- On the Cruel, Fascist, Idiocy Of Prohibition II -
"Computer Company exec Oren Will Foster was sentenced to 93 years in prison for possession of 70 marijuana plants for medicinal use."
Michael Levine
The People who drink grains are in the statehouse while the people who smoke plants are in the jailhouse. Does this make any sense?
What we have with the war on drugs is clearly a pogrom. A pogrom is defined as "an organized massacre of helpless people." A drug war carried on by self-righteous, grain-drinking, zealots against hapless and non-violent plant smokers surely qualifies as a pogrom" not to mention a massive violation of human and natural rights.
Where is the Supreme Court on this? Are justices having a nice martini while people who smoked pot are in jail? Are our legislators out gathering corporate cash while so many innocents rot in jail and have their lives ruined for meaningless, victimless, offenses?
There is no excuse for this latter-day pogrom and state torture, except religious and social insanity, aided and abetted by one's own cruel nature. Of course, the other less discussed excuse is that it's a "war" which ruling oligarchies need in order to smash dissidents, terrorize labor and political opponents, and destroy democracy under the cover of a "war on drugs."
Yet why does this counterproductive carnage continue despite our experience with Prohibition I? One would think that Prohibition II would not, with rational minds prevailing and history as our guide, be continuing and yet it does - all with devastating effects on the lives of millions of innocent people and with huge unnecessary costs to society.
In effect then, the drug war is little more than ruling-class terrorism - always in the name of the children, of course - and this despite the fact it is the rights of adults that are being violated and eviscerated. Laws protecting children, and regulation of adulterated substances, are fine and necessary but, between consenting adults, the mere possession of natural, unadultered, substances is an entirely different matter.
"One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other"
Jane Austen
The final straw here is denying marijuana for pain control to cancer and chronic pain patients and dying people. Who is it that is really sick here? The Control Fiends need help" but they must first be voted out of office.
There is clearly an element of insanity, cruelty, and incredible arrogance involved in the anti-drug position. First, one has to assume that they are akin to a self-righteous God imbued with the power to tell other people (i.e., other adults with equal human and natural rights) that they cannot touch, possess, or smoke certain plants in God's green Eden - an unalienable legacy belonging to all mankind.
This is demented and nonsensical on its face, and akin to puerile religious and dangerous beliefs of the "my savior is better than yours" variety - in short, idiotic belief afflictions from which mankind suffers enormously with no end in sight. It is also the fear of let-go so typical of the up-tight, fascist, personality - from which the puritanical urge to hurt and punish others emerges.
The insanity is such that anti-drug zealots have gone to far as to prohibit the use of hemp in clothes and various items. Imagine, the very paper upon which our own Constitution is written is now prohibited, and so a source of competition for oil cannot be grown. Yet more criminal idiocy.
"The war on drugs was the first major test by the country's elite to see if Americans would willingly surrender their constitutional rights. It turned out that they would and so for the past twenty years invasions of civil liberties increased, America threw more and more of its young people into prison, while exploding drug war budgets did nothing to stem the growth of the drug industry. Further, the drug war was a useful testing ground for repressive measures instituted following September 11."
Sam Smith
Another reason for this madness may well be the elimination of voting rights - as with Black voters in Florida put on the felon, cannot vote, lists. Republicans and ruling elites may be pursuing this purge against young, liberal-minded, people for purely political reasons" i.e., they may tend to vote democratic and so the more that can be eliminated, via felony-class drug law penalties, the better.
While this vicious pogrom continues we see drug companies selling their "social anxiety" drugs at great cost - while the cheaper natural variety of classic, eons-old, medicines are rendered illegal and hundreds of thousands are seriously injured or killed by prescription drugs every year.
Speaking of drug dealers, big drug companies send doctors money in the mail for prescribing their nostrums while we see people sent to jail (for years on end) for possessing or selling small quantities of drugs far less harmful than those which drug companies proffer, and for which they may have buried serious side-effect results in order to bring them to market. Who are the criminals here? Where are the penalties against the drug companies for their drugola payments and perks to doctors and media?
Another cruelty is brought upon students who have a minor drug offense - i.e., with marijuana - and are scarlet-lettered and denied financial aid for their education - this while students who binge drink, ruin their livers, and threaten the lives of others while behind the wheel of a car, see no penalty. Nothing could be more unfair or nonsensical.
Lastly, we must consider the ego-driven lives of politicians ever running for re-election who wish to be "tough on drugs" but not on corporate crime. Surely, their re-election psychosis is a disease in itself, and one for which there is currently no re-hab except un-election made nearly impossible by their impregnable incumbent status.
"This court seems incapable of admitting that some matters - any matters - are none of its business."
Justice Antonin Scalia
In effect, as with all questions of human and natural rights, we have to be protected from the perverse and treasonous idiocy of our own dealing-for-corporate-campaign-cash representatives. For this reason, the Supreme Court is the only hope to end this madness, to stop cruel and unusual imprisonment, and put an end to the immense societal and budgetary costs of Prohibition II. In short, we must bring an end to a vicious pogrom based on the choice of one's natural substances employed for pleasure, pain control, social lubrication, or enlightenment.
"They (politicians) are so against drugs because people come to know themselves, politicians lose their power over them, and they love their power. In the Vedas they call it soma, the essence, and since those days until today, all those who have known have recognised, either directly or indirectly, that chemicals can be of immense service to man. Man is chemistry, so is existence. All is chemistry...."
Osho
In sum, the court must declare that human beings have equal rights to possession of god-given, natural, unadulterated, substances - i.e., marijuana, coca leaves, mushrooms, etc. Only is this fashion can we restore our ancient freedoms and responsibilities, keep our bodies and minds from being owned by the state, and dismantle the incredibly profitable, illegal, gang-producing, underground economy drug business caused by these unconstitutional and counterproductive drug laws.
Clearly, the drug laws are the problem, a point made clear by the many law enforcement officers who now support decriminalization. Yet our brown-shirted ruling elite has recently stopped Mexico in its tracks from decriminalizing possession - yet another imperialist effort that is simply the latest in a long line of crimes in Latin America and around the world. All this in the name of the drug war, all of which simply maintains criminal markets and keeps addicts, and young people making drug choice mistakes, from coming forward for treatment. Clearly, the cruelty and counter-productivity is legion.
Nevertheless, it may, as with the end of prohibition I, take a depression to bring about real change once the sheer costs of this folly force politicians to come to their senses. Today, with their forced-trade, fascist, globalization policies undermining the economy and freedom of the United States, they/we are now well down the road to achieving Depression II.
Despite the lessons of the past, the costly madness continues with the gangs, murders, dangerous adulteration of natural substances, creation of an underground culture and untaxed economy, mindless imprisonment of non-violent innocents, wasted police efforts, and loss of down-a-rathole billions much better spent on medical needs and legitimate state pursuits. May the Supreme Court justices step up, do their duty, free the slaves, end this pogrom and persecution of innocents, and un-enclose nature's god-given garden and pharmacopeia.
Kent Welton
