Cocaine Production Plummets After DEA Kicked Out Of Bolivia

John Vibes
antimedia.org

After the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) was kicked out of Bolivia, the country was able to drastically reduce the amount of coca (cocaine) produced within its borders. According to data released by the United Nations, cocaine production in the country declined by 11% in the past year, marking the fourth year in a row of steady decrease.

It was just seven years ago that the DEA left Bolivia — and only three years after that, progress was finally made. The strategy employed by the Bolivian government may be a surprise to many prohibitionists because it did not involve any strong-arm police state tactics. Instead, they worked to find alternative crops for farmers to grow that would actually make them more money.

“Bolivia has adopted a policy based on dialogue, where coca cultivation is allowed in traditional areas alongside alternative development [in others],” Antonino de Leo, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s representative in Bolivia, told VICE News.

“It’s not only about making money off a crop. In the old fashioned alternative development approach, we substitute one illicit crop for a licit crop. It’s about a more comprehensive approach that includes access to essential services like schools, hospitals, and roads in areas that traditionally have been hard to reach,” Leo added.

There are unfortunately still harsh laws against drug trafficking in Bolivia, but these have been active since the height of the drug war and have had no effect on the recent decline in production. Bolivian president, Evo Morales — a former coca farmer himself — has been less heavy handed since the DEA left the country, a move that allowed the government to develop alternatives for the struggling farmers instead.

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The Dark Alliance of Media and Empire: The ‘Dissident’ Smear of Gary Webb

Chris Floyd
Empire Burlesque

I assume that most of the rapidly dwindling number of people who read this blog have already read Tarzie’s takedown of The Intercept’s curiously CIA-slanted smear of Gary Webb, who revealed the Agency’s instrumental involvement in the 1980s crack epidemic that devastated America’s inner cities in order to fund the illegal Contra war in Nicaragua.

(As an aside, I’d like to note that the flood of crack into America was not of course confined to the inner cities, although that was indeed its epicenter. Over time, it crept out into that rural “heartland” where, in Gore Vidal’s immortal phase, “chiggers burrow and Jesus saves,” and destroyed the lives of many “good old boys” along with the ghetto dwellers who were the primary targets. One of these old boys was a close friend of mine, a good-hearted, “unharmful gentle soul” damaged by a violent upbringing who got hooked on crack and ended up in the absolute hellhole of the American prison complex. This was a sweet, music-loving, friend-supporting man who’d never hurt a single person in his life, who spent his time in prison trying to mediate between the racist gangs — paying the price for it with beatings and threats — trying to walk the line and being scorned for it by guards and prisoners alike. All this for a quiet, diversionary high he could have gotten from a couple of legal six-packs every night, if not for the insidious addictive nature of the product the CIA pushed into the hands of the pushers. This is one of the main things that drive my rage against the murderers and liars who strut upon the national and international stages, pretending to be pious leaders: the fate of good people like my friend, ordinary people, people filled with love, with dreams, who just want to get beyond whatever torments their pasts have inflicted upon them and enjoy their time, their friends, their children, their lovers, but are instead crushed like bugs beneath the bootheels of imperial policy. It’s things like this that make me want to say: Damn these killers and liars to hell, whatever their party or professed ideals may be.)

Anyway, in his original piece, Tarzie committed the increasingly rare sin of genuine journalism by investigating and debunking, point by point, The Intercept’s ugly spin on Webb’s work — work which was later confirmed by the CIA itself. Now Tarzie is back with a follow-up on the continuing disparagement of Webb’s work by the Establishment media (covering its own spotty posterior for its original collaboration with CIA smears) in a new piece, with links to several other important stories on the case. Both pieces are well worth reading, if you haven’t already.

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U.S. Military: More Counter-Narcotics Funding Will Help Stem Exodus of Children from Central America

Bill Conroy
Narco News

Critics Argue Drug-War Money is Part of the Problem, Not the Solution

Some 58,000 migrant children, mostly Central Americans, have made the treacherous journey to the U.S. southern border alone over the past 10 months, but actions being considered by U.S. officials to combat the problem with more military and drug-war aid to their countries, critics warn, may worsen the violence that provokes this unprecedented exodus.

The number of unaccompanied children that have arrived at the U.S. border so far this fiscal year is up 106 percent from the same period a year earlier — with the total expected to reach 90,000 before Sept. 30, the end of the current fiscal year.

To put that latter number in perspective, it is nearly five times larger than the number of Border Patrol agents now stationed along the entire southern border.

The Obama administration paints the crisis as a humanitarian issue sparked by poverty, violence and the tug of family bonds. Congressional Republicans point the finger at the Obama administration’s lax enforcement of immigration laws.

Seemingly lost among the fray of political talking points over the child-migrant flight, however, is the stance of the U.S. military — which, unlike the president or Congress, is openly talking about the drug war as being a primary driver of the exodus.

Jose Ruiz, spokesperson for the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), said the transnational criminal organizations now entrenched in Central America have created elaborate networks “capable of moving drugs, money, arms and people” around the world.

“Sadly, crime syndicates that profit from human smuggling prey on victims willing to put themselves and their loved ones at great risk by entrusting ruthless criminals with their safety,” he added.

Gen. John Kelly, commander of SOUTHCOM, recently penned an opinion piece for the military press that lays out the nexus he sees between the flight of unaccompanied children and the pervasive narco-trafficking networks in Central America — particularly in Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, the major source nations for the child-migrant surge.

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$6 Billion Goes Missing at State Department

Fiscal Times

The State Department has no idea what happened to $6 billion used to pay its contractors.

In a special “management alert” made public Thursday, the State Department’s Inspector General Steve Linick warned “significant financial risk and a lack of internal control at the department has led to billions of unaccounted dollars over the last six years.

The alert was just the latest example of the federal government’s continued struggle with oversight over its outside contractors.

The lack of oversight “exposes the department to significant financial risk,” the auditor said. “It creates conditions conducive to fraud, as corrupt individuals may attempt to conceal evidence of illicit behavior by omitting key documents from the contract file. It impairs the ability of the Department to take effective and timely action to protect its interests, and, in tum, those of taxpayers.”

In the memo, the IG detailed “repeated examples of poor contract file administration.” For instance, a recent investigation of the closeout process for contracts supporting the mission in Iraq, showed that auditors couldn't find 33 of the 115 contract files totaling about $2.1 billion. Of the remaining 82 files, auditors said 48 contained insufficient documents required by federal law.

In another instance, the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement issued a $1 billion contract in Afghanistan that was deemed “incomplete.”

The auditor recommended that the State Department establish a centralized system to track, maintain and retain contract files.

The department responded and said it concurred with the recommendations to address the “vulnerability” in its contracting process.

Before Linick took office last fall, the State Department had been without an inspector general position for five years—the longest IG vacancy in the government’s history, as noted in The Washington Post.

Mexican Marines Kill Leader of Knights Templar Drug Cartel

Gulf News

Mexican marines killed a leader of the Knights Templar drug cartel on Monday, three weeks after the cult-like gang’s top chief was gunned down, officials said.

Enrique “Kike” Plancarte was killed in the state of Queretaro in central Mexico, two government officials said on condition of anonymity.

“It was in a navy operation,” one of the officials told AFP, declining to give more details because the interior ministry will make an official announcement on Tuesday.

Plancarte, 43, was considered one of the top four leaders of the Knights Templar gang, which is based in the western state of Michoacan and has been under pressure from government and vigilante forces for several months.

Mexican media reported that Plancarte was killed by marines after resisting arrest near a football field in the town of Colon following an operation that involved around 150-200 troops.

The interior ministry said on Twitter that authorities were verifying Plancarte’s identity and that more information would be given on Tuesday.

Officials said this was standard procedure. The national daily Reforma said navy sources confirmed Plancarte was killed.

His death comes after Knights Templar founder Nazario Moreno, alias “El Chayo,” was killed by troops in Michoacan on March 9.

Moreno had been mistakenly reported killed in December 2010, leaving fellow leader Servando “La Tuta” Gomez as the public face of the cartel.

Gomez, a former school teacher, remains at large.

Plancarte’s uncle Dionicio, who was also a key leader of the gang, was detained in January.

Vigilante militias that formed a year ago to kick the cartel out of Michoacan towns had named Plancarte as one of the top Knights Templar leaders that they wanted to see taken down.

Mexican authorities had offered a $750,000 (Dh2.7 million) reward for information leading to his capture, with prosecutors accusing him of being one of the main traffickers of drugs to the United States. He was also on a US Treasury list of drug lords under sanctions.

The Knights Templar are considered major smugglers of crystal meth to the United States, but their business has expanded to include illegal mining of iron ore for export to China.

The gang held sway across Michoacan’s agricultural Tierra Caliente (Hot Country) region, but farmers began to take up arms in February 2013, fed up with the police’s inability or unwillingness to curb the cartel.

The vigilantes kicked the cartel out of some 20 towns and allied themselves with federal forces in January, but the so-called “self-defence” militias have faced trouble with the law.

Earlier on Monday, authorities accused a vigilante leader of ordering the murder of a mayor who opposed the self-defence forces.

Enrique Hernandez Salcedo was among 19 people detained in connection with the murder of Tanhuato Mayor Gustavo Garibay Garcia.

It was the second arrest of a vigilante leader in recent weeks.

Earlier in March, authorities arrested one of the most high-profile self-defence leaders, Hipolito Mora, on charges of being behind the March 8 double murder of two fellow vigilantes.

Mora, a lime grower from the town of La Ruana, has declared his innocence.

Drug routes expanding in Asian region

ANN

Drug syndicates are expanding regionally, hence countries should hold discussions with each other to tackle drug-related issues, said Singapore’s Central Narcotics Bureau Director Ng Ser Long on Wednesday.

“One of the big trends we have seen in the past, is the movement of drugs from the Golden Triangle to other parts of the world. Now we are seeing drugs from other parts of the world moving to our (Asean) region,” he told The Brunei Times.

Ng led a six-member delegation from Singapore to Brunei for the 6th Bilateral Meeting between Brunei’s Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) and Singapore’s Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB).

Ng believes the drug movement trend is a reflection of the region’s economic growth.

“Countries in the region are doing well, their economies are growing, therefore there is larger consumption. So in some way, you see drug movement increasing in the region. The way forward for all of us is good cooperation and sharing of intelligence,” he said.

“At one point, we were all worried about a certain African drug gang making use of local ladies as drug mules/couriers. Three countries (Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia) organised joint operations and shared intelligence, and through that, we managed to bring them (the gang) down,” he said.

Brunei and Singapore have a long history of bilateral cooperation.

The CNB team also visited Al-Islah Rehabilitation Centre in Kg Kupang, Tutong, which began operations on Feb 1, 2010.

The director lauded the centre’s success, and said that knowledge gained from their visit will be used to increase their own standards of quality.

NCB Director Hj Jasmin Hj Jamudin described the working visit as beneficial for both parties, noting the CNB’s legal and investigative aspects as key areas of interest for Brunei.

“Brunei and Singapore share similarities in our approaches and practises in curbing drug abuse. We are also looking forward to implementing some of the new technology used by Singapore (such as using hair to test for drug abuse),” he said.

Concerns over border control at immigration posts was also among the issue brought up during the meeting.

Peru's Top Indigenous Leader Says Industry, Traffickers Behind Shaman Slayings

Shaman Wilson showing plants used in preparing a 

'pusanga' in Peru, September, 2009.(Photo: Howard G Charing)

Truthout

Darrin Mortenson

Iquitos, Peru - It's been more than one month since Peru's government sent investigators to the Amazon to probe the brutal murders and mutilation of at least 14 shamans, traditional healers or medicos, of the indigenous Shawi people of Peru's northern border region near Ecuador.

Since then, the government has remained mum and, so far, has made no arrests, or at least has not made any known. Early reports focused on the Evangelical Christian mayor of the river port town of Balsapuerto, citing officials who accused him of instigating a fanatical religious purge.

But Alberto Pizango, Peru's top indigenous leader and president of the country's most powerful indigenous organization, the Interethnic Development Association of the Peruvian Rainforest (known by its Spanish acronym, AIDESEP) paints a more complex picture of the case, blaming cash and pressure from legal and illegal industries in the Amazon who poach natural resources from indigenous lands.

"What is happening now in my community is organized crime," said Pizango, himself a Shawi medico who studied for seven years under a master shaman.

"This work, I would say, is done in a very subtle way by the extractive industries," Pizango said, naming the timber and oil industries as well as those involved in producing illegal drugs.

"Divide and conquer," he said. "That is exactly what is happening here."

Masking Ambition

Pizango explained that Shawi tradition used to allow certain shamans, often ones who had quit their apprenticeships and used their powers for "bad things," to be killed or banished by others in the community. Now, he said, a "bad interpretation" of that tradition has been used to cover up corruption and greed.

"The criminals accuse someone, [they say], "He is a brujo! He is evil! He was killed because he was evil!" Pizango said. "That was ancestral justice," he said. "But now it is just organized crime." 

Original reports cited public prosecutors from the nearby port of Yurimaguas who specifically named Balsapuerto mayor Alfredo Torres and his brother Augusto, also known locally as a matabrujos or "witch killer," as suspects in at least some of the murders. One early report said at least seven additional shamans were still missing from Shawi territory and listed as dead by local officials of the Catholic Church - making it more than 20 shamans killed in the region in less than two years.

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U.S. Agents Launder Mexican Profits of Drug Cartels

Josue Gonzalez/ReutersA crime scene in Monterrey, Mexico, last week. 

Drug-related violence has claimed the lives of more than 40,000 people since 

late 2006, Mexican officials say.

New York Times

WASHINGTON — Undercover American narcotics agents have laundered or smuggled millions of dollars in drug proceeds as part of Washington’s expanding role in Mexico’s fight against drug cartels, according to current and former federal law enforcement officials.

The agents, primarily with the Drug Enforcement Administration, have handled shipments of hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal cash across borders, those officials said, to identify how criminal organizations move their money, where they keep their assets and, most important, who their leaders are. 

They said agents had deposited the drug proceeds in accounts designated by traffickers, or in shell accounts set up by agents. 

The officials said that while the D.E.A. conducted such operations in other countries, it began doing so in Mexico only in the past few years. The high-risk activities raise delicate questions about the agency’s effectiveness in bringing down drug kingpins, underscore diplomatic concerns about Mexican sovereignty, and blur the line between surveillance and facilitating crime. As it launders drug money, the agency often allows cartels to continue their operations over months or even years before making seizures or arrests. 

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Drug Cartel Murders Another Blogger

ReadWriteWeb

Rascatripas, a blogger and moderator of the site Nuevo Laredo En Vivo, was murdered by the drug gang Las Zetas. His body was hung from the same overpass where two other bloggers were murdered last month. According to the Houston Chronicle, a sign hung with his body said, in Spanish, "This happened to me for not understanding that I shouldn't report on the social networks."

 

One of the two bloggers murdered earlier, Elizabeth Macias, also wrote on the social media site Nuevo Laredo En Vivo.

In response to the alleged abduction of an Anonymous-allied Mexican hacker, that group declared war this month on Las Zetas under the code name Opcartel.

Other members of Anonymous denied there was any such action, saying it was much too dangerous and pursuing it would be irresponsible. It seems in retrospect that it was aborted.

One other casualty seems to be Barrett Brown, the representative of Anonymous for Opcartel. 

He has fled his Dallas home, asking for a ticket to Boston or New York. The ticket was provided by members of #OccupyDC, according to Gawker.

Although there is no evidence that the murder of Rascatripas is related to Opcartel or Anonymous directly, it is certainly a function of the same unchecked murderous strategy the cartels have used to take over significant stretches of Mexico for their own. They have frightened, bribed or otherwise suborned traditional media and law enforcement. (The latter have even arrested Twitter users for tweeting a cartel rumor.) What's left are the bloggers and other users of social media, as Andres Monroy-Hernandez explained here in September.

Despite the vicious tactics of the cartels, Twitter and other social media tools were employed in the aftermath of the murder to communicate the news.

A post on Nuevo Laredo En Vivo after the murder was reported stated defiantly:

"Let's continue denouncing them, now that we've seen it burns them, hurts them... We have to continue. We can't give in."

UPDATE: Eva Galperin of the Electronic Frontier Foundation left a comment on my G+ post.

"The Nuevo Laredo en Vivo twitter account has a tweet in which they deny that the murder victim was one of their moderators. If that is the case, it is no less terrifying, but it does remind us to approach initial reports with skepticism."

"It could also be, that they do not want to be associated with the dead blogger," I noted. "That would be sad, if understandable."

Please note, I have no evidence aside from the Chronicle report attaching the victim to the website.

ATF apparently ordered one of its own agents to purchase firearms with taxpayer money, and sell them directly to a Mexican drug cartel

New York Post

This just might be the smoking gun we’ve been waiting for to break the festering “Fast and Furious” gun-running scandal wide open: the Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives apparently ordered one of its own agents to purchase firearms with taxpayer money, and sell them directly to a Mexican drug cartel.

Let that sink in: After months of pretending that “Fast and Furious” was a botched surveillance operation of illegal gun-running spearheaded by the ATF and the US attorney’s office in Phoenix, it turns out that the government itself was selling guns to the bad guys.

Agent John Dodson was ordered to buy four Draco pistols for cash and even got a letter from his supervisor, David Voth, authorizing a federally licensed gun dealer to sell him the guns without bothering about the necessary paperwork.

“Please accept this letter in lieu of completing an ATF Form 4473 for the purchase of four (4) CAI, Model Draco, 7.62x39 mm pistols, by Special Agent John Dodson,” read the June 1, 2010, letter. “These aforementioned pistols will be used by Special Agent Dodson in furtherance of performance of his official duties.”

On orders, Dodson then sold the guns to known criminals, who first stashed them away and then -- deliberately unhindered by the ATF or any other agency -- whisked them off to Mexico.

People were killed with Fast and Furious weapons, including at least two American agents and hundreds of Mexicans. And the taxpayers picked up the bill.

So where’s the outrage?

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U.S. soldiers dangerously over-medicated with antipsychotic drugs

Natural News

As if American soldiers sent to fight America's undeclared wars in Iraq and Afghanistan haven't suffered enough, now it turns out many are being prescribed powerful, side-effect laden drugs to treat their post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). These Big Pharma mind altering concoctions are ineffective and can be downright dangerous.

Multiple studies show around 30 percent of Americans soldiers who have served in combat now suffer from PTSD. It's not surprising when you consider these facts. Imagine being so young you might still be called a "kid" by some. Only you are a soldier and instead of going to college classes and rock concerts you are watching friends your age die (about 20 percent of those killed in the U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan are between 18 and 21).

You may also be killing people yourself out of self-defense, and sometimes by mistake. Even more traumatizing, you may have witnessed your fellow soldiers torture and kill civilians. Although it is often considered "unpatriotic" to even suggest such possibilities, even the U.S. Pentagon has officially apologized about American soldiers forming a so-called "death squad" to randomly murder Afghan civilians, mutilate their corpses, and keep their body parts as trophies.

PTSD typically occurs after someone has experienced a situation like the ones described above -- it results when a person has the severe shock of feeling their life was in danger or there was a sense of extreme hopelessness or helplessness.

The condition is characterized by re-experiencing the painful memory, trying to avoid anything that reminds them the traumatic events, and being kept in a state of hyper-arousal when reminded of the trauma. Earlier this year, research published in the JAMA Archives of General Psychiatry concluded that those who experienced post-traumatic stress disorder during combat in Iraq were also more likely to suffer longer-term health problems including depression, headaches, tinnitus, irritability and memory problems than soldiers who experienced only concussions without PTSD.

Now comes a new and disturbing study just published in JAMA (the Journal of the American Medical Association) that reveals patients with military-related, chronic PTSD are typically treated with antidepressants known as serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SRIs, such as Prozac). The drugs don't often work and doctors are now using a heavier drug -- the antipsychotic medication risperidone, also found to be ineffective.

Background information in the JAMA report notes that PTSD is among the most common and disabling psychiatric disorders among soldiers who have faced combat and according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), almost 90 percent of veterans diagnosed with PTSD are prescribed SRIs. The authors of the study stated that an SRI study in veterans produced negative results so antipsychotics (SGAs) are now commonly used medications for PTSD symptoms "despite limited evidence supporting this practice."

In other words, without data showing this is a good, reasonable way to treat PTSD, doctors are routinely drugging tens of thousands of U.S veterans with these mind altering drugs. [...]

Ten Years Ago Portugal Legalized All Drugs -- What Happened Next?

Alternet

The government in Portugal has no plans to back down. Although the Netherlands is the European country most associated with liberal drug laws, it has already been ten years since Portugal became the first European nation to take the brave step of decriminalizing possession of all drugs within its borders - from marijuana to heroin, and everything in between. This controversial move went into effect in June of 2001, in response to the country's spiraling HIV/AIDS statistics. While many critics in the poor and largely conservative country attacked the sea change in drug policy, fearing it would lead to drug tourism while simultaneously worsening the country's already shockingly high rate of hard drug use, a report published in 2009 by the Cato Institute tells a different story. Glenn Greenwald, the attorney and author who conducted the research, told Time: "Judging by every metric, drug decriminalization in Portugal has been a resounding success. It has enabled the Portuguese government to manage and control the drug problem far better than virtually every other Western country."

Back in 2001, Portugal had the highest rate of HIV among injecting drug users in the European Union - an incredible 2,000 new cases a year, in a country with a population of just 10 million. Despite the predictable controversy the move stirred up at home and abroad, the Portuguese government felt there was no other way they could effectively quell this ballooning problem. While here in the U.S. calls for full drug decriminalization are still dismissed as something of a fringe concern, the Portuguese decided to do it, and have been quietly getting on with it now for a decade. Surprisingly, most credible reports appear to show that decriminalization has been a staggering success. [...]

Mephedrone, or 'meow meow', as popular as cocaine, drugs survey says

Guardian

Former legal high used by 4.4% of all people aged between 16 and 24, as use of illegal drugs in decline long-term 

 
Mephedrone, the former legal high known as "meow meow", is as popular as cocaine among teenagers and young adults despite being banned last year, according to official figures. Home Office figures drawn from the authoritative British Crime Survey estimate that around 300,000 16 to 24-year-olds, or 4.4% of their age group, used mephedrone in the past 12 months. This is a similar level of popularity to the use of powder cocaine by teenagers and young adults. The BCS survey, drug misuse declared 2010/2011, say that mephedrone and cocaine rank joint second in popularity behind cannabis for this age group. Mephedrone ranks alongside ecstasy in popularity among all drug users aged between 16 and 59, with 1.4% of all adults reporting they had used them in the past year. The results of the annual survey of drug use in England and Wales show that almost 3 million people (8.8% of adults) used illicit drugs in the past year. They also show that one million of them – or 3% – used class-A drugs, with a fall in the use of cocaine accompanied by a rise in the use of methadone. Around 2.2 million people aged 16 to 59 used cannabis last year and the survey also indicates a rise in popularity in ketamine in recent years. The use of illegal drugs among the younger age group of 16 to 24 has, however, undergone a long-term decline, from 29% of the age group reporting they had used an illicit drug in 1996 to 20% in 2010/2011. Home Office minister, James Brokenshire, denied that the alarming figures for the use of mephedrone, which was made illegal in April 2010, demonstrated that the ban had been ineffective. He said the BCS figures covered patterns of use before and after the ban had come into force. He stressed that just because a drug had been sold as a legal high it did not mean it was harmless. But the interviews undertaken by the BCS for this year's report would have took place between April 2010 and March this year. Respondents were however asked about their illicit drug use in the previous 12 months, and so could have related to the period when mephedrone was a legal high.

Should we be popping the "Limitless" pill?

salon.com

The movie "Limitless," which came out on DVD last week, presents a potential future fueled by designer drugs. When we meet the film's protagonist Eddie Mora (Bradley Cooper), he's a divorced, disheveled, socially awkward writer who can't even come up with the first words of his novel. After getting dumped by his girlfriend, Mora runs into his drug-dealing ex-brother-in-law who offers Eddie a solution in the form of a little round pill. Within minutes, the drug transforms Eddie into a brilliant, creative, driven alpha male who quickly and effortlessly completes his long-stalled book.

"Enhanced Eddie" then acquires a stash of these pills and, in rapid succession, cleans himself up, learns Italian, wins back his ex-girlfriend and becomes a celebrity investment banker.

The film's "miracle" drug may seem far-fetched, but it's based in a medical reality: Taking certain medications, specifically those developed to treat psychiatric and neurological disorders, can boost cognitive performance in otherwise healthy people.

Many of us instinctively recoil from such an idea for moral reasons. Sculpting our brains, unlike, say, sculpting our noses, seems like cheating. But consider this: 7 percent of surveyed college students (and some 25 percent of those on elite campuses) have taken an unprescribed Ritalin -- or a similar drug used to treat attention deficit disorder -- to boost their performance on an exam.

And the phenomenon is not restricted to college students trying to raise their grade point averages: The military has a history of encouraging -- and sometimes even ordering -- soldiers to take Ritalin or Provigil, a drug that boosts alertness. Canadian researchers are now looking at a drug called metyrapone that may help dull the sting of painful memories. Already common is the number of executives who swallow a little dose of Propranolol -- which is normally used to treat high blood pressure but has also been prescribed for performance anxiety for many years -- to calm their nerves before they speak. And with so many of us already hustling to Starbucks morning, noon and night for shots of caffeine to keep us going, the question arises: Is there a case to be made for cognitive enhancement? [...]

Pharmageddon: Prescription drugs are killing America's youth

naturalnews.com

No parent wants to lose a child, but when one dies from something that should be very preventable, the heartbreak and tragedy is compounded. Such is increasingly the case with prescription drugs - they're killing our youth.

Sarah Shay and Savannah Kissick, of Morehead, Ky., best friends since high school, were both victims of what experts and the White House are describing as an epidemic of prescription drug deaths. Sarah died in 2006 at the tender age of 19; Savannah just three years later, at 22.

Since the medications they were using were prescribed by physicians, some experts believe they carry some sort of legitimacy. But the fact is they are being abused by young people just the same as drugs that are illegal - more so even, in some cases.

"I don't think the kids have any idea how addicting the substance is," Karen Shays told the BBC in an interview. "Before they know it, bam! They're addicted."

Drugs like Xanax, Oxycodone, Klonopin and Hydrocodone are routinely being abused more and more in Kentucky in particular, but in other parts of the nation too, by teenagers and young adults. So bad is the problem that the state has set up rehabilitation centers, where a huge number of addicts - more all the time - are being treated.

So bad is the addition that some kids have even turned to crime to feed it.

Some of the kids say they could have likely found other drugs to feed their habit, but prescription drugs were not only legal but much easier to get.

All in all, it's sort of like Armageddon, but with prescription drugs - a sort of "Pharmageddon," if you will, as evidenced by Kentucky's overflowing jails, say state officials. [...]

If Crime Is Organized, then Why Not Us?

narconews.com/

Sicilia: “We Are Taking the First Steps in this Great Crusade to Dignify Our Country”

Before the Caravan of Solace, many of the families who had lost their own to the war on drugs remembered them in the privacy of their living rooms. They lived below a yoke of fear imposed by the government’s criminalization of the victims and they didn’t dare raise their voices in a cry for justice. Now, as a result of the caravan, many know each other and recognize each other. They dare to go out into the street and say that their son, daughter, husband, wife, father or mother was not a criminal. Families that beforehand did not know each other began to share their pain, hugging each other, in the street, to appeal for justice, peace and dignity.

Maria Elena Herrera Magdalene holding a Chihuahua sign with photographs of her 4 children and two relatives missing. DR 2011 Marta Molina.

The recognition between them, the sharing of stories of life and death, the pain and solace, the love, the desires for justice, helped them to dignify the names of their fallen family members, friends and neighbors. This is what unites María Elena Herrera Magdalena of Morelia, Michoacán, whose four children were disappeared, with the parents of Juan Martín Ayala and of Sarahy Méndez Salazar, murdered in San Luís Potosí. This is what joins María América Nava of Ecatepec, in the state of Mexico, whose brother, a community organizer, was assassinated, in a hug with Nepomuceno Moreno, from Sonora, who joined the caravan to continue seeking justice for his son. Estela Ángeles Mondragón, of the Rarámuri, (also known as Tarahumara) indigenous community, shares with them the constant pilgrimage she makes from the mountains to the courtrooms to claim justice for her daughter, gunned down, and her assassinated husband.

Gloria Aguilar Hernández came out to denounce the disappearance of her husband and children and embraced Melchor Flores Landa, father of the performance artist known as the Galactic Cowboy, who had wanted to work in Barcelona as a street statue in Las Ramblas in his costume as a silver cowboy. The father of college student Gabi Pineda of Monterrey shared his pain with Soledad Marina, of Ciudad Juárez, where they killed her son, a graffiti artist.

All the victims that have found their voice during the caravan united with each other in this constant act of “making a path,” as Estela calls it in Tarahumara, “bohuerasa.” Each of them found their voice to each other they joined, with banners, photographs, names, tears and hugs: the family members of the victims of this war. [...]

The Hidden Wisdom Within Addiction

awakeninthenow.com/ via serendipity

I’ve had a number of people in my life who have struggled with various forms of substance addiction. I myself have struggled with it at different times in my life. One of the most significant qualities of substance addiction is the obsessive desire to consume the substance of choice and the longing to change one’s state of consciousness. There is a consistent feeling of aversion to the usual state of consciousness which can involve painful emotions the addict has suppressed and is not prepared to deal with, often related to unresolved past trauma. A dissatisfaction with the usual state of consciousness. This is also present in people who choose to take psychoactive substances to alter their consciousness although in non-addicts there is a lesser degree of aversion to the normal state as well as the absence of the compulsive quality. Almost everyone consumes substances to alter their state of mind, consider not only alcohol, marijuana and psychedelics but also coffee, tea, sugar, etc. So there is nothing particularly unusual about this.

There is no question of the destructiveness of addiction in our society. However there is another element within this process that I’ve recently begun to explore. I’m calling this the hidden wisdom within addiction. The unwavering desire to change one’s state of consciousness out of a profound dissatisfaction with the usual state can be seen as a healthy motivation and possibly as a distorted representation of a spiritual drive to realize freedom. If we consider the normal state of consciousness of the average person in our society it becomes easy to understand why people would be dissatisfied with it. Most of us live in a mind state that can be characterized as subdued madness in my view. The baseline collective consciousness is one that is based in separation/isolation, low-level fear/anxiety, low-level depression, a very limited experience of the world based on a tight set of mental filters and most importantly a disconnect from source or spirit. Is it any wonder that so many people feel such a drive to alter their state of consciousness given the limitations and stifling isolation of everyday consciousness? The desire to expand conscious experience can easily be seen as a powerful urge to grow and evolve.

Our society however does not reward or encourage expansion of consciousness and spiritual growth, in fact it often punishes it. As soon as psychedelics began to be seriously researched in the late 50s and early 60s and their potential as a healing tool was realized they were immediately criminalized. The evidence suggested further study and potentially powerful positive effects from careful intentional use in a wide variety of contexts from the treatment of mental health issues to their use as a spiritual tool. We are conditioned into limited perspectives and beliefs about our world and how life should be lived and most of us to some degree buy into these limitations. Psychoactive substances temporarily dissolve these limitations but they are an imperfect solution because their effects cannot be maintained without continuous or repeated consumption. However they provide a window or a glimpse of other states of consciousness and a reminder that our usual state is only one possible perspective. If the desire behind addiction can be channeled into a spiritual path that is uniquely tailored for the individual’s needs and personality that desire will have another outlet besides addictive use of substances or other behaviors. For many this spiritual alternative may include mind altering substances used with a different intention than what we find in an addictive context. The intention of truly achieving personal freedom rather than escaping from unpleasant experience.

The value of seeing this aspect of addiction is not to condone the destructiveness of it, rather it is to see that there can be a positive underlying motivation that is needing expression. This helps to let go of judgment, blame and shame which are the truly enabling aspects of addiction. If we can see the that there is a wisdom that is trying to be expressed through it we can approach it in a creative way that aims to redirect the expression rather than forcefully stop it out of judgment. It is a common aspect of addiction that when people forcefully stop their addictive use of a substance, the addictive behavior is often transferred to another substance or behavior. It cannot be stopped but it can be transformed. Transformation is only possible with acceptance however. With acceptance the inner battle ceases and we have many more options open to us to grow in a creative way. The prevalence of addiction and the use of psychiatric drugs in our society suggests that we as a society are screaming for true paths to freedom and growth. Those path are available if we can open our minds to what is possible and if we have the courage to face our inner demons.

Call off the global drug war

startribune

In an extraordinary new initiative announced earlier this month, the Global Commission on Drug Policy has made some courageous and profoundly important recommendations in a report on how to bring more effective control over the illicit drug trade.

The commission includes the former presidents or prime ministers of five countries, a former secretary general of the United Nations, human rights leaders, and business and government leaders, including Richard Branson, George P. Shultz and Paul A. Volcker.

The report describes the total failure of the present global antidrug effort, and in particular America's "war on drugs," which was declared 40 years ago today. It notes that the global consumption of opiates has increased 34.5 percent, cocaine 27 percent and cannabis 8.5 percent from 1998 to 2008.

Its primary recommendations are to substitute treatment for imprisonment for people who use drugs but do no harm to others, and to concentrate more coordinated international effort on combating violent criminal organizations rather than nonviolent, low-level offenders.
 These recommendations are compatible with U.S. drug policy from three decades ago. In a message to Congress in 1977, I said the country should decriminalize the possession of less than an ounce of marijuana, with a full program of treatment for addicts.

I also cautioned against filling our prisons with young people who were no threat to society, and summarized by saying: "Penalties against possession of a drug should not be more damaging to an individual than the use of the drug itself."

These ideas were widely accepted at the time. But in the 1980s President Ronald Reagan and Congress began to shift from balanced drug policies, including the treatment and rehabilitation of addicts, toward futile efforts to control drug imports from foreign countries.
 This approach entailed an enormous expenditure of resources and the dependence on police and military forces to reduce the foreign cultivation of marijuana, coca and opium poppy and the production of cocaine and heroin. One result has been a terrible escalation in drug-related violence, corruption and gross violations of human rights in a growing number of Latin American countries.

 The commission's facts and arguments are persuasive. It recommends that governments be encouraged to experiment "with models of legal regulation of drugs ... that are designed to undermine the power of organized crime and safeguard the health and security of their citizens." For effective examples, they can look to policies that have shown promising results in Europe, Australia and other places.

 But they probably won't turn to the U.S. for advice. Drug policies here are more punitive and counterproductive than in other democracies, and have brought about an explosion in prison populations. At the end of 1980, just before I left office, 500,000 people were incarcerated in America; at the end of 2009 the number was nearly 2.3 million.

 There are 743 people in prison for every 100,000 Americans, a higher portion than in any other country and seven times as great as in Europe. Some 7.2 million people are either in prison or on probation or parole — more than 3 percent of all American adults!

Some of this increase has been caused by mandatory minimum sentencing and "three strikes you're out" laws. But about three-quarters of new admissions to state prisons are for nonviolent crimes.

 And the single greatest cause of prison population growth has been the war on drugs, with the number of people incarcerated for nonviolent drug offenses increasing more than twelvefold since 1980.

 Not only has this excessive punishment destroyed the lives of millions of young people and their families (disproportionately minorities), but it is wreaking havoc on state and local budgets. Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger pointed out that, in 1980, 10 percent of his state's budget went to higher education and 3 percent to prisons; in 2010, almost 11 percent went to prisons and only 7.5 percent to higher education.

Maybe the increased tax burden on wealthy citizens necessary to pay for the war on drugs will help to bring about a reform of America's drug policies. At least the recommendations of the Global Commission will give some cover to political leaders who wish to do what is right.

A few years ago I worked side by side for four months with a group of prison inmates, who were learning the building trade, to renovate some public buildings in my hometown of Plains, Ga. They were intelligent and dedicated young men, each preparing for a productive life after the completion of his sentence. More than half of them were in prison for drug-related crimes, and would have been better off in college or trade school.

To help such men remain valuable members of society, and to make drug policies more humane and more effective, the American government should support and enact the reforms laid out by the Global Commission on Drug Policy.

Mind Games: Are Cyberspace and Psychiatric Drugs Messing with Our Heads?

 

alternet.org/

 

We rely more and more on psychiatric drugs to keep us level and technology to keep us informed. But over-reliance could be changing our very reality.
 

At least 10 percent of all Americans over six-years-old are currently on antidepressants. That’s more than 35 million people, double the number from 15 years ago. Meanwhile, anti-psychotics have eclipsed cholesterol treatments as the country’s fastest selling and most profitable drugs, even though half the prescriptions treat disorders for which they haven’t been proven effective. At least 5 million children and adolescents use them, in part because more kids are being diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

So, are a growing number of people experiencing psychological troubles? Have we just become better at recognizing them? Or is some other dynamic at work.

One possibility is that the criteria for what constitutes a mental illness or disability may have expanded to the point that a vast number appear to have clinical problems. But there’s an even more insidious development: the drugs being used to treat many of the new diagnoses could cause long-term effects that persist after the original trouble has been resolved. That’s the case made by Robert Whitaker in his new book, Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America.

Speaking of long-term impacts on the brain, we’re also heading toward a world where humans are directly linked with computers that profoundly influence their perceptions and ideas. Despite many potential benefits, there is danger here as well. Rather than simply augmenting our memories by providing neutral information, the brain-computer connection may lead people into separate realities based on their assumptions and politics.

Brain-altering drugs and digital “indoctrination” – a potent combination. Together, they pose a potential threat not only to the stability of many individuals but of society itself. Seduced by the promise that our brains can be managed and enhanced without serious side-effects, we may be creating a future where psychological dysfunction becomes a post-modern plague and powerful forces use cyberspace to reshape “reality” in their private interest.

Do prescription drugs create new mental problems? And if so, how could it be happening? For Whitaker the answer lies in the effects of drugs on neurotransmitters, a process he calls negative feedback. When a drug blocks neurotransmitters or increases the level of serotonin, for instance, neurons initially attempt to counteract the effects. When the drug is used over a long period, however, it can produce “substantial and long-lasting alterations in neural function,” says Steven Hyman, former director of the National Institutes of Mental Health. The brain begins to function differently. Its ability to compensate starts to fail and side effects created by the drug emerge.

What comes next? More drugs and, along with them, new side effects, an evolving chemical mixture often accompanied by a revised diagnosis. According to Marcia Angell, former editor of The New England Journal of Medicine, it can go this way: use of an antidepressant leads to mania, which leads to a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, which leads to the prescription of mood stabilizers. Through such a process people can end up taking several drugs daily for many years.

What may happen after that is deeply troubling. Researcher Nancy Andreasen claims the brain begins to shrink, an effect she links directly to dosage and duration. “The prefrontal cortex doesn’t get the input it needs and is being shut down by drugs,” she has explained in The New York Times. “That reduces the psychotic symptoms.” But the pre-frontal cortex gradually atrophies. [...]

Mexico: Impunity and profits (video)

 aljazeera.net/

Once known as a booming industrial city and a model of economic progress in Mexico, the border city of Juarez has become infamous as the murder capital of the world. More than 8,000 people have been killed there since 2008, when Mexican President Felipe Calderon sent in the army to carry out his offensive against the drug cartels.

The official story is that the Sinaloa and Juarez cartels are fighting for the city and the access it provides to the multi-billion dollar US drug market only a few hundred metres away.

On this episode of Fault Lines, Josh Rushing travels to Ciudad Juarez, and asks how human life there came to be worth so much less than the drugs being trafficked through.

Fault Lines airs each week at the following times GMT: Monday: 2230; Tuesday: 0930; Wednesday: 0330; Thursday: 1630.

Click here for more Fault Lines.