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Post-Modern Reefer Madness

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As we marked the 40th anniversary of Richard Nixon’s jihad against pot this week, I thought about posting in a snippet of a reply I’d gotten from Patty Murray’s office in response to an action alert I’d sent out regarding upcoming medical marijuana legislation. Like every other Senator, Patty Murray opposes the creation of legal and regulated marijuana sales for adults, so her position is not a surprise. But the action alert I sent out was about medical marijuana, so I’m not sure why I got this reply in my inbox:

Like many Americans, I am concerned about the high use of drugs, including marijuana, among our citizens, especially for young people. I believe we must continue to work to reduce drug use. One important aspect of our efforts is to send a consistent message to young people about the use of drugs and alcohol. Therefore, I do not support legalizing or decriminalizing currently illegal drugs, including marijuana.

She could’ve dodged the question entirely, but she didn’t. Kudos to that, but seriously, that’s an idiotic response. What consistent message is being sent to young people by having alcohol legal and marijuana illegal? That makes absolutely no sense. And even worse, this policy results in marijuana being far easier for a young person to obtain than alcohol. Any time someone wonders what message we’d be sending to kids if we legalize marijuana, the appropriate reply should be, “the message is that high school freshmen won’t be able to buy it from the kid sitting next to them in math class any more“. And that’s the appropriate message we should be sending. It’s for adults only, just like alcohol.

But I wasn’t the only person in the state who sent out this action item to our various representatives. Another gentleman from Eastern Washington sent it out and shared with me this spectacular reefer-madness reply from Cathy McMorris-Rodgers (hold on to your hat):

The alleged “medicinal benefits” of marijuana to treat glaucoma and other ailments are assertions that have been examined and debated for decades. Although I support research into alternative medical treatments, studies have shown that marijuana possesses significant addictive chemical properties that have had devastating effects on users. Moreover, a study conducted by the Office of National Drug Control Policy indicates that 374,000 people annually enter an emergency room with a primary marijuana addiction diagnosis.

Holy fuck.

For starters, the medicinal benefits of marijuana have been examined and debated for centuries, not decades. In fact, when marijuana was made illegal in 1937, the American Medical Association protested the action on the basis that marijuana had well-known medicinal properties. And today, the American Medical Association has recommended that the government look into rescheduling marijuana precisely because it’s known to have medicinal benefits. There’s no debate here. Marijuana has medicinal properties. Everyone knows this, pharmaceutical companies are already growing the plant for use in legal drugs like Sativex, and the Department of Health and Human Services has even filed for a patent on “Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants“.

Second, marijuana is not chemically addictive. That’s just an outright lie. Even long-term users experience little to no physical effects from cessation of use. It’s certainly psychologically addictive (similar to addictions to video games, gambling, or sex), but calling it chemically addictive is simply a lie. It’s not. And I have no idea what “devastating effects” it’s had on users, but the vast majority of marijuana users in this country lead pretty normal lives. And of course, alcohol – a legal drug sold in grocery stores and gas stations throughout the state – is actually more addictive than marijuana.

But that last statement there from McMorris-Rodgers is just spectacular:

Moreover, a study conducted by the Office of National Drug Control Policy indicates that 374,000 people annually enter an emergency room with a primary marijuana addiction diagnosis.

I nearly laughed out loud when I read this. At first, I assumed she just made the statistic up out of thin air, but then realized that even McMorris-Rodgers isn’t dumb enough to cite the ONDCP for a completely made-up statistic. Instead, it turns out that she just embellished what was already a pretty embellished statistic. Here’s what it says on the ONDCP’s page:

Marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug in the United States, with nearly 17 million Americans age 12 and older reporting past-month use, and 374,000 people entering an emergency room annually with a primary marijuana problem.

Obviously, the word “addiction” does not appear in the ONDCP headline – for a good reason. They’re not talking about addiction. And when they say “primary marijuana problem”, this is one of the things they’re referencing:

Although DAWN includes only suicide attempts that involve drugs, these attempts are not limited to drug overdoses. If there is drug involvement in a suicide attempt by other means (e.g., if a patient cuts his or her wrists while under the influence of marijuana), the case is included as drug related.

If you look through those statistics even closer, you’ll see that marijuana is far less common than alcohol, pharmaceuticals, and even the far more sparsely used cocaine in those numbers – which makes sense, because you can’t kill yourself by overdosing on pot. The number there should be zero, but the ONDCP doesn’t like that, so they fuck with the numbers to make it seem as if it actually leads to people dying.

But that’s still only a fraction of the 374,000 people who are supposedly showing up at ER’s across the country needing treatment for their pot addictions. Where do the rest come from? It appears they’re in that magic category called “Other” [emphasis mine]:

How are drug abuse cases denoted in DAWN?

…

Each case reported to DAWN is assigned to one of eight case types according to the following hierarchy:

1. Suicide attempt
2. Seeking detox
3. Alcohol only (age < 21) 4. Adverse reaction 5. Overmedication 6. Malicious poisoning 7. Accidental ingestion 8. Other Cases not falling into any of the first seven case types are classified as "Other." Most drug abuse cases are classified as "Other."

So what we likely have here are people coming into the emergency room for various reasons, testing positive for pot and then ending up being tagged that they have a “primary marijuana problem” even though it likely had no influence at all on why they were in the ER. But this sleight of hand gives idiot politicians like McMorris-Rodgers the ability to claim that thousands of Americans are coming into hospitals every day needing to be treated for their pot addictions. Reefer madness lives on.

Third Priority

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Nothing too egregious about this press release from Senator Joseph Zarelli about the budget forecast being tighter than we’d thought, but this was a bit off.

I would have been more comfortable leaving an even larger amount in reserve, but reaching this new budget agreement required a number of compromises, and the size of the ending fund balance was one. Our side figured the June forecast would be down significantly, just like the March forecast was, which is why we insisted on policy reforms that will save money going forward, and made sure this new budget was the first one since 1997 to spend less than anticipated revenue.

If he was that interested in having a larger reserve, he might have considered raising taxes. Yes, there was a 2/3 requirement, but if the chief Republican budget negotiator in the state senate had decided to push for higher taxes, it would have done a lot. So it seems like the things that made him most comfortable were (a) passing a budget since it was a special session, and all the legislators just wanted to go home already, (b) no tax increases, (c) having a reserve. Although (a) and (b) may not be in that order.

Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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Young Turks: Schwarzenegger mistress tells all to Hello Magazine.

Glenn Beck blames Ed Schultz:

Newsy: Federal Judge upholds gay Judges Prop-8 ruling.

Rat and Cenk: Republicans are fiscally responsible? How about the missing 6.6 Billion dollars?

Republican teabaggingfest Debate:

Cenk: Teabagger Summer Camp for Kids.

Stephen: GOP would win Presidency if not for those meddling kids (via TalkingPointsMemo).

Newsy: Wisconsin Republicans further gains in their War on Workers.

Bill Maher with some New Rules.

Young Turks: TX Gov. Rick Perry claims he is a ‘Prophet’.

President Mittens:

Newsy: NY on the verge of allowing gay marriage.

Cenk: Newt’s 3rd wife is behind his staff quitting.

Thom: The good, the bad, and the very very ugly.

Sam Seder: Catherine Harris calls in on behalf of her friend Michelle Bachmann.

More at the Weiner Roast:

Sam Seder: Who are Santorum’s gay friends?

White House: West Wing Week.

Young Turks: Wingnut talk show host says to kill Blacks.

Ed and Pap: Sissy conservatives are afraid of EVERYTHING.

Texas Legislator: “Too many Hispanics in the Legislature (via Crooks and Liars).

Michelle Bachmann’s unrivaled extremism.

Cenk: Paul Ryan’s budget benefits his family.

Most Offensive Ad Ever:

Lawrence O’Donnell speaks with Lt. Dan Choi & Adam Green.

Sam Seder: Herman Cain suggests war is just like delivering pizza.

Young Turks: Did Bush have CIA try to destroy Juan Cole?

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Bad Excuses

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Sorry, I’m still writing about Anthony Weiner. His personal life isn’t of concern to me, nor is the fact that he lied about his personal life, but harassing women concerns me greatly. There is another side to Nick’s piece that I linked to in the open thread that “female members of the House Democratic leadership, as well as the female members of the rank-and-file, are actually personally upset” with his conduct. Namely, Democrats are the party of everyone gets a seat at the table, and as such we have more women in leadership and the rank and file, so more of our leadership and rank and file have got harassing nonsense at work or, for participating in politics, and are less likely to forgive it.

I’ve been thinking about what isn’t a good excuse for such behavior. So here’s a partial list of things that aren’t a good excuses for sending nude pictures of yourself or other harassing email/tweets/Facebook messages without consent:

  • It’s the Internet, what do you expect?
  • Other people cheat
  • Other people are doing/have done something worse
  • It was a joke
  • Don’t you have a sense of humor
  • It’s not a big deal
  • He’s a good Congressman
  • One of them was a Porn Star, so it’s OK
  • Come on
  • He’s taking on corporate crime, and that’s worse
  • You’re playing into the hands of the GOP
  • You’re playing into the hands of Breitbart
  • You’re playing into the hands of corporate crooks

Open Thread

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– What Nick said (except to add that it doesn’t have to be women who were offended).

– We really need universal single payer.

– I want a Democratic Party primary for governor and I want Jay Inslee to win it (probably, but I want that primary to be sure). It looks like it’ll be one or the other.

– Can we at least put disclosure on Citizens United now?

– Goodbye Point.

– This story about international cricket was really long and way too Boston centric, but I enjoyed it.

– What the fuck?

The War on Drugs: 40 Years of Sharia Law in the US

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Tomorrow marks the 40th Anniversary of Richard Nixon’s declaration that America needs to wage a war against drugs and drug abuse. And since that time, there’s never been such a widespread consensus as there is today that it’s a complete failure and needs to end.

I’ve written endlessly about this and won’t bore everyone with another post listing out the reasons why we need to make major changes in how we deal with drugs and the problem of drug addiction. But one thing that has struck me in recent years is the odd ideological pairing of drug war zealotry and being terrified of Sharia Law.

Of course, the idea of Sharia Law “taking over” in America is world-class stupidity. But at its root, this hysteria is about a fear of having members of another faith or culture making laws that dictate morality. Yet while the war on drugs has always been painted as a way of protecting us from drugs, that’s never been what it’s really about. It’s about government dictating our moral choices. And not surprisingly, Sharia Law does exactly the same thing when it comes to wine consumption and other moral taboos.

The reasons for ending the war on drugs are numerous, but the central cause of all of that calamity is a single failing. It’s a mistaken belief that government should make moral decisions in our lives that should instead be left to the spiritual world. This endeavor is both impossible and reckless. And it’s a failure that extends to nearly every nation on this planet in various ways – particularly in the Middle East.

In America, we have a high tolerance and acceptance for some moral failings – extreme avarice being a big one – but for reasons that never made sense to me, we turn into shrieking nannies at the thought of anyone using a mind-altering substance. And 40 years after Ayatollah Nixon ignored his own government commission’s advice and declared war on our private actions, it’s long past time to reassess the damage that’s been done.

Redmond’s own Fukushima

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A power substation in Redmond, WA, about 2 miles from my house, experienced an explosion and fire today.

I’ve been watching the King5 live feed.

Thick black smoke is bellowing from the site—probably a mixture of burning insulation and transformer oil. In the bad old days, transformer oil contained PCBs. Nasty stuff. But I don’t think this substation is old enough to have the rally nasty stuff on-site.

It is probably unwise to use water to fight fires at electrical substations, so they brought in a foam truck, supposedly from Seatac.

They’ve dumped a third load of foam on the fire, and it is still going strong.

Oh…the humanity!

Update: A fourth application of foam applied from multiple angles seems to be doing the trick.

Update: MyNorthwest, “Puget Sound Energy tells KIRO Radio there are about 9,000 scattered outages in the area.”

You won’t have Weiner to kick around anymore

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Anthony Weiner just resigned, and as you can imagine I am disappointed:

I can think of one circumstance under which Rep. Weiner should resign: he makes a pact with Sen. Vitter and they both fall on their swords (figuratively) and go away.

Yes…I’m disappointed…primarily because Sen. Vitter is still a Senator.

Seriously…Weiner inappropriately flirted electronically. Vitter broke the law when he hired a prostitute, and broke his marriage vows when he fucked her. And he broke his mother’s heart when he wore diapers for foreplay.

And I’m disappointed because…well, we have lost our distraction. Weinergate was fun, with its rich raw material for double entendres. It’s hard to resist. It brought out the 14-year old in all of us. (Okay…maybe not all of us, but a lot of us.)

The scandal even emboldened those normally sexually repressed and anal retentive tweeters, bloggers, and media talking heads, who were suddenly given license to unleash upon their audience jokes and banter of a prurient nature that rivaled the most salacious tweets from Rep. Weiner.

Except that it was okay for them to do that because…well, it’s in the news, and his name is Weiner. And everyone else is doing it.

So now, I suppose, we will have to go back to talking about serious issues, like clawing our way out of this stubborn recession brought to us by eight disastrous years of George W. Bush. We’ll have to grapple with an enormous debt caused almost entirely by the Bush tax cuts and Bush’s reckless failure to fund his Most Excellent Military Adventures. And we now have to start asking whether Republican obstructionism in fixing the economic mess they created puts them in league with al Qaeda.

See why Weinergate was such a nice distraction?

So let’s go at it one more time…for old time sake. Let’s get some major Weiner distraction going in the comment thread….

Cars are Vehicles Too

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A helpful primer from a fellow driver who was on his bike this morning and observed worse than usual behavior from the cars on the road:

First, look to your left behind the steering wheel. Do you see a stick? OK, good. If you pull that stick up a bit, it will indicate that you are turning right. If you press it down, you’ll show the world that you’re turning left. Use it.

Also, I know I recently wrote about when bicyclists can ride through a red light, so take this with a grain of salt. If you’re in a car and there’s a red, you probably shouldn’t go through it. Especially, if I’m on a bike going through the green, there are pedestrians in the crosswalk, and you’re just going to have to wait in line for the onramp anyway.

Finally, some roads have a yellow stripe down the middle. This lets people know that cars will drive in both directions down this road. Keep to the right. No, your right. YOUR FUCKING RIGHT!

Our Wars

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I’m glad that Senators Murray and Cantwell are among the senators pushing for a draw down of troops from Afghanistan. It’s past time we got serious about getting out. Bin Laden is dead. I’m not sure what good we’re doing there any more.

This is to say nothing of the money we’ve sunk and the lives lost there. So, yes, it’s very good to see Democrats pushing a Democratic president on this.

And yet, with Libya it’s not a lot of mainstream Democrats. Any time Kucinich gets to take the lead on something it’s because there aren’t a lot of other Democrats lined up. While I understand that unlike Iraq, the humanitarian mission isn’t total bullshit, Congressional approval ought to come before the bombs start falling. And that’s a principal that Democrats should stand for no matter who is in the White House. So even though I have nothing but contempt for the people who turned a blind eye when Bush was doing worse, I still hope they succeed in stopping our involvement in Libya.

Open Thread

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– Cool bus shelter for a great man.

– If you want to scare an English person, tell them their health care might become more American.

– Fuse does the arrhythmic on McKenna’s education plan (h/t, Howie on Facebook).

– Pretty horrible effects of having busy highways and a port in your neighborhood. I’m glad the port is mitigating some of the worst of it.

– Kill Rockstars’ spring cleaning sale.

Higher Ed

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From CNN Money (h/t) more about the increased costs of college.

The numbers confirm what most middle class families already know — college is becoming so expensive, it’s starting to hold them back.

The crux of the problem: Tuition and fees at public universities, according to the College Board, have surged almost 130% over the last 20 years — while middle class incomes have stagnated.

And for better or for worse, a college education is becoming more and more a stepping stone to the middle class in this country. As we’ve moved the factories and other lower skill middle class jobs out of the country, there is a greater and greater premium on post high school education. If we’re no longer going to have a manufacturing economy, the least we can do is to prepare the next generation for the economy we will have.

Of course, there’s so much more to an education than just job training. Hopefully, people come out of college more well rounded and better thinkers, the kind of people we need around the state. Maybe some will create the next industry, maybe someone will find a passion they never had before but maybe some will just be better able to help their kids with homework or become smarter, more well rounded, more engaged citizens. The state shouldn’t short change itself of that, either.

Drinking Liberally — Seattle

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The Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally meets tonight, and there are a few topics likely to be raised over a pint: The Washington state gubernatorial race, Ron Sims’ return to Seattle (running for Gov?), the tunnel-ish vote, last night’s Republican debate, today’s Wisconsin Supreme Court decision, and today’s Prop. 8 ruling in California.

So please join us tonight for drinks, conversation, and even dinner at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00 pm, but a few folks show up around 7:00 pm for dinner.



Can’t make it? Drinking Liberally—Tacoma meets on Thursday, June 16th, 7:00pm at the Hub Restaurant.

Special Event:

Next week, our meeting will be moved from Tuesday to Wednesday (June 22) for a special Drinking Liberally with Living Liberally co-founder Justin Krebs.

Justin is on his “538 Ways to Live, Work and Play Like a Liberal” book tour.

Bring your copy of the book for Justin to sign. Copies of the book will be available for purchase at the event. We’ll meet at the usual spot.

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