Tag: war on drugs

Joe Biden determined to harsh your mellow.

Guess what?  Notorious War on Some Drugs warrior Joe Biden ain’t planning to change his spots:

The Obama Administration is not pushing marijuana legalization on the federal level, Vice President Joe Biden said Thursday in an exclusive interview with TIME.

Just weeks after President Barack Obama told the New Yorker that the drug is no more dangerous than alcohol, Biden said the Administration supports smarter enforcement, but not outright legalization. “I think the idea of focusing significant resources on interdicting or convicting people for smoking marijuana is a waste of our resources,” Biden told TIME in an interview aboard an Amtrak train on the way to an event in Philadelphia. “That’s different than [legalization]. Our policy for our Administration is still not legalization, and that is [and] continues to be our policy.”

Continue reading Joe Biden determined to harsh your mellow.

Oh, wow, man: the GOP, like, wants to legalize hemp cultivation again.

This is, you know, really deep and stuff:

The federal government currently puts hemp in the same category of illegal drug as heroin, LSD and ecstasy — but the Senate’s top Republican wants to change that.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R – Ky., joined forces Thursday with a pair of West Coast Democrats — Oregon Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley — to cosponsor a bill that would allow American farmers to grow hemp without fear of punishment. Also on board is libertarian Rand Paul, McConnell’s fellow Republican Bluegrass State senator.

Continue reading Oh, wow, man: the GOP, like, wants to legalize hemp cultivation again.

Obama’s War on Some Drugs ticking along… nicely.

If you can call it that.

I assume that Radley Balko was being sarcastic when he wrote this:

I was so very excited about all that sensible drug policy we were going to get out of President Obama in his second term. I mean sure, Obama had spent a good deal of his first term waging more raids on medical marijuana clinics in four years than Bush had waged in eight. And his administration defended DEA agents who point guns at the heads of children during drug raids. And his appointees continued to defend the carnage in Mexico as merely the consequence of good, sensible drug policy.

Sure. There was all of that. But there were also all of these progressive pundits who kept telling drug war reformers that they should go ahead and vote for Obama anyway . . . because they just knew, or at least they were pretty sure, or at least they had heard rumors, that maybe, possibly, Obama would turn the corner and show some leadership.

Continue reading Obama’s War on Some Drugs ticking along… nicely.

Q. Will Obama go after new pro-pot laws? A. That’s what people are guessing.

This isn’t a told-you-so. Yet. But it’s a good way to bet:

Votes making Colorado and Washington the first U.S. states to legalize marijuana for recreational use could be short-lived victories for pot backers because the federal government will fight them, two former U.S. drug control officials said on Wednesday.

They said the federal government could sue to block parts of the measures or send threatening letters to marijuana shops, followed up by street-level clampdowns similar to those targeting medical marijuana dispensaries the government suspects are fronts for drug traffickers.

Continue reading Q. Will Obama go after new pro-pot laws? A. That’s what people are guessing.

#rsrh …Wait, people actually trusted Barack Obama on medical pot?

Well, that was stupid of them.

Many of California’s most prominent and well-respected medical cannabis dispensaries and related facilities — including Oaksterdam University, Berkeley Patients Group, and Harborside Health Center (HHC) — flourished under the George W. Bush administration. But they’ll be lucky to survive President Barack Obama’s first term.

On Tuesday, federal prosecutors targeted Harborside Health Center in Oakland, as well as its sister facility in San Jose, for closure and civil asset forfeiture. In court papers filed by the US Attorney for the northern district of California, Melinda Haag, the federal government alleges that Harborside is “operating in violation of federal law” by providing cannabis to state-qualified patients.

Guess marijuana really does affect your long-term judgement.  Which might explain President Choom, come to think of it… nah, that’s too harsh.  Hey: just like the Obama administration!

…Too soon?

Continue reading #rsrh …Wait, people actually trusted Barack Obama on medical pot?