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Simplepowa
In Pursuit of Knowledge


Registered: 03/06/09
Posts: 4,310
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Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies 1
#18980742 - 10/15/13 10:25 AM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Drugs AlterNet / By April M. Short
Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies The DEA is a failed institution. October 6, 2013 |
The GOP House's temper-tantrum-induced shutdown of the U.S. government can be called many things—an extortion, a frustration, an outrage... name your unflattering descriptor. But if it does anything of use for the American people, it serves up an inarguable indication of the government’s true priorities. It shows us, verbatim, which programs are deemed “essential” and which aren't.
For instance, the national parks and almost a million federal employees have been cutoff, while the military continues to operate full-force.
And while the injustices of the shutdown are many, among the most hypocritical government priorities is the continued funding of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
Bill Piper, director of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA)—an organization focused on ending the war on drugs—sent an email to supporters on Friday asking why the DEA was considered essential during the government shutdown.
“You and I both know the DEA isn’t effective,” he wrote. “So why is it considered essential?”
A very good question considering the fact that, even if fighting the war on drugs was reasonable priority to maintain during a shutdown (it isn't) the DEA has long since lost the war. Since its inception in 1973, it has failed to reduce the number of drug-related crimes in the U.S., and continues to place more than 1.2 million people behind bars each year for the mere possession of illegal substances.
As a report last week by the British Medical Journal Open declared, the war on drugs has failed—not just in America but around the globe. The report shows how, despite decades of 'war on drugs' efforts, the potency of illegal drugs has increased, prices have dropped, and the number of users is on the rise.
Even U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder appears to be humming a tune contrary to that of the drug war, as he announced in August the Department of Justice will stay out of the way when it comes to the state-regulated legalization of marijuana.
The DPA’s email called for supporters to sign a petition urging Congress to defund the DEA once and for all.
“The DEA is one of the biggest obstacles standing in the way of marijuana law reform and ending the drug war,” the email notes. “It blatantly lies about marijuana and other drugs while blocking and ignoring scientific research. It relies on dishonesty and scare tactics to promote its vested interests. It undermines the will of voters in medical marijuana states with militarized raids that have resulted in the deaths of innocent people. And it’s been secretly using NSA and CIA programs to spy on virtually all Americans.”
April M. Short is an associate editor at AlterNet.
http://www.alternet.org/drugs/why-didnt-shutdown-cut-funding-dea-its-one-least-essential-govt-agencies
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Carl Sagan - "Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people." --- Robert Pirsig - "When one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion." --- Brian Cox - "[One] problem with today’s world is that everyone believes they have the right to express their opinion AND have others listen to it. The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion, but crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense."
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badchad
Mad Scientist

Registered: 03/02/05
Posts: 13,373
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: Simplepowa]
#18980756 - 10/15/13 10:29 AM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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It's probably a much simpler answer: Because the DEA has external sources of funding.
-------------------- ...the whole experience is (and is as) a profound piece of knowledge. It is an indellible experience; it is forever known. I have known myself in a way I doubt I would have ever occurred except as it did. Smith, P. Bull. Menninger Clinic (1959) 23:20-27; p. 27. ...most subjects find the experience valuable, some find it frightening, and many say that is it uniquely lovely. Osmond, H. Annals, NY Acad Science (1957) 66:418-434; p.436
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Repertoire89
Cat



Registered: 11/15/12
Posts: 21,773
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: badchad]
#18980765 - 10/15/13 10:30 AM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
badchad said: It's probably a much simpler answer: Because the DEA has external sources of funding.
Those sources including the money they steal from business men
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thirtygoats

Registered: 12/29/11
Posts: 1,991
Last seen: 4 days, 10 hours
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: Simplepowa]
#18981004 - 10/15/13 11:42 AM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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The shutdown is just another way for them to steal from the people, as is obamacare and DEA. Theives.
-------------------- No one knows who I am. Therefore, I am not anyone.
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BIGS
Connoisseur

Registered: 01/29/12
Posts: 475
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: Repertoire89]
#18981211 - 10/15/13 12:51 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
Repertoire89 said:
Quote:
badchad said: It's probably a much simpler answer: Because the DEA has external sources of funding.
Those sources including the money they steal from business men
External sources like selling Ammo and guns to our enemies and running drugs for big cartels. DEA is the biggest Scam of all time.
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luvdemshrooms
Two inch dick..but it spins!?


Registered: 11/29/01
Posts: 34,247
Loc: Lost In Space
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: Simplepowa] 2
#18981235 - 10/15/13 12:58 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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The DEA isn't actually about drugs. It's about control.
-------------------- You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers
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wildernessjunkie
Reshitivest



Registered: 06/13/10
Posts: 8,118
Loc: HTTP 404 Not Found
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: luvdemshrooms]
#18981605 - 10/15/13 02:33 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
luvdemshrooms said: The DEA isn't actually about drugs. It's about control.
This.
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FleshCap
FleshCap



Registered: 11/10/08
Posts: 685
Loc: Cali Underground
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: wildernessjunkie]
#18981974 - 10/15/13 04:05 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Essentialness is in the eye of the beholder.
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Rockhound
The Rockweiler



Registered: 01/19/13
Posts: 664
Loc: hell creek anticline
Last seen: 8 years, 8 months
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: FleshCap]
#18983106 - 10/15/13 08:05 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Everybody pause for a minute and read this: The USPS funds itself. The United States Postal Service has delivered all U.S. domestic packages from silk road. My mail still came today, with an unexpected bonus! Neither snow, nor sleet, nor the dead of night, ect.ect.....
-------------------- Rocks speak to me, and tell me this: The Hell Creek formation is a gigantic slab of rocks that covers several western states. It contains an account of the dinosaurs' demise. In the late Cretaceous period, the first Cannabis species appear, and soon after, all the non-bird dinosaurs disappeared. Obviously, marihuana killed the dinosaurs. That giant meteor that smacked the yucatan peninsula right afterwards, coincidence.
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huffinglue
tryin to stay sober


Registered: 09/26/08
Posts: 450
Loc: Texas
Last seen: 9 years, 6 months
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Re: Why Didn't the Shutdown Cut Funding for the DEA? It's One of the Least 'Essential' Govt. Agencies [Re: Rockhound]
#18986138 - 10/16/13 01:20 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Usps doesn't totally fund itself. Its been loosing billions of dollars a year for decades.
-------------------- I fucking hate grammer nazis! Yes, I can't spell. Yes, I don't have perfect grammer. I post from my phone and dont give a shit about people whose lifes are so boring they get off on putting people down for not having perfect fucking grammer, even though they know excactly what there saying.. Fuck You. It's just a ride mang...
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