes in another direction."

Some patients prefer delivery. Medithrive declined to comment, but it is busy.

Calls to the service often go directly to voice mail because of high volume. The company also has an online menu as well as smart-phone apps that feature strains such as Dream Queen for $40 for an eighth of an ounce - about a week's supply for an average patient.

Warning of delivery dangers

The Department of Justice's crackdown amounts to a dangerous form of theater, in that it does nothing to curtail supply or demand, said Lisa Gygax, a California dispensary attorney. People feel less safe buying cannabis from a random guy coming up to their house - but they will if options become limited, she said.

"Delivery is dangerous, it's extremely difficult to regulate, but they're extremely successful if there is no safe access," she said. "What else are patients going to do - go to the park?"

San Francisco has one delivery-only licensee, the Green Cross. It is delivery-only because it was pushed out of a storefront during the 2005 San Francisco licensing process, said General Manager Caren Woodson. The Green Cross is seeking a city permit for a storefront because it's the preferred business model, she said.

Risk of robbery

Safety concerns for drivers are huge, Woodson said, and the service has been robbed once.

Unlicensed delivery services probably underreport robberies, Gygax said.

The conflict between California's medicinal marijuana supporters - including advocates and lawmakers - and federal authorities is expected to worsen. That is likely to bring an awkward social compromise: more delivered dope.

"We sort of predicted this," said Dale Gieringer, head of California's National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. "I could see cars going around. I could see delivery trucks. It's sort of what one expected. ... I've seen a decline in delivery services in the last four or five years as dispensaries have proliferated. I suppose that will go in the other direction now."

E-mail comments to metro@sfchronicle.com.

Powerful painkiller has government twits worried

Of course the federal government demonized heroin and eventually made it illegal with the 1914 Harrison Narcotics Tax Act. Probably because some religious twits in the government think if it makes you feel good, it should be illegal.

Source

New powerful painkiller has experts worried

Dec. 26, 2011 11:51 AM

Associated Press

NEW YORK — Drug companies are working to develop a pure, more powerful version of a highly abused medicine, which has addiction experts worried that it could spur a new wave of abuse.

The new pills contain the highly addictive painkiller hydrocodone, packing up to 10 times the amount of the drug as existing medications such as Vicodin. Four companies have begun patient testing, and one of them — Zogenix of San Diego — plans to apply early next year to begin marketing its product, Zohydro.

If approved, it would mark the first time patients could legally buy pure hydrocodone. Existing products combine the drug with nonaddictive painkillers such as acetaminophen.

Critics say they are especially worried about Zohydro, a timed-release drug meant for managing moderate to severe pain, because abusers could crush it to release an intense, immediate high.

“I have a big concern that this could be the next OxyContin,” said April Rovero, president of the National Coalition Against Prescription Drug Abuse. “We just don’t need this on the market.”

OxyContin, introduced in 1995 by Purdue Pharma of Stamford, Connecticut, was designed to manage pain with a formula that dribbled one dose of oxycodone over many hours.

Abusers quickly discovered they could defeat the timed-release feature by crushing the pills. Purdue Pharma changed the formula to make OxyContin more tamper-resistant, but addicts have moved onto generic oxycodone and other drugs that do not have a timed-release feature.

Oxycodone is now the most-abused medicine in the United States, with hydrocodone second, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration’s annual count of drug seizures sent to police drug labs for analysis.

The latest drug tests come as more pharmaceutical companies are getting into the $10 billion-a-year legal market for powerful — and addictive — opiate narcotics.

“It’s like the wild west,” said Peter Jackson, co-founder of Advocates for the Reform of Prescription Opioids. “The whole supply-side system is set up to perpetuate this massive unloading of opioid narcotics on the American public.”

The pharmaceutical firms say the new hydrocodone drugs give doctors another tool to try on patients in legitimate pain, part of a constant search for better painkillers to treat the aging U.S. population.

“Sometimes you circulate a patient between various opioids, and some may have a better effect than others,” said Karsten Lindhardt, chief executive of Denmark-based Egalet, which is testing its own pure hydrocodone product.

The companies say a pure hydrocodone pill would avoid liver problems linked to high doses of acetaminophen, an ingredient in products like Vicodin. They also say patients will be more closely supervised because, by law, they will have to return to their doctors each time they need more pills. Prescriptions for the weaker, hydrocodone-acetaminophen products now on the market can be refilled up to five times.

Zogenix has completed three rounds of patient testing, and last week it announced it had held a final meeting with Food and Drug Administration officials to talk about its upcoming drug application. It plans to file the application in early 2012 and have Zohydro on the market by early 2013.

Purdue Pharma and Cephalon, a Frazer, Pennsylvania-based unit of Israel-based Teva Pharmaceuticals, are conducting late-stage trials of their own hydrocodone drugs, according to documents filed with federal regulators.

Hydrocodone belongs to family of drugs known as opiates or opioids because they are chemically similar to opium. They include morphine, heroin, oxycodone, codeine, methadone and hydromorphone.

Opiates block pain but also unleash intense feelings of well-being and can create physical dependence. The withdrawal symptoms are also intense, with users complaining of cramps, diarrhea, muddled thinking, nausea and vomiting.

After a while, opiates stop working, forcing users to take stronger doses or to try slightly different chemicals.

Mexican drug cartels build own radio system

Mexican drug cartels build own radio system

by Michael Weissenstein - Dec. 27, 2011 12:00 AM

Associated Press

MEXICO CITY - When convoys of soldiers or federal police move through the scrubland of northern Mexico, the Zetas drug cartel knows they are coming.

The alert goes out from a taxi driver or a street vendor, equipped with a high-end handheld radio and paid to work as a lookout known as a "halcon," or hawk.

The radio signal travels deep into the arid countryside, hours by foot from the nearest road. There, the 8-foot-tall dark-green branches of the rockrose bush conceal a radio tower painted to match. A cable buried in the dirt draws power from a solar panel. A signal-boosting repeater relays the message along a network of powerful antennas and other repeaters that stretch hundreds of miles across Mexico, a shadow communications system allowing the cartel to coordinate drug deliveries, kidnapping, extortion and other crimes with the immediacy and precision of a modern military or law-enforcement agency.

The Mexican army and marines have begun attacking the system, seizing hundreds of pieces of communications equipment in at least three operations since September that offer a firsthand look at a surprisingly far-ranging and sophisticated infrastructure.

Current and former U.S. law-enforcement officials say the equipment, ranging from professional-grade towers to handheld radios, was part of a single network that until recently extended from a U.S. border down eastern Mexico's Gulf Coast and into Guatemala.

The network allowed Zetas operatives to conduct encrypted conversations without depending on the official cellphone network, which is relatively easy for authorities to tap into and in many cases does not reach deep into the Mexican countryside.

"They're doing what any sensible military unit would do," said Robert Killebrew, a retired U.S. Army colonel who has studied the Mexican drug cartels for the Center for a New American Security, a Washington think tank. "They're branching out into as many forms of communications as possible."

The Mexican army said on Dec. 4 that it had seized a total of at least 167 antennas, 155 repeaters, 166 power sources, 71 pieces of computer equipment and 1,446 radios. The equipment was taken down in the Gulf Coast state of Veracruz and northern states of Nuevo Leon, Coahuila, San Luis Potosi and Tamaulipas.

Mexico police arrested over torture video

Source

Mexico police arrested over torture video

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican authorities arrested five policemen on Monday on suspicion of torture after a video was made public showing police officers submerging a detainee's head in a bucket of water.

An official at the attorney general's office said five Mexico City police officers were taken into custody over the alleged torture, which took place in the capital's tough inner city neighborhood of Tepito last month.

Soon after the incident, a video was posted on the Internet showing a man with his shirt pulled over his head being dunked in a bucket of water while in the custody of a unit of well-armed policemen. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spQi5-e4ft4 )

President Felipe Calderon's term in office has been dominated by an army-led crackdown on drug trafficking cartels, which sparked a wave of criminal violence that has claimed more than 45,000 lives in the past five years.

Human rights groups have accused the police and army of abuses, including torture and killings, though very few officials have been convicted. Last month activists asked the International Criminal Court in The Hague to investigate Calderon and top officials over the allegations.

(Reporting by Patrick Rucker and Dave Graham; editing by Anthony Boadle)

Appeals court rules against police in drug case

Appeals court rules against police in drug case

Posted: Tuesday, December 27, 2011 5:44 pm

By Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services

Someone’s refusal to open the door to police doing an investigation is insufficient, by itself, for the officers to enter without a warrant, the Arizona Court of Appeals has ruled.

The judges unanimously rejected arguments by prosecutors that the Department of Public Safety officers were justified in demanding that Pablo Aguilar open the door to the hotel room he was occupying. The officers said they had evidence that someone in that room was selling marijuana.

But appellate Judge Philip Hall said the officers should instead have asked a judge for a warrant.

Assistant Attorney General Joe Maziarz said his office is studying the ruling and has not decided whether to appeal. He said, though, he believes that what the officers did fits within exceptions to constitutional provisions, laws and court rulings which spell out when police do not have to seek a warrant.

This case involves what the court describes as DPS officers, on a routine early morning patrol, arresting a woman in a hotel parking lot for possession of methamphetamine. She told them she had purchased the drug from room 211 of the hotel.

That room, however, was found vacant.

Further information, including from the hotel manager and people stopped in the parking lot with a glass pipe, led to information that someone in room 214 was selling the drugs.

After the officers knocked on the door and identified themselves, someone peeked out from the curtains and a person inside asked who was there.

According to court documents one of the two officers said, “we need you to open the door,’’ and one gave the occupant three seconds to comply. The door was opened about 30 seconds later and the officers said they saw and smelled what appeared to be marijuana, leading to the arrest of Pablo Aguilar.

At trial, Aguilar’s lawyer sought to suppress the results of the search, saying his client merely submitted to the state’s authority. Prosecutors conceded Aguilar was “forced to open the door’’ but argued that the officers had legitimate reason for their actions.

A trial judge allowed the evidence and Aguilar was sentenced to eight years in prison.

Hall said the U.S. Constitution protects against unreasonable search and seizure. He said that generally requires officers to get a warrant, signed by a judge, before forcing their way into a building.

The judge said, though, courts have said there is an exception when police have both probable cause that a crime is being committed as well as “exigent circumstances.’’

Here, Hall said, there was enough information for officers to have cause to believe that drugs were being sold from Aguilar’s room.

But he said that other category requires something more.

For example, Hall said, officers do not need a warrant in responding to an emergency or when they are in “hot pursuit’’ of someone who runs into a building. And the law also permits police to enter if there is a probability that evidence will be destroyed.

Here, prosecutors said those “exigent circumstances’’ arose when a suspect peeked through a curtain and saw the police officers. But Hall said that, by itself is not enough.

For example, he said there was no testimony that officers heard people moving things in the room or any other indication that evidence was being destroyed.

“Instead, someone simply looked outside and observed police officers and defendant chose not to answer the door,’’ Hall wrote for the appellate court. “When law enforcement officers who are not armed with a warrant knock on a door, the occupant has no obligation to open the door or to speak.’’

The judge said the peek through the curtain and refusal to open the door was not enough to justify the warrantless search.

Maziarz agreed — up to a point.

He said one thing the court did not consider was whether the officers, based on prior experience, know that suspects are likely to destroy evidence once they see police at the door.

“It’s almost common sense,’’ Maziarz said.

He acknowledged that refusal to admit police or open the door does not eliminate the need for a warrant.

“But here you had the guy peeking out,’’ Maziarz said.

“And you had all this other information about drugs being sold out of this room,’’ he continued. “What you didn’t have was the officer saying (that) based upon our experience, when someone doesn’t answer the door right away, they obviously know we’re there, they’re destroying evidence.’’

Obama, an emerging global apparatus for drone killing

Source

Under Obama, an emerging global apparatus for drone killing

By Greg Miller, Published: December 27

The Obama administration’s counterterrorism accomplishments are most apparent in what it has been able to dismantle, including CIA prisons and entire tiers of al-Qaeda’s leadership. But what the administration has assembled, hidden from public view, may be equally consequential.

In the space of three years, the administration has built an extensive apparatus for using drones to carry out targeted killings of suspected terrorists and stealth surveillance of other adversaries. The apparatus involves dozens of secret facilities, including two operational hubs on the East Coast, virtual Air Force­ ­cockpits in the Southwest and clandestine bases in at least six countries on two continents.

 The emergence of hunter-killer and surveillance drones as revolutionary new weapons in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and in counterterrorism operations in places such as Pakistan and Yemen, has spawned a multibillion-dollar industry.

Other commanders in chief have presided over wars with far higher casualty counts. But no president has ever relied so extensively on the secret killing of individuals to advance the nation’s security goals.

The rapid expansion of the drone program has blurred long-standing boundaries between the CIA and the military. Lethal operations are increasingly assembled a la carte, piecing together personnel and equipment in ways that allow the White House to toggle between separate legal authorities that govern the use of lethal force.

In Yemen, for instance, the CIA and the military’s Joint Special Operations Command pursue the same adversary with nearly identical aircraft. But they alternate taking the lead on strikes to exploit their separate authorities, and they maintain separate kill lists that overlap but don’t match. CIA and military strikes this fall killed three U.S. citizens, two of whom were suspected al-Qaeda operatives.

The convergence of military and intelligence resources has created blind spots in congressional oversight. Intelligence committees are briefed on CIA operations, and JSOC reports to armed services panels. As a result, no committee has a complete, unobstructed view.

With a year to go in President Obama’s first term, his administration can point to undeniable results: Osama bin Laden is dead, the core al-Qaeda network is near defeat, and members of its regional affiliates scan the sky for metallic glints.

Those results, delivered with unprecedented precision from aircraft that put no American pilots at risk, may help explain why the drone campaign has never attracted as much scrutiny as the detention or interrogation programs of the George W. Bush era. Although human rights advocates and others are increasingly critical of the drone program, the level of public debate remains muted.

Senior Democrats barely blink at the idea that a president from their party has assembled such a highly efficient machine for the targeted killing of suspected terrorists. It is a measure of the extent to which the drone campaign has become an awkward open secret in Washington that even those inclined to express misgivings can only allude to a program that, officially, they are not allowed to discuss.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence, described the program with a mixture of awe and concern. Its expansion under Obama was almost inevitable, she said, because of the technology’s growing sophistication. But the pace of its development, she said, makes it hard to predict how it might come to be used.

“What this does is it takes a lot of Americans out of harm’s way . . . without having to send in a special ops team or drop a 500-pound bomb,” Feinstein said in an interview in which she was careful to avoid explicit confirmation that the programs exist. “But I worry about how this develops. I’m worried because of what increased technology will make it capable of doing.”

Another reason for the lack of extensive debate is secrecy. The White House has refused to divulge details about the structure of the drone program or, with rare exceptions, who has been killed. White House and CIA officials declined to speak for attribution for this article.

Drone war’s evolution

Inside the White House, according to officials who would discuss the drone program only on the condition of anonymity, the drone is seen as a critical tool whose evolution was accelerating even before Obama was elected. Senior administration officials said the escalating number of strikes has created a perception that the drone is driving counterterrorism policy, when the reverse is true.

“People think we start with the drone and go from there, but that’s not it at all,” said a senior administration official involved with the program. “We’re not constructing a campaign around the drone. We’re not seeking to create some worldwide basing network so we have drone capabilities in every corner of the globe.”

Nevertheless, for a president who campaigned against the alleged counterterrorism excesses of his predecessor, Obama has emphatically embraced the post-Sept. 11 era’s signature counterterrorism tool.

When Obama was sworn into office in 2009, the nation’s clandestine drone war was confined to a single country, Pakistan, where 44 strikes over five years had left about 400 people dead, according to the New America Foundation. The number of strikes has since soared to nearly 240, and the number of those killed, according to conservative estimates, has more than quadrupled.

The number of strikes in Pakistan has declined this year, partly because the CIA has occasionally suspended them to ease tensions at moments of crisis. One lull followed the arrest of an American agency contractor who killed two Pakistani men; another came after the U.S. commando raid that killed bin Laden. The CIA’s most recent period of restraint followed U.S. military airstrikes last month that inadvertently killed 24 Pakistani soldiers along the Afghan border. At the same time, U.S. officials have said that the number of “high-value” al-Qaeda targets in Pakistan has dwindled to two.

Administration officials said the expansion of the program under Obama has largely been driven by the timeline of the drone’s development. Remotely piloted aircraft were used during the Clinton and Bush administrations, but only in recent years have they become advanced and abundant enough to be deployed on such a large scale.

The number of drone aircraft has exploded in the past three years. A recent study by the Congressional Budget Office counted 775 Predators, Reapers and other medium- and long-range drones in the U.S. inventory, with hundreds more in the pipeline.

About 30 of those aircraft have been allocated to the CIA, officials said. But the agency has a separate category that doesn’t show up in any public accounting, a fleet of stealth drones that were developed and acquired under a highly compartmentalized CIA program created after the Sept. 11 attacks. The RQ-170 model that recently crashed in Iran exposed the agency’s use of stealth drones to spy on that country’s nuclear program, but the planes have also been used in other countries.

The escalation of the lethal drone campaign under Obama was driven to an extent by early counterterrorism decisions. Shuttering the CIA’s detention program and halting transfers to Guantanamo Bay left few options beyond drone strikes or detention by often unreliable allies.

Key members of Obama’s national security team came into office more inclined to endorse drone strikes than were their counterparts under Bush, current and former officials said.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former CIA director and current Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, and counterterrorism adviser John O. Brennan seemed always ready to step on the accelerator, said a former official who served in both administrations and was supportive of the program. Current administration officials did not dispute the former official’s characterization of the internal dynamics.

The only member of Obama’s team known to have formally raised objections to the expanding drone campaign is Dennis Blair, who served as director of national intelligence.

During a National Security Council meeting in November 2009, Blair sought to override the agenda and force a debate on the use of drones, according to two participants.

Blair has since articulated his concerns publicly, calling for a suspension of unilateral drone strikes in Pakistan, which he argues damage relations with that country and kill mainly mid-level militants. But he now speaks as a private citizen. His opinion contributed to his isolation from Obama’s inner circle, and he was fired last year.

Obama himself was “oddly passive in this world,” the former official said, tending to defer on drone policy to senior aides whose instincts often dovetailed with the institutional agendas of the CIA and JSOC.

The senior administration official disputed that characterization, saying that Obama doesn’t weigh in on every operation but has been deeply involved in setting the criteria for strikes and emphasizing the need to minimize collateral damage.

“Everything about our counterterrorism operations is about carrying out the guidance that he’s given,” the official said. “I don’t think you could have the president any more involved.”

Yemen convergence

Yemen has emerged as a crucible of convergence, the only country where both the CIA and JSOC are known to fly armed drones and carry out strikes. The attacks are aimed at al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a Yemen-based affiliate that has eclipsed the terrorist network’s core as the most worrisome security threat.

From separate “ops centers” at Langley and Fort Bragg, N.C., the agency and JSOC share intelligence and coordinate attacks, even as operations unfold. U.S. officials said the CIA recently intervened in a planned JSOC strike in Yemen, urging its military counterpart to hold its fire because the intended target was not where the missile was aimed. Subsequent intelligence confirmed the agency’s concerns, officials said.

But seams in the collaboration still show.

After locating Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen this fall, the CIA quickly assembled a fleet of armed drones to track the alleged al-Qaeda leader until it could take a shot.

The agency moved armed Predators from Pakistan to Yemen temporarily, and assumed control of others from JSOC’s arsenal, to expand surveillance of Awlaki, a U.S.-born cleric connected to terrorism plots, including the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day 2009.

The choreography of the strike, which involved four drones, was intricate. Two Predators pointed lasers at Awlaki’s vehicle, and a third circled to make sure that no civilians wandered into the cross hairs. Reaper drones, which are larger than Predators and can carry more missiles, have become the main shooters in most strikes.

On Sept. 30, Awlaki was killed in a missile strike carried out by the CIA under Title 50 authorities — which govern covert intelligence operations — even though officials said it was initially unclear whether an agency or JSOC drone had delivered the fatal blow. A second U.S. citizen, an al-Qaeda propagandist who had lived in North Carolina, was among those killed.

The execution was nearly flawless, officials said. Nevertheless, when a similar strike was conducted just two weeks later, the entire protocol had changed. The second attack, which killed Awlaki’s 16-year-old son, was carried out by JSOC under Title 10 authorities that apply to the use of military force.

When pressed on why the CIA had not pulled the trigger, U.S. officials said it was because the main target of the Oct. 14 attack, an Egyptian named Ibrahim al-Banna, was not on the agency’s kill list. The Awlaki teenager, a U.S. citizen with no history of involvement with al-Qaeda, was an unintended casualty.

In interviews, senior U.S. officials acknowledged that the two kill lists don’t match, but offered conflicting explanations as to why.

Three senior U.S. officials said the lists vary because of the divergent legal authorities. JSOC’s list is longer, the officials said, because the post-Sept. 11, 2001, Authorization for Use of Military Force, as well as a separate executive order, gave JSOC latitude to hunt broadly defined groups of al-Qaeda fighters, even outside conventional war zones. The CIA’s lethal-action authorities, based in a presidential “finding” that has been modified since Sept. 11, were described as more narrow.

But others directly involved in the drone campaign offered a simpler explanation: Because the CIA had only recently resumed armed drone flights over Yemen, the agency hadn’t had as much time as JSOC to compile its kill list. Over time, officials said, the agency would catch up.

The administration official who discussed the drone program declined to address the discrepancies in the kill lists, except to say: “We are aiming and striving for alignment. That is an ideal to be achieved.”

Divided oversight

Such disparities often elude Congress, where the structure of oversight committees has failed to keep pace with the way military and intelligence operations have converged.

Within 24 hours of every CIA drone strike, a classified fax machine lights up in the secure spaces of the Senate intelligence committee, spitting out a report on the location, target and result.

The outdated procedure reflects the agency’s effort to comply with Title 50 requirements that Congress be provided with timely, written notification of covert action overseas. There is no comparable requirement in Title 10, and the Senate Armed Services Committee can go days before learning the details of JSOC strikes.

Neither panel is in a position to compare the CIA and JSOC kill lists or even arrive at a comprehensive understanding of the rules by which each is assembled.

The senior administration official said the gap is inadvertent. “It’s certainly not something where the goal is to evade oversight,” the official said. A senior Senate aide involved in reviewing military drone strikes said that the blind spot reflects a failure by Congress to adapt but that “we will eventually catch up.”

The disclosure of these operations is generally limited to relevant committees in the House and Senate and sometimes only to their leaders. Those briefed must abide by restrictions that prevent them from discussing what they have learned with those who lack the requisite security clearances. The vast majority of lawmakers receive scant information about the administration’s drone program.

The Senate intelligence committee, which is wrapping up a years-long investigation of the Bush-era interrogation program, has not initiated such an examination of armed drones. But officials said their oversight of the program has been augmented significantly in the past couple of years, with senior staff members now making frequent and sometimes unannounced visits to the CIA “ops center,” reviewing the intelligence involved in errant strikes, and visiting counterterrorism operations sites overseas.

Feinstein acknowledged concern with emerging blind spots.

“Whenever this is used, particularly in a lethal manner, there ought to be careful oversight, and that ought to be by civilians,” Feinstein said. “What we have is a very unique battlefield weapon. You can’t stop the technology from improving, so you better start thinking about how you monitor it.”

Increasing reach

The return of armed CIA Predators to Yemen — after carrying out a single strike there in 2002 — was part of a significant expansion of the drones’ geographic reach.

Over the past year, the agency has erected a secret drone base on the Arabian Peninsula. The U.S. military began flying Predators and Reapers from bases in Seychelles and Ethi­o­pia, in addition to JSOC’s long-standing drone base in Djibouti.

Senior administration officials said the sprawling program comprises distinct campaigns, each calibrated according to where and against whom the aircraft and other counterterrorism weapons are used.

In Pakistan, the CIA has carried out 239 strikes since Obama was sworn in, and the agency continues to have wide latitude to launch attacks.

In Yemen, there have been about 15 strikes since Obama took office, although it is not clear how many were carried out by drones because the U.S. military has also used conventional aircraft and cruise missiles.

Somalia, where the militant group al-Shabab is based, is surrounded by American drone installations. And officials said that JSOC has repeatedly lobbied for authority to strike al-Shabab training camps that have attracted some Somali Americans.

But the administration has allowed only a handful of strikes, out of concern that a broader campaign could turn al-Shabab from a regional menace into an adversary determined to carry out attacks on U.S. soil.

The plans are constantly being adjusted, officials said, with the White House holding strategy sessions on Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia two or three times a month. Administration officials point to the varied approach as evidence of its restraint.

“Somalia would be the easiest place to go in in an undiscriminating way and do drone strikes because there’s no host government to get” angry, the senior administration official said. “But that’s certainly not the way we’re approaching it.”

Drone strikes could resume, however, if factions of al-Shabab’s leadership succeed in expanding the group’s agenda.

“That’s an ongoing calculation because there’s an ongoing debate inside the senior leadership of al-Shabab,” the senior administration official said. “It certainly would not bother us if potential terrorists took note of the fact that we tend to go after those who go after us.”

Staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.

Drug war violence creeping into Mexican City

Insight: Violence creeping into Mexican capital

By Ioan Grillo | Reuters – Tue, Dec 27, 2011

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - In a nation wracked by drug violence, this sprawling capital city of more than 20 million has been an oasis of relative peace. But the key to that calm - an informal truce among rival gangs - may be cracking.

On a sunny afternoon this month, a group of gunmen drove into a slum in the north of Mexico City, the streets packed with shoppers and children leaving school. In plain sight, the killers lined three crack cocaine dealers against a wall and shot them in the head with AK-47 assault rifles. They then forced another two men into a black van and drove away past terrified onlookers.

The killings, allegedly carried out by the bloodthirsty La Familia cartel of the central state of Michoacan, were the latest sign that the drug violence raging across large swathes of Mexico is creeping into the capital.

The drug lords have long kept a lid on turf wars in Mexico City. But a generation of upstart gangsters has this year carried out a series of massacres and decapitations on the city edges. Cells of these newer cartels have also become more active in kidnapping and shaking down local businessmen.

In the greater Mexico City area, police have reported more than 300 gangland killings this year. The carnage includes the massacre of a family of five in the Tlalpan area, a decapitation close to the wealthy business district of Santa Fe, and two headless bodies hanged from bridge in Huixquilucan in the west of the city. The death toll is up from last year, when 260 murders in the area were blamed on rival gangs.

Mexico City includes the inner Federal District, home to almost 9 million people, and another 12 million in outer suburbs and slums governed by the State of Mexico.

"A cartel crime wave here would be catastrophic," says Luis de la Barreda, head of ICESI, a Mexican think-tank on crime. "Mexico City is not only the home of all the country's major institutions, it is an image that is constantly in everyone's minds."

The capital, to be sure, remains one of the safest parts of the nation. Ciudad Juarez on the U.S. border was last year the most murderous city on the planet. The tourist resort of Acapulco has been hollowed out by violence. Even the affluent business city of Monterrey has been ravaged. But the Federal District boasts a lower homicide rate than many U.S. cities.

Many wealthy Mexicans have retreated here from violent enclaves, setting up new businesses and helping to boost property prices. Poorer families have fled from the bloodshed around the country to shanty towns on the city edges.

But there are signs the capital could go the way of other regions. The Guadalupe Victoria neighborhood - where gangsters shot dead the three alleged crack dealers in broad daylight - is typical of the slums the new cartels are moving into.

It is in the far north of the metropolitan sprawl, beneath shanty towns that spiral up dusty hills, a two-hour commute from the heart of the capital. The victims represented a problem relatively new to Mexico - a growing population of addicts and dealers who sell rocks of crack cocaine for as little as 30 pesos ($2.15).

Although the gunmen shot the alleged dealers right in front of a row of shops, store owners are too scared to talk about it. Most denied seeing anything, saying they were busy or their view was blocked.

TRUCE

Until a few years ago, when kidnappings and armed robbery were the biggest threats, Mexico City was seen as one of the most dangerous spots in the country. But it has enjoyed a relative calm while other regions were engulfed by turf wars triggered when President Felipe Calderon went after the cartels in late 2006.

The capital even seemed to be a safe place for the families of gangsters. Vicente Carrillo Leyva, son of the Juarez cartel founder, was arrested in 2009 as he exercised in the park of a plush suburb wearing an Abercrombie & Fitch jogging suit. Vicente Zambada, an heir to the rival Sinaloa cartel, was nabbed the same year driving through the upscale district of Lomas de Pedregal.

While cartel leaders kept money, houses and families in the capital, they were extremely cautious about unleashing violence on its streets. Security analysts say gangsters had a tacit understanding not to set off alarm bells in the heartland of Mexico's political power.

The murder rate tells the story. In the last three years, there were between 8 and 10 homicides for every 100,000 residents of the Federal District, police figures show. That is about half the national rate and much lower than U.S. cities like New Orleans, Baltimore and Detroit.

Meanwhile, Sinaloa state, the cradle of the drugs trade, had 81 murders per 100,000 last year. Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, had a horrifying rate of 272 homicides per 100,000.

The truce in the capital is now threatened by the intensity of turf wars elsewhere and the emergence of three cartels of a new ilk: La Familia, the widely-feared Zetas and a criminal cell called Mano con Ojos - or Hand With Eyes. These groups have all become major players, radicalized amid the fury of the drug war.

Many kingpins of these new cartels were once assassins and use violence as a basic form of communication instead of a last resort. The three groups have been fighting over turf in states surrounding the capital for years. Recent violence shows they may be spreading this war into the periphery of the city.

Police have hit back by raiding dozens of safe houses, busting gangsters holed up with guns, drugs and money. In some of these houses, usually rented properties in residential streets, agents have rescued terrified kidnap victims.

In one case, detectives arrested 14 men and women who allegedly formed a cell carrying out kidnappings for the Zetas cartel in the northern parts of the city. Detectives say the gangsters always demanded ransom payments in dollars and collected them at passenger bridges. One victim was a pregnant woman. The criminals cut off two of her fingers and sent them to her husband, in a box to pressure for the ransom.

Another gangster arrested in Mexico City was a leader of the Mano con Ojos gang called Oscar Osvaldo Garcia, nabbed by police in August. Garcia, a 36-year old former Mexican marine, allegedly spent many years working as a hit man for older kingpins of the Sinaloa Cartel.

But his bosses were taken down as part of Calderon's war on drugs and he began to head his own operations, recruiting young men from the Mexico City area to sell drugs, kidnap and kill.

TRAINED KILLERS

His career path underlines a central problem with Calderon's offensive. As the older kingpins are captured or killed, bloodthirsty lieutenants have risen up to fight over their empires.

"I was trained to kill," Garcia told police in videotaped testimony. He acknowledged murdering not only rival gangsters but dozens of witnesses. "They were innocent but they had seen too much. They had seen too many faces, and they had to go."

The attorney general of Mexico State, Alfredo Castillo, concedes the gangsters extort businesses in the area, a tactic of increasing concern across Mexico.

Rather than going after big companies or foreign ventures, they hit local vendors - taco stands, hardware stores and clothes stalls on the edge of the capital. Police arrested four such extortionists on December 12, alleging they were members of La Familia and shaking down businesses for 500 pesos ($36) a week each in the Cuautitlan area in the north of Mexico City.

Most of the affluent neighborhoods have not been affected. In trendy areas such as La Condesa, residents enjoy cappuccinos, sushi restaurants and Irish pubs with no sign of gunmen or soldiers.

Hugh Carroll, an offshore investment banker from Scotland, has lived here almost 10 years and hasn't felt any personal effect from the drug war. "I tend to operate in business areas, which are all very safe," Carroll says. "The worst thing that ever happened to me is that I was mugged a few years ago, but that can happen anywhere in the world."

Mexico's biggest security company, Multisistemas de Seguridad, still considers Mexico City a relatively low risk area. "In places close to the border such as Tamaulipas, there are real warlike conditions, but we have seen nothing like that here," says company spokesman Gabriel Avalos. "The incursion of these cartels is worrying, but it hasn't yet had a major effect on violence in the city."

Avalos says the Federal District's government, led by Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, has helped keep wealthier neighborhoods safe. After visiting London, Ebrard set out to install 8,000 cameras by 2012, when he leaves office. These eyes in the sky are on many street corners in plush districts and have been used to catch muggers and other criminals.

The Federal District's police officers are more effective than those in much of Mexico. While the rest of the country has different state and municipal police forces that often fight each other, the Federal District has a unified force.

"If other Mexican police forces were to follow this model it would be a positive development," says Jon French, a former U.S. State Department official who runs a Mexico City-based security consultancy.

With the city still relatively secure, Mexicans continue to take refuge here.

Diego Viloro moved from his native town of Uruapan, Michoacan to settle here in February. Uruapan was the scene of one of the first high-profile atrocities of the war when thugs rolled five severed heads onto a nightclub dance floor in 2006.

Viloro owned a grocery store but fled when gangsters threatened to kill him in a row over extortion payments. He left a big house and decent living, he said, to rent an apartment and get by driving a taxi.

"It worries me a lot when I see news about La Familia and Zetas on the edge of this city. That was how it started in Michoacan and it just got worse and worse," Viloro says.

"I don't want my children growing up around that fear and bloodshed. That was why I moved here."

Arizona gets 4th Predator B drone to patrol border

Arizona gets 4th drone to patrol border

Dec. 28, 2011 06:51 AM

Associated Press

TUCSON -- A new unmanned aircraft has arrived in Arizona and will be the fourth in the state's fleet to patrol the U.S.-Mexico border.

The Arizona Daily Star reports that the aircraft, also known as a drone, arrived Tuesday.

In all, six drones patrol the border from California to Texas, doing things most manned aircraft can't.

Source

4th Predator B drone added to Ariz. fleet

Brady McCombs Arizona Daily Star

Posted: Wednesday, December 28, 2011 12:00 am

A new Predator B unmanned aircraft arrived Tuesday in Arizona, becoming the fourth in U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Arizona fleet.

The aircraft, also known as a "drone," will be used to patrol the U.S.-Mexico border.

The agency now has six Predator B's available to patrol the U.S.-Mexico borderland from the eastern tip of California and across Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. The two others are based in Corpus Christi, Texas, said a news release from Customs and Border Protection.

The aircraft, which are flown remotely by pilots in cockpits on the ground, are a valuable border enforcement tool because they can do things most manned aircraft cannot, agency officials say.

The Predator B can fly for 20 hours at a time. Its cameras can determine from as far as 10 miles away if a ground sensor was set off by armed drug smugglers or cows. And it can collect intelligence on suspicious behavior at houses without anybody below knowing because it flies so high and is quieter than other aircraft.

But critics question if this is the best use of taxpayer money and whether the Predator B might crash into other planes in the sky or people on the ground. The Federal Aviation Administration hasn't fully accepted unmanned aircraft into the national airspace because of safety concerns, limiting the hours and places they can fly.

The aircraft weighs 10,500 pounds, has a 66-foot wingspan and stretches 39 feet from front to back. The Predator B costs about $6 million, and the rest of the system needed to fly it - antennas, sensor, radar, satellite bandwidth, systems spares, maintenance and ground support - brings the per-unit total to $18.5 million.

Since the unmanned aerial system program was started in 2006, the Predator B's have flown 12,000 hours, helping to seize 46,600 pounds of drugs and apprehend 7,500 illegal border crossers and drug runners, the agency said.

Contact reporter Brady McCombs at 573-4213 or bmccombs@azstarnet.com

Drug warriors declare war on fake marijuana

Source

‘Spice’ makers alter recipes to sidestep state laws banning synthetic marijuana

By Justin Jouvenal, Published: December 28

“Spice” is back.

Just months after Virginia and dozens of other states banned synthetic marijuana, the chemists who make it have found a way to outfox lawmakers..

Spice manufacturers, who spray herbs with compounds that mimic the active ingredient in marijuana, have altered their recipes just enough to skirt the bans and are again openly marketing spice in stores and on the Web. Some users report that the new generation of products could be more potent than the original formulas, which have sickened hundreds nationwide and been linked to deaths.

Spice, commonly sold in colorful packets as “herbal incense,” is smoked to get high. A new National Institute on Drug Abuse study found that it is the second- most frequently used illicit substance among high school seniors, behind marijuana.

Some users have experienced seizures, hallucinations, vomiting, anxiety and an accelerated heart rate, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. [Which is why I would recommend that drug users stick to time tested and safe real marijuana!!!] Virginia, one of about 40 states that regulate spice, in March made it a crime to have or sell spice that contains any of 10 chemicals often used in the mixture. The same month, the DEA issued a 12-month nationwide emergency prohibition on five compounds. Maryland is also considering restrictions, and the D.C. Council is weighing a ban.

But prosecutions of three of the largest spice busts in Virginia — including one in Falls Church — have hit roadblocks because the spice that police seized does not contain banned chemicals listed in state law. Authorities in Florida, Indiana, Illinois and Alaska have encountered similar problems. [Who needs the legally required "probable cause" to make an arrest, when you can bankrupt a business by arresting them on bogus charges]

“I don’t know whether we are going to be able stay one step ahead of these chemists,” said Richard Trodden, Arlington County’s top prosecutor and a member of Virginia’s crime commission.

In the Falls Church case, police in June raided a tobacco shop near two schools, seizing 1,700 packets of synthetic marijuana. But the 34 spice samples tested from Arabica Tobacco contained only nonrestricted active ingredients, according to court papers. ["Probable cause"? We don't need no stinking "probable cause" to make an arrest!!! F*ck the Constitution! The Constitution doesn't apply to the "drug war"]

The case is scheduled to go to court next month, and prosecutors declined to say whether it will go forward. A reporter did not find spice on sale there this month, and an owner declined to comment on the case.

The emergence of spice

Spice caught the attention of law enforcement in 2008 and has exploded in popularity. The mixes, made with the synthetic version of compounds known as cannabinoids, are sold for about $15 to $25 a gram. One Web site advertises “Legal products available for each . . . state!”

A member of the Falls Church School Board, which pushed for the state spice ban, said she is frustrated it remains on the market. [Well if you government dopes had not made perfectly safe marijuana illegal, people wouldn't be smoking these legal but potentially dangerous fake versions of marijuana!]

“To the extent that these makers are putting out a product that’s harmful to kids, that’s going to bother me and every other school board member out there,” Vice Chairman Susan Kearney said.

The problem for lawmakers is thorny. There are potentially hundreds of synthetic cannabinoids that makers could substitute for the banned ones — and that is exactly what has happened.

In July and August alone, Virginia’s forensic lab tested 468 spice samples sent by police statewide. Only 101 included banned substances.

Virginia lawmakers anticipated that spicemakers might switch formulas, so they included a provision in the law that controls chemicals intended to act in a similar fashion as the banned ones. So far, it has not led to any prosecutions.

State scientists say they cannot offer testimony to juries to prove reformulated spice is similar to the original versions — not enough is known about the compounds. [Wonder why? These scientists routinely commit perjury helping the police convict people on other bogus charges!]

“There’s not enough foundational research done on these chemicals on which to base our testimony,” said Linda Jackson, a chemistry program manager for the state lab.

The problems with enforcement come as the substance is exacting a higher toll. Annual calls to poison control centers about spice have more than doubled nationwide, to about 6,300 this year, according to the American Association of Poison Control Centers. In the Washington area, there were 65 calls to the National Capital Poison Center last year and 85 through August 2011. [Again if perfectly safe marijuana was legal, people wouldn't be making these 6,300 calls to medical centers!]

A recent study found a possible link between spice use and heart attacks in three Texas teens. An eighth-grader in Pennsylvania who had reportedly smoked the drug from a Pez dispenser died in October after a double lung transplant.

In June 2010, David Rozga, an Iowa 18-year-old who had just graduated from high school with a 3.5 grade-point average and planned to attend college, smoked synthetic marijuana, his father said.

Rozga became agitated and told his friends “he felt like he was in hell,” his father said. A short time later, Rozga went home and shot himself in the head. Police implicated use of synthetic marijuana as a factor in his suicide.

“Our whole world was taken out from under us,” said Mike Rozga, David’s father. “We are in a new age of drug dealing when you can walk into a local mall, convenience store or go online and buy this stuff.”

Prepared for the bans

Whatever the dangers, spicemakers were ready for the bans.

Two weeks after Virginia outlawed synthetic marijuana, Hampton police seized 842 packets worth more than $8,000 from Outer Edge Gifts, a Hampton Roads area head shop.

Police said the high-profile bust was intended to send the message that spice was not welcome. Local media photographed seized drugs laid out neatly on a table.

But when the cameras turned away, the case crumbled. Police said forensic tests showed the synthetic marijuana did not contain banned compounds. They never filed charges. [Again who needs the legally required "probably cause" to seize the fake pot, when your intent is to bankrupt the businss on bogus charges.]

A man who identified himself as the owner of Outer Edge Gifts but declined to give his name said suppliers went so far as to include results of lab tests showing the spice did not have the newly banned ingredients.

“I told the police straight up what we were selling was legal,” the man said. “We had results from a DEA-registered lab.”

A raid in which $10,000 worth of synthetic marijuana was seized from a Newport News hookah bar has not resulted in charges, either. The owner did not return calls, but he told a local newspaper in September that he was selling a new version of spice.

State Sen. Mark R. Herring (D-Loudoun), who wrote Virginia’s spice law, said it has helped educate people about the dangers of the drug and encouraged reputable retailers to stop selling it. But he said that more needs to be done. He said legislation is being written that would add six compounds to the banned list.

Lawmakers on the federal level are also taking a more comprehensive approach by seeking to ban spice compounds, as well as classes of chemical structures on which synthetic marijuana compounds are commonly built. [So what's next? Will any organic compound with a benzene ring in it's structure be made illegal??? Or perhaps any organic compound with a carbon atom in it. Now that should make convictions easy!!!!]

The initial appeal of spice was as a legal high, but it remains popular because most drug tests will not pick it up and it is readily available from dozens of Web sites.

“We had guys with Pentagon security clearance badges coming in to buy it,” said Alan Amsterdam, co-owner of Capitol Hemp in Adams Morgan. Although he stopped selling spice, he is dubious about efforts to control it.

“The government is one step behind science,” Amsterdam said. “It’s here to stay.”

Justice and Prosecutorial Misconduct

Source

Justice and Prosecutorial Misconduct

Published: December 28, 2011

Michael Morton was exonerated by DNA evidence this month after being wrongfully convicted of murdering his wife and serving nearly 25 years in prison in Texas. In seeking to prove Mr. Morton’s innocence, his lawyers found in recently unsealed court records evidence that the prosecutor in the original trial, Ken Anderson, had withheld critical evidence that may have helped Mr. Morton.

The judge reviewing the case allowed Mr. Morton’s lawyers, including those from the Innocence Project, which represents prisoners seeking exoneration through DNA evidence, to gather facts about the prosecutor’s conduct. The Innocence Project’s report makes a compelling case that Mr. Anderson, now a state judge, disobeyed “a direct order from the trial court to produce the exculpatory police reports from the lead investigator” in the case.

Mr. Morton’s lawyers have asked that the judge recommend a “court of inquiry” to investigate whether Mr. Anderson violated the law and should be charged in a criminal proceeding. While this process is an urgent matter for Mr. Morton, it is also a test of American justice — whether a prosecutor who flouts his duty under the Constitution to disclose crucial evidence to a defendant is subject to any meaningful sanction.

Prosecutors have enormous power in determining who is subjected to criminal punishment because they have broad discretion in deciding criminal charges. The Brady rule, established by the Supreme Court in 1963, is supposed to be an important check on that power. It requires prosecutors to disclose evidence favorable to the defendant. But their failure to comply is rarely discovered, and, even then, prosecutors are almost never punished.

The Supreme Court, in an outrageous decision earlier this year, further weakened the ability of wronged defendants to make prosecutors’ offices liable by giving them nearly absolute immunity against civil suits. Justice Clarence Thomas justified the ruling, noting that an “attorney who violates his or her ethical obligations is subject to professional discipline, including sanctions, suspension, and disbarment.” But bar associations hardly ever punish this behavior; judges seldom discipline prosecutors for such violations; and criminal sanctions are rarely imposed against prosecutors.

This is why the Morton inquiry is crucial. The Innocence Project report found that Mr. Anderson willfully failed to disclose police notes that another man committed the murder, concealed from the trial judge that he did not provide the full police report and advised his successor as prosecutor “to oppose all of Mr. Morton’s postconviction motions for DNA testing.” If a court confirms these findings, it must hold Mr. Anderson accountable — or it will send a message to prosecutors in Texas and elsewhere that the criminal justice system is incapable of deterring or punishing this conduct.

There are, however, a small but growing number of prosecutors’ offices around the country that have systems to prevent the gross miscarriage of justice that Mr. Morton suffered. Like the New York County District Attorney’s Office, they allow open records so defendants can have a copy of almost anything in the case file, and they support having courts audit their compliance with Brady.

Courts should more closely supervise prosecutors by using pretrial conferences where prosecutors must say what they are disclosing under the Brady rule and what they are withholding. Prosecutors must understand that they will be held accountable — with strong criminal sanctions — when they violate their constitutional duties.

Washington man arrested with marijuana wrapped as gifts

Wash. man arrested with marijuana wrapped as gifts

COEUR d'ALENE, Idaho (AP) — A Washington state man faces felony marijuana trafficking charges after an officer found 3.3 pounds of marijuana wrapped up as Christmas gifts during a traffic stop in northern Idaho.

Jason D. Palmer, 36, of Springdale, Wash., was arrested Dec. 22 as he returned from a trip to Montana, where he had been visiting family, the Coeur d'Alene Press (http://bit.ly/uj4XeZ) reported Thursday.

Kootenai County sheriff's officials said Palmer was stopped east of Coeur d'Alene because his vehicle was repeatedly changing lanes and following other drivers too closely. The officer said he smelled marijuana as he approached the vehicle.

"When I made contact at the window, the odor increased its potency," the deputy wrote in his report.

Palmer told the officer he was a medical marijuana cardholder and had a small amount of "medicine" in the vehicle.

"I asked him what was in the presents and he stated some 'sweaters,'" the deputy wrote.

A drug-sniffing dog indicated the packages contained drugs and officers opened them, court records said.

Deputies also seized $800 in cash Palmer had with him.

Palmer's 12- and 14-year-old sons, who were in the vehicle with him, were taken into custody on suspicion of frequenting, or being in the company of someone in possession of a controlled substance. Prosecuting attorney Barry McHugh told The Associated Press on Thursday that the boys will not be charged.

Palmer has been released after posting a $20,000 bond and a preliminary hearing is set for Jan. 13, court records said. The judge ordered a public defender be appointed for Palmer.

A phone listing for Palmer in Springdale, Wash., could not be located. He works at a hydroponics supply store in north Spokane.

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Information from: Coeur d'Alene Press, http://www.cdapress.com

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Pot-filled presents put man in jail

Posted: Thursday, December 29, 2011 12:15 am

By DAVID COLE/Staff writer

COEUR d'ALENE - Maybe it's a case of high for the holidays. Maybe it's a case of the smelly "sweaters."

A Dec. 22 traffic stop for erratic driving on Interstate 90 turned into a marijuana bust in which Kootenai County sheriff's deputies found 3.3 pounds of the pungent drug plant packaged in Christmas presents.

Arrested was Jason D. Palmer, 36, of Springdale, Wash., which is northwest of Spokane. Palmer has been charged with felony trafficking in marijuana.

Also charged were two of Palmer's four kids, age 12 and 14, who were in the vehicle with him when he was pulled over and the pot was discovered. The boys were charged with frequenting.

Palmer, who works at Advanced Indoor Garden Supply, in north Spokane, has been released after posting his $20,000 bond, and a preliminary hearing is scheduled for Jan. 13, court documents said.

According to a sheriff's deputy's report, Palmer was stopped east of Coeur d'Alene as he was driving from Montana, where he had been visiting family, to Washington.

Deputies said he was changing lanes repeatedly in a rented 2012 four-door Mazda wagon, and following too close behind other drivers.

After the vehicles pulled over, a deputy walked up to Palmer's driver's side window and found the smell of raw marijuana to be overpowering.

"When I made contact at the window, the odor increased its potency," the deputy wrote in his report.

Palmer was asked to exit the vehicle. He then told the deputy he is a medical marijuana card holder and had a small amount of "medicine" in the vehicle.

The deputy wrote, "I asked him what was in the presents and he stated some 'sweaters.'"

A K-9 unit was called to the scene, and the dog immediately went for the presents, which were unwrapped to find the drugs.

The sons were arrested because deputies believed the boys had knowledge of the presence of the drugs, court documents said.

Deputies also confiscated $800 cash Palmer had on him, which was seized for possible asset forfeiture.

In court last week, Palmer said he has no prior criminal history.

Cops illegally search 5 buses on a ski tour????

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Police in Nev. seize pot from Utah-bound ski buses

By KEN RITTER, Associated Press

Thursday, December 29, 2011

A police chief in northern Nevada said Thursday he decided to use the discovery of marijuana on five Utah-bound buses carrying 250 underage skiers from Northern California as a teaching moment instead of an enforcement headache.

Elko Police Chief Don Zumwalt said he offered a choice to the mostly teenage passengers from the Bay Area: They could spend their three-day ski and snowboard trip in juvenile detention in northeast Nevada, or they could turn over the illegal drugs voluntarily.

The kids gave up the pot.

"A lot of them thanked us. Some scowled," Zumwalt said during a telephone interview from his town of about 19,000 residents off Interstate 80. "You wonder, `Did I make a difference here?'"

Video showed the haul included pipes, bongs and rolling papers stored in jars, Tupperware, cigarette packs and plastic bags. Zumwalt said it hadn't been weighed, but he guessed the marijuana totaled several pounds.

KRNV-TV in Reno first reported the contraband confiscation on late Tuesday. Zumwalt said it stemmed from a store clerk's report that passengers were smoking in the parking lot of an Elko travel plaza near the interstate. The police chief estimated the group had been traveling for eight hours, and was about four or five hours from Salt Lake City.

After police dogs sniffed marijuana in each baggage compartment of each bus, Zumwalt said he realized he had a problem.

"We had 250 kids. I don't know if anyone was over 21," he said. "I could have written a citation and arrested them all and confiscated the buses. But logistically it would have been a nightmare. Who belonged to what? Where would we put them?"

The juvenile detention facility in Elko has 20 beds.

"Las Vegas or Reno police might have done things differently," Zumwalt said. "But this is how we solved the dilemma. Rather than seize the buses and obtain search warrants, we said, `Get all the stuff off the buses.'"

"No one was under the influence. No one was injured. I gave each bus a fatherly talk about skiing sober. I told them to be safe. I didn't want them skiing stoned out of their minds or dying of a drug overdose." [Hmmm, when is the last time somebody died of a marijuana overdose???]

Zumwalt said he was trying to contact officials with the tour operator, Summer Winter Action Tours, based in Costa Mesa, Calif. A website touts the trip, dubbed El Nino 2011, as a gathering of high school students from 67 schools in Los Angeles, Orange County, Temecula and Arizona, 27 schools in the San Diego area, and 40 schools in Northern California.

"I'm trying to hunt down who has ultimate responsibility," Zumwalt said.

Company officials didn't immediately respond to messages Thursday from The AP.

KRNV said a company official called it almost impossible to control what people bring onto the bus.

Jan Brewer flip flops on the 10th Amendment

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States' rights claim from Brewer goes to pot

by E. J. Montini - Dec. 31, 2011 09:11 PM

The Republic | azcentral.com

Gov. Jan Brewer is a champion of states' rights.

Except when she's not.

Like, for instance, when it comes to defending a citizen-approved proposition authorizing dispensaries for medical marijuana.

(Feel free to insert your favorite marijuana-pun headline here: "States' rights claim goes up in smoke." Or "... goes to pot." Or the more subtle "Jan backs away from Mary Jane." Or a stoner favorite like, "Doobie-ous support for states' rights.")

Brewer, Attorney General Tom Horne and others were against the medical-marijuana proposition, but voters approved it anyway.

Since then, the governor has refused to allow a portion of the law that allows for the creation of the dispensaries to go into effect, saying that she was worried that federal prosecutors might arrest state employees who process the paperwork.

It's a ridiculous notion, since that hasn't happened in any of the other states where medical marijuana is legal.

And it seems kind of odd coming from a politician who claims to eat scorpions for breakfast and calls federal authority into question by saying things like, "We (the states) need to be able to make the decisions that control the destiny of our populations. And if the (federal) government would step back and give us the opportunity, we would do a great job."

Of course, that would only be true if Brewer really was a champion of states' rights. Which she is.

Except when she's not.

Not long ago the governor's spokesman said that Brewer would bow to federal authority when it comes to medical marijuana.

"The governor believes that the distribution portion is pre-empted by federal drug law, so the state's legal filing will be amended to represent that," Matthew Benson said. "The governor's primary concern has always been for the welfare of her state employees."

That really isn't saying much since those employees were never under any threat of being arrested should all the provisions of Proposition 203 go into effect.

And where's the tough talk about states controlling their own destinies, as happens each time Brewer brings up Senate Bill 1070 and Arizona's challenge of federal authority?

Brewer has said, "The United States has a federal government, not a national government. For the next four years, Arizona will continue to pursue a policy of renewed federalism. ..."

And we do. Except when we don't.

Brewer is back to scorpion eating when it comes to President Barack Obama's national health-care program. Last year at this time, Brewer's office issued a press release under the headline, "Governor Brewer Continues Fight for States' Rights." It quoted Brewer calling the health-care plan "a massive intrusion and violation of states' rights."

Gerald Gaines, the CEO of a medical-marijuana advocacy group called Compassion First AZ, wonders where the "states' rights" vehemence is for his organization.

"What this shows is that the real issue isn't states' rights," he said. "It is taking whatever agenda that they have and using states' rights to make it work. Or to pander to their political base."

Gaines is involved in a lawsuit against the state for not allowing the voter-approved dispensaries to open.

"I understand the motivation behind what the governor is doing," he said. "In the Religious Right community, there is a very strong feeling that medical marijuana is just a fig leaf for illicit use and that illicit use is a personal shortcoming that the state should not be supporting.

"I believe there is some real genuine support on the Republican side that feels that this should not be legal. I am comfortable with them having that feeling, but they lost the vote. There were fewer of them than there were of people who saw the medical benefits. The fact is that the governor and others are choosing to ignore the will of the people and instead are trying to respond to their voter base. It's hypocrisy."

The proposition passed by voters allows for 125 medical-marijuana dispensaries statewide. It also allows for state-issued ID cards for patients who can use medical pot for certain health conditions. While the state is collecting fees on more than 16,000 such cards, many of the people holding them have nowhere to purchase marijuana.

A scorpion-eating champion of states' rights would not kowtow to the feds on this. Except when she does.

Reach Montini at 602-444-8978 or ed.montini@arizonarepublic.com.

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Quitting smoking is tough, but not impossible

No one ever regrets stopping smoking, only failing to stop, St. Joseph Medical Center expert says

By Meredith Cohn, The Baltimore Sun

2:07 p.m. CST, December 28, 2011

Many people pick quitting smoking as their New Year's resolution. But if quitting smoking was easy, most smokers would have already done it. Tobacco is highly addictive and the process isn't easy, but quitting is possible for those who really are ready and are linked to methods that work for them, says Christine Schutzman, a certified tobacco treatment specialist who leads a free Freshstart smoking cessation program at the Cancer Institute at St. Joseph Medical Center.

How often do you hear about people giving up on their New Year's resolutions to quit smoking?

About 20 percent of Americans smoke — or close to 48 million people. Of them, 70 percent would like to quit, according to the American Cancer Society. Every year, millions resolve to stop smoking for the new year. Last year, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study showed that 69 percent of adult smokers wanted to quit and 52 percent tried to quit in the past year.

Unfortunately, only one in 10 will stick with it long enough to successfully quit. When we call it a resolution, that's what it means — those who are truly resolved are 10 times more likely to become tobacco-free as those who think they'll give it a try.

Can you say just how hard it is, compared to other addictions?

Nicotine is one of the hardest, if not the hardest, addiction to break. It is as addictive, or more so, than heroin or cocaine. Long-term use of any addictive drug, including tobacco, changes the way the brain functions. Consequently, people become physically and mentally dependent on tobacco.

Cigarettes are often the first step for teens who go on to experiment with alcohol and other drugs. Many recovering alcoholics and recovering drug addicts struggle for years to stop smoking — without success — even though they've kicked their other dependencies. And because smoking is legal and can be done out in the open, this makes quitting smoking even harder.

What support works best — group or individual counseling, phone support or products like gum or drugs?

If there was a best way to stop smoking, everyone would do it and no one would be smoking! So while there is no best way to stop smoking, there are better ways. Studies have shown that with each additional support component added to a person's quit plan, it is more likely that they will succeed. Combination therapies are increasingly becoming standard of care (nicotine patch and lozenge or gum, other medications and nicotine replacement products) along with supportive coaching — individual, in a group, online or phone quit-line. Every quit plan may have common elements, but it really needs to be suited to the individual. With Freshstart, we work with each person to create his or her own quit plan featuring the elements best suited for them.

Chantix was linked to an increased risk of heart attacks, so do you still recommend it for some people?

There are pros and cons to every tobacco cessation medication. The best recommendation is to talk to your doctor or pharmacist about Chantix or any other prescription you are considering.

Everyone knows smoking causes cancer, but can you give more details on the dangers of smoking?

Smoking affects every single organ in the body. In addition to lung cancer, there are 12 other kinds of cancer associated with smoking, including the throat, oral cavity, pancreas, stomach and bladder. Smoking narrows the blood vessels, causing reduced circulation and contributing to peripheral vascular disease. Smoking and secondhand smoke can cause heart disease, respiratory disease, stroke and cataracts. It can cause lung diseases such as emphysema, bronchitis and asthma by damaging the airways and small air sacs in the lungs. Smoking also adversely affects fertility and childbirth, including low birth weight and still-born babies. Smokers have a greater chance of having a baby die of SIDS. Women who have gone through menopause and smoke have a risk of lower bone density and more hip fractures.

What the most important message in St. Joseph's free Freshstart smoking cessation program?

Don't give up on yourself! No one ever regrets stopping smoking, only failing to stop. Start with behavior modification. Eliminate smoking in places you normally would (like the house, back deck or car) before you stop smoking, and it will be easier for you to quit. Ask for help and believe you can do it because you can.

People who would like to sign up for Schutzman's free class can call 410-337-1338 or go to http://www.StJosephTowson.com/Events. They can also call 410-427-5310 or email christineschutzman@catholichealth.net.

meredith.cohn@baltsun.com

twitter.com/baltsunhealth

The DEA sets quotas on the number of drugs produced in America

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F.D.A. Is Finding Attention Drugs in Short Supply

Christopher Capozziello for The New York Times

By GARDINER HARRIS

Published: December 31, 2011

Medicines to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder are in such short supply that hundreds of patients complain daily to the Food and Drug Administration that they are unable to find a pharmacy with enough pills to fill their prescriptions.

The shortages are a result of a troubled partnership between drug manufacturers and the Drug Enforcement Administration, with companies trying to maximize their profits and drug enforcement agents trying to minimize abuse by people, many of them college students, who use the medications to get high or to stay up all night.

Caught in between are millions of children and adults who rely on the pills to help them stay focused and calm. Shortages, particularly of cheaper generics, have become so endemic that some patients say they worry almost constantly about availability.

While the Food and Drug Administration monitors the safety and supply of the drugs, which are sold both as generics and under brand names like Ritalin and Adderall, the Drug Enforcement Administration sets manufacturing quotas that are designed to control supplies and thwart abuse. Every year, the D.E.A. accepts applications from manufacturers to make the drugs, analyzes how much was sold the previous year and then allots portions of the expected demand to various companies.

How each manufacturer divides its quota among its own A.D.H.D. medicines — preparing some as high-priced brands and others as cheaper generics — is left up to the company.

Now, multiple manufacturers have announced that their medicines are in short supply. The F.D.A. has included these pills on its official shortages list, as has the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, which tracks the problem for hospitals. And the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry has told the more than 8,000 doctors in its membership that shortages seem to be “widespread across a number of states” and are “devastating” for children.

Officials at the Food and Drug Administration say the shortages are a result of overly strict quotas set by the Drug Enforcement Administration, which, for its part, questions whether there really are shortages or whether manufacturers are simply choosing to make more of the expensive pills than the generics, creating supply and demand imbalances.

The situation has made for a rare open disagreement between two federal agencies.

“We have reached out to the D.E.A. and told them that there are shortage issues,” said Valerie Jensen, associate director of the F.D.A.’s drug shortage program. “But the quota issues are outside of our area of responsibility.”

Still, Special Agent Gary Boggs of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Office of Diversion Control, said in an interview, “We believe there is plenty of supply.”

Some high-priced pills are indeed readily available, and D.E.A. officials said that so long as that is the case, they believe that A.D.H.D. drug supplies are adequate. Agent Boggs attributed any supply disruptions to decisions made by manufacturers.

Novartis, for instance, makes both branded and generic versions of Ritalin; Shire Pharmaceuticals does the same for Adderall XR. In both cases, the companies have ensured that supplies of branded drugs are adequate while allowing generic versions to go wanting.

“We are working diligently to ensure our supply of these products meets demand, including discussions with D.E.A. regarding our quota levels for these controlled substances,” said Kathy Bloomgarden, a spokeswoman for Novartis.

But those who rely on the drugs can react very differently to apparently similar medicines, so an adequate supply of one drug does them no good when their preferred medicine is unavailable, patients and their doctors say. And prices can vary so much that some patients say they cannot afford to switch.

Lynn Whitton of Westport, Conn., who has an attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, expressed disbelief when told that the Drug Enforcement Administration said there were no shortages of A.D.H.D. medicines. “What?” she said. “I’m just flabbergasted!”

Ms. Whitton said she had recently gone to more than a dozen pharmacies in Westport and New York City before finding one that would partially fill Ritalin prescriptions for her and her 18-year-old son, who also has the disorder.

Erin Fox, manager of the drug information service at the University of Utah, said problems arise when there is a mismatch between what manufacturers choose to make and what patients are prescribed.

And, Dr. Fox said, while manufacturers sometimes use their limited quotas to ensure adequate supplies of high-priced branded drugs at the expense of low-profit generics, all of the issues would be resolved if the Drug Enforcement Administration were simply more generous with its quotas, particularly since sales of A.D.H.D. medicines have risen so rapidly.

Doctors wrote 51.5 million prescriptions for A.D.H.D. drugs in 2010, with a total sales value of $7.42 billion — an increase of 83 percent from the $4.05 billion sold in 2006, according to IMS Health, a drug information company.

Agent Boggs of the Drug Enforcement Administration said his agency was concerned that A.D.H.D. drug abuse was on the rise. “We see people abuse it in college and then continue to abuse it nonmedically once they leave,” he said.

Since the drugs have been shown to improve concentration, and not just in people with A.D.H.D., they have become popular among students who are seeking a study aid. And since they can impart a euphoria that users have likened to a cocaine high, the pills are sometimes ground up by people who snort them for a thrill.

On the other hand, there are people like Sheryl Greenfield of Bryn Mawr, Pa., an A.D.H.D. patient who spent days calling dozens of pharmacies to find a generic substitute for Adderall XR. She finally gave up and bought the brand, and her co-pay went to $200 from $10. “I can afford the difference, but I know some people who can’t,” she said.

Shortages of amphetamine-based drugs like Adderall became so endemic that many doctors switched patients to methylphenidate-based drugs like Ritalin, creating shortages among those medicines as well, according to the F.D.A.

Ruth Hughes, chief executive of Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, a patient advocacy organization, said the drug shortages had become so acute that many patients were going untreated, increasing their risks of deadly traffic accidents and job dismissals. “The consequences of not getting treatment can be devastating,” Ms. Hughes said.

Dr. Alexander Lerman, a psychiatrist from Chappaqua, N.Y., said his patients could not simply switch from one medicine or dosage to another without consequences. And some of his patients, he said, cannot afford the branded version of the drugs.

“For the first time in my career,” Dr. Lerman said, “there is this enormous and mysterious scarcity of the basic product that is proven to work.”

The American worldwide "war on drugs" is not winnable

Let's face it the American worldwide "war on drugs" is not winnable. The only logical answer is to legalize ALL drugs.

In Afghanistan, Poppy Growing Proves Resilient

Bryan Denton for The New York Times

By ALISSA J. RUBIN

Published: January 1, 2012

NAKILABAD KALAY, Afghanistan — This stretch of the Helmand River Valley, the heart of the nation’s poppy-growing area, stands as a showcase for one of NATO’s most ambitious offensives against the Taliban and the drug trade. But now, the area is also becoming an object lesson in the resilience of militants and opium producers alike.

A military offensive broke the Taliban's hold on the valley.

Beginning four years ago, a huge military offensive, first by British troops and then by United States Marines, broke the Taliban’s hold on much of the valley. At the same time, there was an all-out effort to educate farmers and encourage them to grow other crops, with the aim of cutting poppy production. The provincial governor reinforced this initiative with a tough eradication program in the land along the river.

Today, most farmers in this district, Nad Ali, as well as in nearby Marja and other settlements along the river, grow wheat and cotton. The district governor just opened a school in this remote village, and there is a small bazaar with a handful of mud-walled shops doing a steady business in gum, candy and toiletries. Patrols by NATO troops, the Afghan Army and the police are frequent.

Beyond the fertile river lands, however, a more troubling pattern is emerging. According to interviews with farmers, elders and Afghan and Western officials, the poor sharecroppers who used to farm poppy here have moved to the outer reaches of the district, turning the desert into remarkably productive opium fields. The Taliban have moved as well, evading the NATO offensive and offering the poppy farmers protection.

Over just a couple of seasons, these relocated farmers, unhampered by any military presence, have undercut the offensive’s initial gains against poppy production for this district. This, in turn, has raised hard questions about what will happen in villages like this one once the International Security Assistance Forces begin withdrawing.

“Four years ago, no one could stay here like these shopkeepers,” said an elderly man who refused to give his name, as he looked up from repairing a bicycle in the shadow of the thatch awning stretched just outside his little shop. “And when ISAF leaves, no one will be able to stay here.”

The pull of poppies is hard to resist. Despite NATO’s successes in balancing military saturation with agricultural incentives in Helmand, the province provides raw material for more than 40 percent of the world’s opium, and overall poppy cultivation in Afghanistan in 2011 was up 7 percent from the previous year. It is expected to rise further in the years ahead, both because opium prices are high and because the profitability of alternative crops is limited, in part by difficulties in marketing them, according to farmers and academics who study the poppy economy.

Poppy cultivation thrives on a combination of antigovernment feeling, armed insurgency and government corruption. Counternarcotics experts describe a situation in which farmers looking to make money turn to the Taliban for protection. At the same time, the farmers resent the government for what they see as its hypocrisy in simultaneously pursuing eradication, which takes away the farmers’ livelihood, and being open to corruption, which allows those farmers who pay off government officials to continue growing poppies.

In Afghanistan, the developing politics and economics of opium production make it seem as if “you are in Colombia in the early stages, in Mexico in the early years,” said Jean-Luc Lemahieu, who heads the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in Afghanistan.

He said that the Colombian FARC rebels started out as an ideological, antigovernment movement, which was later taken over by financial interests. He described “collusion” among Helmand’s power brokers and the Taliban, who, for a price, protect the farmers from poppy eradication by government security officials. That has added to the sense that the government has little to offer — a feeling compounded by the lack of government services like schools or clinics in poppy-growing areas.

Nad Ali elders agree that the eradication effort is fostering a bond between poppy farmers and the insurgency.

“People who are living in areas where the government has control and where they don’t allow them to grow poppies, they don’t like the ban and they are going to areas where the Taliban have control,” said an elder from Nad Ali, who asked not to be named because he feared government reprisals. “There is nothing more important for people than poppies, and there is nothing more productive for people than poppies.”

The United Nations drug and crime office, as well as academic researchers who study poppy cultivation, say that in the desert areas where poppies are now grown, the Taliban made a strategic decision to refrain from charging the usual tax based on production amounts and are asking for smaller fees on farmers’ harvests.

The big profits do not go to the farmers or to the Taliban. The United Nations estimates that, of the total opium profits that remain in the country, about 10 percent goes to the insurgents, 20 percent to the farmers and the rest to the traffickers, the police, power brokers and those government officials who facilitate the transport out of the country.

“From the farmers on, there’s collusion,” said Mr. Lemahieu, referring to the payments the farmers and the traffickers make to protect the poppy crops.

Though poppy cultivation continues to flourish elsewhere, NATO has shown real progress in the Helmand River Valley in the area now called the food zone. Here, the poppy crop has been eliminated almost entirely, and the Taliban have had to relinquish their hold.

In the irrigated areas of Nad Ali, the British, who had military responsibility for Helmand until last year, distributed high-quality wheat seed to spur farmers to stop planting poppies. The effort worked best among farmers who had well-irrigated land and were able to grow enough wheat that they could invest in secondary businesses in towns to augment their income, according to David Mansfield, a researcher at Tufts University who has tracked the rural livelihoods in Helmand Province for more than a decade and recently published an exhaustive study of the province’s rural economy.

Helmand’s governor, Gulab Mangal, coupled the wheat seed distribution program with aggressive poppy eradication in the food zone, where Nakilabad Kalay is. By the second year, there were impressive results: a 33 percent reduction in poppy cultivation in the food zone. But that trend diminished sharply in subsequent years, with only a 7 percent reduction in 2010 and a 3 percent reduction in 2011, according to statistics from the provincial reconstruction team in Helmand, suggesting that the alternative crop program’s effectiveness may have reached its limit.

While wheat pays relatively well, selling it can be a problem, several farmers in Nad Ali said. That is even more true of cotton. Farmers have complained that the government’s cotton mill often either is not working or is slow to pay farmers for their crops. Moreover, Afghan cotton cannot compete with cheaper Pakistani cotton, they say.

For poorer farmers, many of whom say they were sharecroppers when they worked land in the food zone, moving to the desert to grow poppies has meant they can afford to buy land since it is cheap, and they can feed their families better because they can earn more. Mr. Mansfield’s study notes most farmers in the desert areas can afford meat more often than they could as sharecroppers growing legitimate crops in the food zone and can afford to marry off their children, an expensive undertaking in Afghanistan.

“People are committed to grow poppies, because there aren’t any other crops where we can make enough money to fill our children’s stomachs,” said Abdul Rauf, a farmer in the desert area of Nad Ali.

Even in the food zone, there are worries about the sustainability of the alternative crops policy because of corruption, according to provincial elders and Western officials. While many farmers in the food zone have stopped growing poppies, some are paying off the police and judges to be allowed to continue to grow it.

And some farmers are trying to have it both ways: growing legal crops in the food zone as well as farming illegal poppies in the desert.

“The harvest was very good this year: I am growing wheat, and I am growing poppies,” said Gul Hamid, 20, a farmer in Nakilabad Kalay, as he sat in a plastic chair with some friends outside a small shop that sold combs and detergent.

“People will grow more poppies next year,” he said.

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