Maptalk-Digest Wednesday, December 13 2000 Volume 00 : Number 264
Winnie the Pooh characters seen 'seriously troubled'
From: Allan Erickson <>
Re: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: Allan Erickson <>
RE: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: "Ken Russell" <>
European Drug Policies
From: Allan Erickson <>
Re: MAP: European Drug Policies
From: Eric Ernst <>
RE: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: "Don Beck" <>
Re: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: Allan Erickson <>
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subj: Winnie the Pooh characters seen 'seriously troubled'
From: Allan Erickson <>
Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2000 21:56:30 +0000
hi all-
seems some folks in medicine have too much time on their hands...
allan
http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=human&Repository=HUMAN_
Winnie the Pooh characters seen "seriously troubled"
Last updated: 12 Dec 2000 19:33 GMT (Reuters)
By Ian Karleff
TORONTO (Reuters) - Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, Tigger and Christopher
Robin are "seriously troubled individuals" living in the "disenchanted"
Hundred Acre Wood and are in dire need of psychoactive drugs, said
Canadian researchers on Tuesday.
The characters in A.A. Milne's famous children's stories suffer from
unrecognised and untreated problems including attention deficit disorder
and chronic depression, said a tongue-and-cheek study by paediatricians
at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and published in the
Canadian Medical Association Journal.
- -snip-
------------------------------
Subj: Re: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: Allan Erickson <>
Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2000 22:35:24 +0000
Don Beck wrote:
- -snip-
> I think it's important that this prohibitionist OPED be refuted. Please read
> it and see if you don't agree. It is of a generally higher quality than most
> such efforts that appear, and makes a much more persuasive case against harm
> minimisation than we usually see. Despite being couched much more reasonably
> than the usual prohibitionist effort, it relies on the same persuasive
> gimmickry and evidence: confuse association with causation and make
> unwarranted doomsday predictions of consequences of "legalisation."
>
> Thanks and regards, don
- -----------
How about this Don?
To the editor-
Bill Muehlenberg, in his opinion of Monday Dec 11, Cost Of Drugs
Free-For-All Is More Than Money, writes a good piece. Convincing,
almost.
Mr Muehlenburg writes, "During Prohibition in the US, consumption
of alcohol declined substantially, as did the cirrhosis death rate for
men (cut by two-thirds between 1911 and 1929), and arrests for public
drunkenness dropped 50 per cent between 1919 and 1922." Indeed.
Unfortunately, youthful consumption of alcohol became so pervasive, it
was one of the chief arguments against prohibition. And of course public
drunkenness dropped. With the rocketing rise of gangster control over
not just the flow of booze but our politicians and courts and police as
well...
Mr. Muehlenburg says, "Even if we assume that lower prices will cause
addicts to steal fewer valuables, we know that this will be offset by
the general crime increase associated with the increase in users. Any
police officer will tell you that a person on drugs will be more likely
to neglect a child, abuse a spouse or take a life." Indeed, again.
Well, lets see. Here in the U.S. alcohol is statistically involved in
more neglect and child abuse cases than drugs. Auto accident fatalities
are caused 50% of the time by alcohol. Legal, pharmaceutical drugs here
are attributed for causing over 100,000 deaths per year, illegal drugs
20,000.
In California over a 10 year period cigarette consumption was reduced by
40% by (drum roll please)- truthful education! Compare the U.S. crime
and drug statistics to the Netherlands and you can make up your own mind
whether a liberalised, truthful education approach works when compared
to a repressive system of racial profiling, property seizures and
massive incarceration. We cannot keep drugs away from the people we put
in prison because of drugs. How then shall we keep them out of the hands
of a civilian population? Nuclear weapons maybe?
Allan Erickson
(contact info)
> **********************************************
> Australia: OPED: Cost Of Drugs Free-For-All Is More Than Money
> URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00.n1863.a09.html
> Newshawk: M & M Family
> Pubdate: Mon, 11 Dec 2000
> Source: Australian, The (Australia)
> Copyright: News Limited 2000
> Contact:
> Website: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/
> Author: Bill Muehlenberg, national secretary of the Australian Family
> Association.
>
> COST OF DRUGS FREE-FOR-ALL IS MORE THAN MONEY
>
> DUNCAN Campbell (Opinion, December 6) gives a good summary of the harm
> minimisation approach to drugs.
>
> This view says that drug abuse will always be with us, so let's try to make
> it safer. It also says that any attempt to ban such substances is doomed to
> failure. However, the harm minimisation approach is a defective and
> defeatist policy that exists through the perpetuation of myths and
> misinformation.
- -snip-
------------------------------
Subj: RE: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: "Ken Russell" <>
Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2000 19:51:22 +1100
Don,
This article was missing from the clippings I receive.
I will purchase the article later this evening from the Newstext
site and submit it. I noticed that another person has written
a prohibition-type response to it, will grab that also.
Anything else needed while I'm there?
Cheers
Ken
- -----Original Message-----
From: []On
Behalf Of Don Beck
Sent: Wednesday, 13 December 2000 12:47 PM
To: Hawktalk (E-mail); MAPTalk-posts (E-mail); DRCTalk Reformers' Forum
(E-mail); DPFT-L (E-mail)
Subject: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
This OPED refers to an earlier piece from The Australian, by a Duncan
Campbell, Pubdate 6 Dec.
It is no longer on the Australian's Opinion page archive, but is apparently
available in an online archive available to subscribers..........hope
someone can hawk it.
I think it's important that this prohibitionist OPED be refuted. Please read
it and see if you don't agree. It is of a generally higher quality than most
such efforts that appear, and makes a much more persuasive case against harm
minimisation than we usually see. Despite being couched much more reasonably
than the usual prohibitionist effort, it relies on the same persuasive
gimmickry and evidence: confuse association with causation and make
unwarranted doomsday predictions of consequences of "legalisation."
Thanks and regards, don
**********************************************
Australia: OPED: Cost Of Drugs Free-For-All Is More Than Money
URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00.n1863.a09.html
Newshawk: M & M Family
Pubdate: Mon, 11 Dec 2000
Source: Australian, The (Australia)
Copyright: News Limited 2000
Contact:
Website: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/
Author: Bill Muehlenberg, national secretary of the Australian Family
Association.
COST OF DRUGS FREE-FOR-ALL IS MORE THAN MONEY
DUNCAN Campbell (Opinion, December 6) gives a good summary of the harm
minimisation approach to drugs.
This view says that drug abuse will always be with us, so let's try to make
it safer. It also says that any attempt to ban such substances is doomed to
failure. However, the harm minimisation approach is a defective and
defeatist policy that exists through the perpetuation of myths and
misinformation.
Consider the "banning doesn't work" mentality. Prohibition, Campbell
informs us, has failed. Has it? During Prohibition in the US, consumption
of alcohol declined substantially, as did the cirrhosis death rate for men
(cut by two-thirds between 1911 and 1929), and arrests for public
drunkenness dropped 50 per cent between 1919 and 1922.
But, Campbell asks, what about crime? This is a familiar furphy. The
argument goes like this: by making drugs legal or less prohibitive, drug
prices will decline and, as a result, crime and the black market associated
with illicit drugs will also decline or disappear. It is also claimed that
the legalisation of drugs will remove the profit motive from the drug trade.
And it is argued that the money saved in stopping parts of the drug war or
in taxing the newly legalised drugs can go to rehabilitation.
There are several problems with these arguments.
First, the costs to society of drug use are far greater than any money saved
on reduced law enforcement efforts. Consider the costs of drug
legalisation: lost productivity; increased medical services for addicts and
their families; more car accidents; poorer educational performance;
increased policing; more babies who may pick up their mother's addiction. A
recent study found that the annual cost of drugs to the Australian community
is $14.3 billion. Increase the number of drug users, as legalisation will
do, and you increase this figure as well.
Second, any taxes raised by these legalised drugs will not offset the costs
to society. Indeed, the taxation of legalised drugs will still drive people
to crime. In order for governments to raise enough revenue from drug taxes
to pay for all the costs of increased drug use, taxes will have to be high.
Third, the profit motive abounds in existing legal operations. The alcohol
and tobacco industries are driven by hopes of large profits. If drugs were
legalised, whole new industries would develop to cash in on the trade.
Greed for gain does not disappear when an activity is legalised.
Fourth, black markets exist today for all kinds of legal products. Just
because something is legal does not mean the black market will disappear.
Fifth, crime rates may in fact rise. Advocates of legalisation claim that
such a move will reduce drug-associated crime. But will it? Not
necessarily. Even if we assume that lower prices will cause addicts to
steal fewer valuables, we know that this will be offset by the general crime
increase associated with the increase in users. Any police officer will
tell you that a person on drugs will be more likely to neglect a child,
abuse a spouse or take a life.
The point is, drug use contributes to crime. It is the illegal activities
people engage in while on mind-altering drugs that is the problem. As one
commentator put it, "It's not just that people do bad things to get drugs;
drugs make them do bad things."
CONSIDER some statistics: a 1991 US federal survey found that most of those
arrested in 24 cities for robbery, assault, burglary and homicide tested
positive for drugs; a 1994 study of 31,000 abused and neglected children in
Cook County, Illinois, found that more that 80 per cent of the cases
involved drugs; in The Netherlands, from 1988 to 1993, when drugs laws were
relaxed, the number of organised crime groups jumped from three to 93; a
1992 study of NSW inmates found that 67 per cent of prisoners had been on
drugs while committing the crime for which they were imprisoned; a 2000
study of Australian detainees found that a large percentage had tested
positive for drug use. For example, 70 per cent of adult male detainees
charged with violence tested positive to a drug, and 86 per cent of adult
male detainees on property charges also tested positive.
Also, cheaper drugs do not necessarily mean less crime. When inexpensive
crack cocaine flooded the US in the early 1980s, the rate of addiction
soared, as did crime rates. Indeed, police noted that wherever drugs were
the cheapest, crime rates were the highest.
The truth is that the harm minimisation approach has been tried in Australia
for the past 15 years and it has not worked. Drug use has increased, as
have the number of drug overdoses. A policy that decreases the number of
drug users and helps addicts become drug-free is the only compassionate
approach to the drug problem.
- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
- ----
MAP posted-by: Doc-Hawk
------------------------------
Subj: European Drug Policies
From: Allan Erickson <>
Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2000 05:43:19 +0000
I haven't read them all but this is a pretty good series from Radio Free
Europe. I thought RFE was a propaganda arm ofUS.govcorp.com?
allan
- ------------
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/drugs.html
European Drug Policies
Nov 2000
Drugs have been around since the beginning of civilization. The first
written reference to the opium poppy appears in a Sumerian text dated
4,000 BC. Similar examples can be found in cultures as diverse as the
Celts, the ancient Egyptians and the Aztecs. Today, drugs -- both legal
and illegal -- continue to be widely used but approaches on how to deal
with them differ greatly. In this five-part series, RFE/RL correspondent
Jeremy Bransten examines the issues and the reality of drugs in both
Western and Eastern Europe, how policies are changing to adapt to new
trends, and what lessons can be learned for the future.
Adapting To New Realities (Part 1)
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/27112000163711.asp
The Dutch Practice Liberal Policies (Part 2)
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/28112000132419.asp
Dangers And Addictions (Part 3)
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/29112000131856.asp
Sweden's Strict Policies (Part 4)
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/30112000154646.asp
Czechs Catch Up With The West (Part 5)
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/12/01122000093455.asp
------------------------------
Subj: Re: MAP: European Drug Policies
From: Eric Ernst <>
Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2000 19:09:15 +0100
Allan Erickson wrote:
>
> I haven't read them all but this is a pretty good series from Radio Free
> Europe. I thought RFE was a propaganda arm ofUS.govcorp.com?
Well... yes. But didn't ya' know that white man speaks with split tongue? ;-)
Seriously: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a non-profit private corporation which receives funding through grants from the US Government, namely the State Dept.'s United States Information Agency resp. Service (USIA resp. USIS, same thing), that is, specifically through USIA's Broadcasting Board of Governors.
A substantial supplier of news programs for RFE/RL, on the other hand, is the Open Media Research Institute (OMRI) situated in Prague. In fact, RFE/RL's broadcasting facilities were moved from Munich to Prague as part of the deal struck with OMRI in 1994. OMRI itself is part of the Soros Foundation, which also finances a host of harm reduction oriented programs in the US, most notably the Lindesmith Center (TLC), which was part of said foundation until its merger with the Drug Policy Foundation (DPF) on July 1, 2000. The merged TLC-DPF is now formally (though I suppose not financially) independent of the Soros Foundation.
That RFE/RL is cofinanced with US Govt. and private monies is not unusual for international organizations. The same scheme holds for a host of other orgs, including, for example, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTFY), which is cofinanced, among others, by the US Govt., the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Open Society Institute (OSI), which is also part of the Soros foundation.
In any case, even if the USIA/USIS were completely in charge of RFE/RL, it wouldn't necessarily mean that such a program were impossible. The policy of the USIA/USIS has long been to picture the US as a model society were an open exchange on controversial issues is possible.
Cheers, Eric
>
> allan
>
> ------------
> http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/drugs.html
> European Drug Policies
>
> Nov 2000
>
> Drugs have been around since the beginning of civilization. The first
> written reference to the opium poppy appears in a Sumerian text dated
> 4,000 BC. Similar examples can be found in cultures as diverse as the
> Celts, the ancient Egyptians and the Aztecs. Today, drugs -- both legal
> and illegal -- continue to be widely used but approaches on how to deal
> with them differ greatly. In this five-part series, RFE/RL correspondent
> Jeremy Bransten examines the issues and the reality of drugs in both
> Western and Eastern Europe, how policies are changing to adapt to new
> trends, and what lessons can be learned for the future.
>
> Adapting To New Realities (Part 1)
> http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/27112000163711.asp
>
> The Dutch Practice Liberal Policies (Part 2)
> http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/28112000132419.asp
>
> Dangers And Addictions (Part 3)
> http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/29112000131856.asp
>
> Sweden's Strict Policies (Part 4)
> http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/30112000154646.asp
>
> Czechs Catch Up With The West (Part 5)
> http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/12/01122000093455.asp
------------------------------
Subj: RE: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: "Don Beck" <>
Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2000 20:12:32 -0600
Hey, outstanding!- I would take issue with only one figure, that of deaths
caused by use of currently-illegal drugs. I don't have the sources/figures
at hand, but my recollection is that "official" figures have it at less than
10,000.......
I hope you'll zap it to the Aussies, quick-time! Thanks, Allan!
Regards, don
- -----Original Message-----
From: Allan Erickson []
Sent: Tuesday, December 12, 2000 4:35 PM
To: Don Beck
Cc:
Subject: Re: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
Don Beck wrote:
- -snip-
> I think it's important that this prohibitionist OPED be refuted. Please
read
> it and see if you don't agree. It is of a generally higher quality than
most
> such efforts that appear, and makes a much more persuasive case against
harm
> minimisation than we usually see. Despite being couched much more
reasonably
> than the usual prohibitionist effort, it relies on the same persuasive
> gimmickry and evidence: confuse association with causation and make
> unwarranted doomsday predictions of consequences of "legalisation."
>
> Thanks and regards, don
- -----------
How about this Don?
To the editor-
Bill Muehlenberg, in his opinion of Monday Dec 11, Cost Of Drugs
Free-For-All Is More Than Money, writes a good piece. Convincing,
almost.
Mr Muehlenburg writes, "During Prohibition in the US, consumption
of alcohol declined substantially, as did the cirrhosis death rate for
men (cut by two-thirds between 1911 and 1929), and arrests for public
drunkenness dropped 50 per cent between 1919 and 1922." Indeed.
Unfortunately, youthful consumption of alcohol became so pervasive, it
was one of the chief arguments against prohibition. And of course public
drunkenness dropped. With the rocketing rise of gangster control over
not just the flow of booze but our politicians and courts and police as
well...
Mr. Muehlenburg says, "Even if we assume that lower prices will cause
addicts to steal fewer valuables, we know that this will be offset by
the general crime increase associated with the increase in users. Any
police officer will tell you that a person on drugs will be more likely
to neglect a child, abuse a spouse or take a life." Indeed, again.
Well, lets see. Here in the U.S. alcohol is statistically involved in
more neglect and child abuse cases than drugs. Auto accident fatalities
are caused 50% of the time by alcohol. Legal, pharmaceutical drugs here
are attributed for causing over 100,000 deaths per year, illegal drugs
20,000.
In California over a 10 year period cigarette consumption was reduced by
40% by (drum roll please)- truthful education! Compare the U.S. crime
and drug statistics to the Netherlands and you can make up your own mind
whether a liberalised, truthful education approach works when compared
to a repressive system of racial profiling, property seizures and
massive incarceration. We cannot keep drugs away from the people we put
in prison because of drugs. How then shall we keep them out of the hands
of a civilian population? Nuclear weapons maybe?
Allan Erickson
(contact info)
> **********************************************
> Australia: OPED: Cost Of Drugs Free-For-All Is More Than Money
> URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00.n1863.a09.html
> Newshawk: M & M Family
> Pubdate: Mon, 11 Dec 2000
> Source: Australian, The (Australia)
> Copyright: News Limited 2000
> Contact:
> Website: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/
> Author: Bill Muehlenberg, national secretary of the Australian Family
> Association.
>
> COST OF DRUGS FREE-FOR-ALL IS MORE THAN MONEY
>
> DUNCAN Campbell (Opinion, December 6) gives a good summary of the harm
> minimisation approach to drugs.
>
> This view says that drug abuse will always be with us, so let's try to
make
> it safer. It also says that any attempt to ban such substances is doomed
to
> failure. However, the harm minimisation approach is a defective and
> defeatist policy that exists through the perpetuation of myths and
> misinformation.
- -snip-
------------------------------
Subj: Re: MAP: Needed: Dec. 6 item from The Australian
From: Allan Erickson <>
Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2000 23:04:58 +0000
Yeah I know Don. I've heard 16,000 more often than other numbers and the
drug warriors claim, 50,000 so I just rounded up on the side of caution.
If anyone has an ACCURATE figure with a source please post it!
Haven't had much luck getting printed down Ken's way but we'll see...
peace (please!)
allan
Don Beck wrote:
>
> Hey, outstanding!- I would take issue with only one figure, that of deaths
> caused by use of currently-illegal drugs. I don't have the sources/figures
> at hand, but my recollection is that "official" figures have it at less than
> 10,000.......
>
> I hope you'll zap it to the Aussies, quick-time! Thanks, Allan!
> Regards, don
>
------------------------------
End of Maptalk-Digest V00 #264
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