Legalizing pot may turn out to be a not very good idea. Not because the state (or anyone) has the right to tell a person what they may or may not ingest, freely buy or sell . . . but because of the excuse it will give the police state to become even more authoritarian than it already is.
And yes, such a thing is possible.
Over the course of the last couple of weeks in at least two states (CA and PA) motorists have been stopped at random and “asked” to submit to swab-testing in order to ascertain whether they’ve been using “drugs” (that is, other than the drug alcohol).
Some have been “voluntary” – but expect them soon to become mandatory.
The LAPD, for one, will be forcing drivers at random “safety” checkpoints to submit to having their mouths swabbed for evidence of pot usage (and so on) since conventional Breathalyzers can only detect alcohol.
The authoritarians are using the legalization movement’s successes to argue for widespread, routine use of swabbing-at-gunpoint, arguing that people will be more likely to smoke and drive (and so on) as a way to get around the Alky Nazis.
“There’s a growing recognition that driving under the influence of drugs is something we need to be clamping down on more effectively . . . (t)raditionally, our office has focused on drunken driving cases … we’re expanding drug collection and aggressively enforcing all impaired-driving laws,” says LA City Attorney Mike Feuer.
Consider it blowback – the lashing back at us Mundanes over the minor successes the decriminalization movement has had partially repealing the imbecilic (and evil) “war” on some “drugs.”
A little freedom gained here – more freedoms surrendered there.
One of the farcical aspects of this business not yet commented upon – so far as I have been able to determine – is that pot (to say nothing of other “drugs”) affects the body quite differently than the drug alcohol. Time sense may be altered, but physical coordination may not be affected. It is a very debatable question – in terms of hard facts – whether a person is “impaired” after having smoked a quantity of pot vs. a quantity of alcohol. There are – as yet – no objective standards defining impairment. Merely to test “positive” is sufficient insofar as the law is concerned. This seems unfair on the face of it. But then, it is equally unfair to define a person as “drunk” according to a generalized and arbitrary BAC threshold, even in cases where the person’s driving cannot be faulted.
Much more unfair, though – and also not yet remarked upon – is the fact that while alcohol in the bloodstream dissipates within hours of drinking (and no trace will remain after 12 hours or so) the physical evidence of smoking pot (and probably partaking of other “drugs” as well) can remain in the body for weeks after imbibing. A person who tests positive for pot, in other words, is by no means “stoned” at the time of testing. Yet he may be thrown in prison and his vehicle taken away from him regardless.
Minimally, these tests are outrageous on that account alone.
People who’ve given no indication they’re “impaired” or “high” forced to submit to testing of their bodily fluids and tissues – and then presumed “impaired” or “high” if the tests detect the presence of residual compounds in their system.
These tests are abusive in another way, too.
Swab testing is also DNA testing. A way to collect biological fingerprints of entire populations. Remember: These tests are performed generally, without any individualized suspicion or specific probable cause. Everyone who has the bad luck to roll up on a “safety” checkpoint is required to Submit and Obey.
Is it really going too far to imagine – in this day and age, given what is now happening routinely in this country, including forced anal/vaginal probing by the side of the road – that this power will not be abused? That our DNA will not be collected – and (like everything else) kept somewhere for eventual (inevitable) use against us?
Keep in mind the fact – not “conspiracy theory” – that the U.S. Supreme Court has decreed that any person merely taken into custody – that is, prevented from leaving by being forcibly detained, but not convicted of having committed any crime – can be forced to submit to a DNA test (see here).
“DNA identification of arrestees is a reasonable search that can be considered part of a routine booking procedure,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, representing the court’s majority decision.
Ah yes, “reasonable.”
Just like the “reasonable” random, bereft of any specific reason to suspect impairment (or anything else fishy) checkpoints that now litter the landscape of the former home of the free but increasingly land of the cowed.
Back in January of 2012, Dear Leader Obama signed into law the (get hold of your gag reflex) Katie Sephich Enhanced DNA Collection Act, which provides states with oodles of federal taxpayer-looted “funds” to facilitate DNA collection by your local Officers-Not-So-Friendly.
If you think those funds will not be used – and the latest power conferred not abused – then perhaps you will be interested in purchasing a bridge I own in Brooklyn. I can make you a very good deal, I swear.
Will Americans ever reach their breaking point?
Or are they already broken?
Throw it in the Woods?
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FACEBOOK POT
LEGAL POT
https://www.facebook.com/tinsley.sammons.3
WE the People must not allow ourselves to be content with legal marijuana only.
I urge Liberty loving Individuals to examine the following:
Why Legal Pot Might Turn Out to be Bad News
http://ericpetersautos.com/2014/01/02/legal-pot-may-turn-bad-news/
DRUG PROHIBITION MUST BE DESTROYED IN DETAIL. The Establishment Trash will hold onto every last shred of revenue generating income that they possibly can. They will never cease inventing new ways to violate Human Rights for profit. It is a struggle that will never end and the People must always be prepared to crush them. The Government People care nothing for Liberty and Justice for All, and if you are among of the non-Establishment Individuals they damned sure don’t care about you if you are what Eric Peters refers to as, a “Mundane”.
The Drug War is an ongoing Crime Against Humanity. The Precedent established with the Nuremberg War Crimes Trial and the Trial of The Judges is applicable to the Drug War. Upon the release of the victims of the unconstitutional Drug War there ought to be plenty of prison space available for those who continue perpetuating the Drug War and other legal crimes. They have had plenty of time to realize that the War on Drugs is evil and their continuing support for it makes THEM evil. When you knowingly serve evil, then you yourself are evil.
WE the Mundanes are morally obliged to bring them to justice. Personally, I care not how harsh the administration of that justice might be. The lowlife sons-of-bitches have got it coming.
Tinsley Grey Sammons (1936 –)
Is the End of Marijuana Prohibition the End of the War On Drugs? Probably Not.
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/end-marijuana-prohibition-end-war-drugs-probably-not
No, it won’t mean the end of the war on drugs, and cannabis prohibition hasn’t really “ended”. The rules are in flux and I expect the feds to weigh in by raiding pot shops, growers, and so forth, just as has happened to some extent in California. The present administration has been strangely quiet about Colorado’s new rules recently. A little too quiet. As in, the quiet before the storm. Though that storm might not actually hit until after the next President takes office…
The tide is turning so fast in so many states in favor of removing sanctions on cannabis that I smell a rat. The situation is parallel to the mad rush in virtually every state over a short period to legalize concealed carry—if you will only sign this handy form to receive your permit, heh heh. I have voiced the suspicion here before that concealed carry permits are primarily meant to build a database of gung-ho gun owners for future state confiscation of firearms.
Well, ditto for such things as medical cannabis cards, shop licenses, growing licenses, etc. All this new paperwork for cannabis is building a mighty government database. What’s going to be done with it, and shouldn’t we assume that the people in this database are going to get royally fucked somehow?
Hi Ek,
All of this is probably true, but it might cut both ways. Anytime tyranny cedes ground, it’s a positive for liberty. Millions of people now have CC permits, which all by itself is a boon in that it’s an implicit affirmation of their right to carry a gun. Also, from a purely utilitarian point-of-view, the fact that “gun violence” has gone down in areas where legal restrictions on civilian ownership of firearms have been scaled back is a powerful repudiation of the gun-grabbers’ primary argument.
Same’s true as regards legalized pot. As people – the fence-sitters especially – notice that drug-addled hippies are not running amok, it becomes harder and harder to justify the police state “drug war” tactics.
Anytime the state’s orthodoxies are shown to be ridiculous, it’s a victory for us.
Damn, Eric beat me to it…I echo exactly what he said.
I got my CHL in Texas; it annoys me (and the irony kills me) that Texas isn’t an open-carry state. But I don’t want the hassle of a weapons charge.
Does it mean I’m in a database? Yep. Molon Labe motherfuckers–come take’em. I’m tired of being cowed by their “databases”.
Any one of us, probably EVERY one of us, is on a “list” somewhere because of what we write here.
I’ve communicated about my weapons here, in email, on the phone so often they surely know exactly what I have.
But you know what? So what! WE have the moral high ground. WE are in accordance with Natural Law. WE are the producers, the makers, the protectors, the generators.
THEY are the ones with something to hide, skulking about with their “databases” and mewling about their “laws”.
I’m just so tired of it.
Sick and tired of it, even.
“The List” – seems like a title of an ominous film.
On that note, I saw this and thought of ekrampitzjr ‘s comment of, “concealed carry permits are primarily meant to build a database of gung-ho gun owners for future state confiscation of firearms.”
Gun Owners: Be Careful if You Pass Through Maryland
… “How the officer knew that Filippidis owns a gun has not been revealed. MTAP is conducting an investigation and could not comment.”
http://www.thedailysheeple.com/gun-owners-be-careful-if-you-pass-through-maryland_012014
Gets even better. Maryland does not recognize neighboring states’ concealed carry permits. At all. (To my knowledge, and I looked into this extensively.)
A relative who drives from Pennsylvania to Virginia via West Virginia on I-81 stops at the Maryland border, removes and stows his gun, drives the dozen miles through Maryland, stops in West Virginia, and puts on his gun again. Those other three states all recognize one another’s permits, no problem. But not Maryland.
And that would appear to violate the “full faith and credit” clause of the US Constitution. That clause is the reason that if you are married in Hawaii, you are considered married in the other 49 states, for example.
By the way, your permit is linked to your driver’s license data nationwide. How Maryland knew this Florida driver had a permit isn’t a great mystery. A number of acquaintances and friends who have permits all have said that the cop asked if they were carrying concealed after checking the ID in the cop car computer, without the driver having to say anything about it.
The question is what the cannabis permits will incite among our native storm troopers… You can bet that will be linked to your driver’s license eventually too, and watch the fun really begin when that starts.
Not by a long shot. The War on the War on Drugs merits a Strategic Conclusion. WE the People must take what we can get and continue fighting for it all, even if it gets vicious and bloody. The strategic goal must be an across-the-board repeal of unconstitutional Drug Prohibition.
The tipping point might have arrived and WE simply must not let up for a moment.
Tinsley Grey Sammons (1936 –)
Other unforeseen consequences to “legalized” cannabis have already appeared.
People using medical cannabis in states in which it’s legal, and in which they hold medical cards for its use, have been turned down for organ transplants based on their cannabis use, since it’s still illegal at the federal level. An additional reason given is that often cannabis users allegedly also use other illicit drugs. A Google or other search will turn up several such transplant refusals.
Some recent cases allege that child protective services have taken away (or threatened to take away) children, apparently based on nothing more than the parents’ supposedly legal medical use of cannabis in the states involved. One particularly notorious case occurred in 2013 in Michigan.
There are other good questions about the effect on Second Amendment rights because the federal paperwork asks about drug use. Lying on the form is a felony, by the way.
Decaf coffee is my drug of choice. Have not finished the article yet but my concern is, how will this impact our Second Amendment rights?
“Have you ever been convicted of a felony offense? (Include felony convictions of driving under the influence ….”) It doesn’t specify, influence of what?
Have you been convicted of a misdemeanor offense within the five-year period immediately preceding the application? (Include misdemeanor DUI convictions.)
Are you addicted to, or an unlawful user or distributor of marijuana …?
While I agree that it is none of the state’s business what competent adults choose to smoke, inject or swallow in private, this “concession” from the statists gives a few a five dollar boon with the potential for becoming a $500 nightmare for many.
Do you want to go on record that this drug is a factor in your lifestyle if making that admission could potentially cost your Second Amendment rights?
Exactly, John.
This whole thing is fraught with unintended (and perhaps intended) consequences….
Tell me again about how “free” we are.
@Willy Wonka–
Reminds me of the brilliant techno protest song Adam Freeland We Want Your Soul.
At 2:48 you can hear Bill Hicks…“You’re free! To do as we tell you!”
Wow, great song and video. More A. Freeland lyrics:
Fear…is a mind killer In the space of the heart is a_ place of no FEAR!
A feeling without limits that you cannot ENGINEER! Whoever said we’re not supposed to get ECSTATIC? It’s a media-induced comatose ANAESTHETIC!
It seems naturally enough to say that. we live in the physical world.
Here’s all of us. We’re walking around in this physical world here, right?
But to say that, is a conventional point of view. That is a convention of our existence. to think in those terms, to presume in those terms.
We say things like, “There is this external world, and I am me, you are you.” This universe we say things like this. All we need to do is. to really consider, to really observe. our condition, fundamentally.
I think we’re onto something. Yeah this could be the time. I heard a change is coming. Got here before it arrived. Too late to think about it
Just like in to the ride. Been busy organizing. To bring you here tonight.
Don’t buy the hype about it. Cause this ain’t ’89. No time to talk about it.
Just gotta feel it all right. You’ve been knee deep in nothing. The water’s starting to rise. Need to hold onto something. Before you’re buried alive. Just relax. Cause nothing is under control. Relax.
raided. America’s been invaded. Americans promised to save me.
but strange things happened. it’s crazy. to think you might forsake me.
come back down and save me. breaking. all the deals i made with.
people that promised to save me. wasted. all the sweet times i’ve tasted. all the sweet dreams i’m chasing. embrace me. if you can’t just praise me. if you can’t do that then pay me. or strange things will happen.
tin men always rust. fat men finally bust. heroes bite the dust. some may lose their guts. others fall in ruts. there’s no one you can trust.
the moment comes when we must bend. to forces we can’t understand.
the moment comes when good times end. cash in your chips and start again. while some may try to waste their lives. only a fool can die.
Wow. I thought legalization was a victory too. I mean, I knew it was going to be regulated and taxed. I don’t want it to be regulated or taxed. But I figured it was at least a step in the right direction. Seems like even what seems like a victory can be used by TPTB.
Eric, how would you have voted on the measure?
I support even baby steps in the right direction. That decriminalizing “drugs” may provide a pretext for other abuses does not invalidate the idea of decriminalizing “drugs.”
I agree.
Legalize and punish people who screw up while under the influence. Decrim is BS! Just another way to keep the very profitable scam going.
https://www.facebook.com/jeffry.sanford
Perhaps you can share this with acquaintance lawyer Jeffry Sanford. Jeffry defends victims of the unconstitutional Drug War. I’m hoping he will become one of your regular readers.
[email protected]
Thanks, Tinsley – I’ll give it a shot!
Collecting DNA has been a dream of law enforcement as far back as when it was conceived, like “livescan” electronic fingerprinting. It’s proof positive who you are. I never saw a problem with databases for fingerprints as you can not place someone’s fingerprints anywhere and offer no value when or if sold. DNA on the other hand has a huge value that can easily be used to Illegally place someone at a crime scene or its information sold. Like the NSA collecting data it’s only a matter of time before rouge agents start profiting from this “info”.
I know I’ve said it before but I’ve responded to and took hundreds of accident reports. A tiny fraction involved DUI and a super tiny fraction involved drug use. Its a problem so small why bother wasting money “combating” it? Because it very politically correct to be “tough on crime”. Think how wonderful it is for the government to collect your info and all the agencies that will profit if found driving with drugs in your system. 1, your car will be forfeited $$$$ 2, you’ll pay $$$$ in legal-court fees. 3 If you have underage children whether in your car or not “Child Protective Services” needs to conduct a massive investigation at you expense or you’ll never see your children again. I could keep going but you get my drift.
In a last note….why do people believe that if someone was involved in an accident and was DUI (drugs or alcohol) that makes them at fault? I never understood that slam dunk smoking gun logic.
It doesn’t matter how rare or small the danger is, it is how it can be exploited and what there is to gain from it that determines the effort and attention.
oh and people don’t generally need to be framed for crimes in the USA. Getting out of bed in the morning probably involves a couple felonies give the number of laws on the books. Just pick someone and find a “crime”. ALthough framing does have its purpose to create specific narratives.
Why do people believe that DUI or DUID is a crime to begin with? Why did Connecticut gun owners line up to register their firearms? In general, people are ignorant sheep.
It doesn’t have crap to do with real drug use. Cops know that less tan 2% of the population are “criminals” of any sort that matters. It is all part of tagging and cataloging of the heard, just like your monitored cell phone and emails.
Dear Garysco,
Did you ever know that you’re my hero?
Wind Beneath My Wings – B. Midler
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1xks3_bette-midler-wind-beneath-my-wings_music
Here’s some Memphis Christian Rock from Skillet. Their song: “Hero” has 35 million views.
Hero – Skillet
“I’m just a step away. just a breath away. Losing my faith today. Falling off the edge today.
I am just a man. I’m not superhuman. Someone save me from the hate.
It’s just another war. Just another family torn. I’ve gotta fight today. To live another day. Speaking my mind today. My voice will be heard today.
I’ve gotta make a stand. My voice will be heard today. It’s just another kill. The countdown begins to destroy ourselves.
Who’s gonna fight for what’s right? Who’s gonna help us survive? We’re in the fight of our lives. And we’re not ready to die.
Who’s gonna fight for the weak? Who’s gonna make ’em believe? I’ve got a hero, I’ve got a hero. Living in me.
I’m gonna fight for what’s right. Today I’m speaking my mind. And if it kills me tonight. I will be ready to die. A hero’s not afraid to give his life. A hero’s gonna save me just in time.”
– Anyway, Happy New Year, you hero, you.
@Tor – When I grow up I want to do something that gets 35million views :}
Poor kids today have to break free of the taught communitarian training and think for themselves. Anyway, that is how I read that song and its popularity.
Will Americans ever reach their breaking point?
No because your Freedoms and Privacy are taken away in small increments and always with a safety excuse so not to cause much backlash – then next Generation thinks it has always been this way.
The warrantless, “voluntary” cheek-swabbing stations are already engendering quite a bit of pushback. Several lawsuits, lots of negative publicity.
The PTB have jumped the shark. As the awakening progresses they’re going to see increased pushback on these training initiatives; the cheek-swabbings are another prisoner-training technique.
The saving grace will be probable cause.
Hi Methylamine,
I’d like to think that things like probable cause will limit these dogs of war but I fear that the velvet gloves are coming off and the time of an all-out assault on individual liberty may well be at hand. Look at all the precedents. Laws are on the books that make it “illegal” to film pigs during the implementation of atrocities. The only push-back that’s going to be effective is self-defense….sort of a Newtonian response to violence perpetrated by the pig nation.
GC – The solution is from a scene in the movie “Children of Men.” Go to 3:20 to see one way to handle “the problem”:
Exactly.
Which would have been the appropriate response in the shooting-the-van-full-of-kids scene, or the let’s-repeatedly-medically-rape-you scene.
We just have to be at the point where sufficient numbers will support you–enough that when they crack down more, they’re not cheered for it but jeered for it.
Ah and by “scene” I mean the atrocities in New Mexico last year.
Killing the pigs would have been completely justified in both of those cases: and I’d say MORALLY justified, not just a “well, I’d say its a little excessive but it should still be legal” type of justified. If I had been that woman I probably would never have tried to drive off, but if I had done so and they tried to shoot me, I would have shot back.
As Larken Rose put it “We ‘anarchsts’ and ‘voluntarists’ and ‘libertarians’ only believe in violence for one reason… self-defense. You, on the other hand, have the most hypocritical philosophy imaginable.” (That quote is close to right, but probably a little off.)
Most people just don’t get logic.
The powers that be will take a step back and apologize. Then with the heat off they will take smaller steps forward. In a few years they will achieve their goal.
Works this way over and over again. Slow boil. When they overstep they know how to recover.
Hi Eric,
Your points are valid AND with legalization comes cartelization of production. I know that only “approved” facilities will be able to grow pot in Washington and Colorado and that growing your own will be heavily penalized. I predict that only Monsanto brand of pot will be allowed within ten years. Personally I grew bored with pot decades ago but I still have friends who imbibe. They are all acting like this is a victory of monumental proportions but I’m a natural cynic so I think that this will give the PtB a whole new list of abusive and illegitimate powers. Like I said earlier, I believe that this year a lot of people will be forced to wake up and take off the rose-colored spectacles……as always, OALA, EHOATAS….
Basically the same in Canada. Personal growing goes back to being universally illegal, all medicinal growing licenses to be revoked. Government approved and inspected facilities only.
Oh yeah, and TAXED of course.
Yup! Legalize it like tomatos! It isn’t being legalized. It is being highly regulated. The Black Market will continue. Just like with moonshine! The best of both worlds for the powers that be and they are milking it of our rights and cash with this so-called legalization!
One aspect of pot “legalization” that’s particularly absurd is the pre-condition of regulating it. For what? Is there even a single documented case of someone dying as a result of pot consumption? There is a far more persuasive case to be made for the strict regulation of the drug alcohol (not that I favor such, of course).
I’m afraid that it will never be as legal as corn flakes because state governments and smaller jurisdictions aren’t likely to settle for paltry sales taxes when they’re perfectly positioned to also extract one or more hefty sin taxes (or similar newly created taxes with various labels) many times greater. The best way to achieve that goal, from Colorado’s perspective, was to funnel production and sales mostly through the already established and politically savvy medicinal marijuana guild. It’s pure mercantilism but at least simple possession of dried flowers is no longer a state crime.
Marc wrote, “medicinal marijuana guild”
Mang, in the context it’s in, that’s a gross term.
I was listening to the A.M. radio while waiting for the better half to come out of a craft store I don’t care to go into. Two guys were talking about medical M.J. One was an older doctor of some sort in New Jersey, he kept stressing the idea of tight controls and strict regulation and how there will be more of it all. He thought that in the future, the laws of New Jersey and Colorado would meet in the middle, slightly to that side of control.
The doctor said he was sure(!) that there would be a case soon where a person would get stoned and drive their car into a tree at 100 m.p.h. You could hear in his voice how he thought it was a certainly,… just never-mind the fact that it’s not happened yet.
The world is his lab?
That doctor was just trying his darndest to showcase examples of how there were already pre-conditions and of regulating it in New Jersey as if it were dynamite storage and sales. …Isn’t N.J. a big time mafia state? Regulation and mafia? Hmm?
Anyway, I couldn’t handle anymore of that mega-authoritarian B.S. and hit the CD button while proceeding to do some seriously fun doughnuts in the snow covered parking-lot for a few minutes.