Norm Stamper: Ending the "War on Drugs": The Fierce Urgency of...When?

Norm Stamper: Ending the "War on Drugs": The Fierce Urgency of...When?: "The nation's longest running armed conflict, the drug war, financed to the tune of about $70 billion a year, is an unmitigated economic disaster. Think of the money that could be invested, right now, in 'shovel-ready' infrastructure improvements, or in the credit crisis, the home mortgage crisis, the energy crisis, the automobile industry crisis, the banking crisis, the education crisis, the deficit crisis...

And consider terrorism. I almost fell out of my La-Z-Boy when then-Attorney General John Ashcroft informed us that terrorist missions are financed by drug trafficking."

Can we stand up, uncover our eyes and look at cold reality a bit. The short-sighted, religious right influenced neo-conservative formula of the past 40 years is driving us into the ground. More to come, film at 11.

Can Obama give 'em hell before it's too late?

Can Obama give 'em hell before it's too late? | Salon:
"Sept. 1, 2009 | 'We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace: business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering,' President Franklin Roosevelt told an audience in Madison Square Garden in 1936. 'They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.[my emphasis] Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me and I welcome their hatred.'

Can anyone imagine President Barack Obama saying anything like that? The nickname of Roosevelt's successor in the White House, Harry Truman, was 'Give-'Em-Hell Harry.' As the Republican minority, backed by an avalanche of special-interest money, mobilizes to thwart the health reform agenda of the Democratic majority, maybe the time has come for 'Give-'Em-Hell Barry.'

The most dangerous deficit that the United States faces is not the budget deficit or the trade deficit. It is the Democrats' demagogy deficit. Franklin Roosevelt, looking down from that Hyde Park in the sky, would not be surprised that conservatives are seeking to channel populist anger and anxiety, not against the Wall Street elites who wrecked the economy, but against reformers promoting healthcare reform and economic security for ordinary people.[my emphasis] As he told his audience in 1936, 'It is an old strategy of tyrants to delude their victims into fighting their battles for them.' But FDR would be shocked by the inability of his party to mobilize the public on behalf of reform."

Read the rest at Salon.com from the links above.

t

The value of doing No-Thing

"Don't underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can't hear, and not bothering." PIGLET

Despite the advice of my Taoist friend Piglet, which I value, here I will Do Some-Things.

Among them may be:
-- play with this blogging and figure out WTF it is, how it's useful, or not
-- sharing with myself and 'the rest of out there' useful and not so useful Things and NoThings
-- adding my $0.02 to the general melee' -- I've rarely been shy about doing so - it's in my Irish blood

td

Welcome to the monkey house...

...with apologies to k. vonnegut.

The first post of my first 'blog --
I don't know what's coming next, or how often, but here is my soapbox.
I set it up in the park for all to listen...or ignore.

enjoy