Home | Community | Message Board

Cannabis Seeds UK
This site includes paid links. Please support our sponsors.


Welcome to the Shroomery Message Board! You are experiencing a small sample of what the site has to offer. Please login or register to post messages and view our exclusive members-only content. You'll gain access to additional forums, file attachments, board customizations, encrypted private messages, and much more!

Shop: Bridgetown Botanicals Bridgetown Botanicals   Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order   Original Sensible Seeds Autoflowering Cannabis Seeds   North Spore North Spore Mushroom Grow Kits & Cultivation Supplies   MagicBag.co All-In-One Bags That Don't Suck   Kraken Kratom Kratom Capsules for Sale

Jump to first unread post Pages: 1 | 2 | Next >  [ show all ]
Offlinedokunai
Cactus, Cannabis, Cubensis

Registered: 01/31/10
Posts: 1,878
Loc: Hyphal Heights, USA
Last seen: 7 years, 1 month
Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal * 2
    #19196680 - 11/27/13 02:04 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/11/27/21578665-legalize-all-drugs-the-man-behind-loosening-pot-laws-in-us-eyes-new-goal?lite

When the ball drops this New Year’s Eve, America’s first aboveboard cannabis markets will rise in Colorado and Washington. Uruguay is expected to follow as the first country to legalize the one-time devil weed. But what unites these efforts — along with 20 states that allow marijuana as medicine — isn’t only an evolved approach to drugs. It’s one man: Ethan Nadelmann, the world’s roving prime minister of pot.

The ginger-hued, Harvard-educated son of a rabbi is a relative unknown to most Americans, but his work in the last two decades is liable to end up in their children’s history books. The 56-year-old or his organization — the Drug Policy Alliance — has authored, aided, or helped fund every progressive pot law in the Americas, from California’s breakthrough medical marijuana law in 1996 to the historic reforms going live in 2014.

“I think we’ve hit the tipping point with marijuana,” Nadelmann told a cheering, two-finger-whistling conference crowd last month in Denver. “Two states down, 48 to go, and hopefully one country down, 200 to go.”

While marijuana remains illegal under federal law, the culture is changing rapidly, and Nadelmann is poised for perhaps his most influential year yet. He’s not a pot-smoker himself, nor an evangelist for drug-taking in general, but he believes that drug policy should make users safer and not criminalize them.   

That means embracing over-the-counter sales of marijuana and accepting a boom in pot’s popularity. In August, the Justice Department allowed Colorado and Washington’s experiments in free-market pot to go forward, pledging a backseat approach, assuming certain benchmarks for control are maintained. Now, at least 11 states are considering their own legal weed laws.

“The momentum is huge,” says Nadelmann, who oversees 65 employees, offices in five states, and a $13 million dollar war chest.

A vision that goes far beyond pot

But Nadelmann has much more than just legalized weed riding on the success of Colorado and Washington. In recent speeches and a series of exchanges with NBC, he laid out a more progressive long game, a vision for drug policy reform that goes far beyond pot.

At a standing-room-only talk at Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs earlier this month, Nadelmann delivered an antic hour-long stump speech for broader legalization.

“I’m always telling my marijuana reform allies, when they say we need to legalize marijuana and get tougher on the other drugs, ‘shut the hell up,’” he said, returning to form as the Princeton professor he was before turning to drug policy two decades ago. “We don’t need to end one discrimination and prohibition to double down on another.”

“It’s absolutely pivotal,” he continued, “for building a broader movement for freedom and justice that we treat this thing as of-a-piece.”

The whole, of course, is safe and legal access to all drugs. Cocaine. Heroin. Hash. Ecstasy. You name it, Nadelmann wants people to have the right to get it, hold it, use it and even pass it in small quantities. The only country that comes close to such a program is Portugal, which in 2001 decriminalized the getting, having, and taking of a 10-day supply of any drug.

But Portugal doesn’t go far enough for Nadelmann, personally, because while it allows use, it prohibits distribution, denying people a way to get high without navigating the twilight economy of illicit dealing. He wants to move drug-users out of the criminal justice system entirely, relocating them in the realm of public health.

He often says he represents everything from decriminalization to outright legalization. While the terms are subject to scribbles and tweaks, the former usually means making drug-use a finable civil offense, akin to jaywalking only with counseling involved. The latter is Colorado and Washington — only for all drugs.   

At a minimum, Nadelmann tells NBC, “people should not be punished for possessing a small amount of any drug.” He doesn’t rule out the full-blown legalization of everything, although he remains more skeptical than some of his libertarian allies. He sees drug policy along a continuum, from “lock’em up, hang’em, pull out their fingernails, Singapore, Saudi Arabia” all the way down to “essentially no controls whatsoever, maybe a little for kids.”

Right now, he says, American drug policy is way too close to the hang’em end of the spectrum. The Obama administration has won plaudits for its “public health” approach to drug policy, including more spending on prevention and treatment. But Nadelmann says it’s mostly smoke and mirrors, an attempt to co-opt the rhetoric of reform without adopting the policies.

For Nadelmann, the fight is personal

As clear as he is about his end game, Nadelmann is still mulling the details of implementation. He calls for “legal access,” but doesn’t say whether it should be provided by doctors, delivered by mail, doled out in private cooperatives, or administered by the government, among untold options.

Last fall, when Colorado and Washington voted to regulate marijuana like alcohol, few are likely to have connected a vote for legal cannabis with a vote in the direction of legal everything. Nadelmann himself sees the campaigns as parallel public education efforts. In the pot world, he’ll fight to spread legalization. He’ll work to refine current law, lowering the age of access to 18, and clearing a job path for veterans of the black market, including felons from the old days of the drug war.

The wider push for decriminalization remains a political and social nonstarter. But the Portugal model has been deemed a public health success story in that country, and Nadelmann is hard to doubt in this one. He looks like a surf board in profile with fading hair and a spring caterpillar of a mustache. But he’s a captivating stage performer, a sharp elbowed political operator, and a peerless egghead. With a resume that includes three Harvard degrees (B.A., J.D., Ph.D.), a consulting jag at the State Department and seven years as a professor of politics and public affairs Princeton, he’s also impossible to tar as a mere activist.

But make no mistake: this fight is personal for Nadelmann.

His father escaped the Nazis and his grandfather did not, and what he sees as the persecution of responsible drug users pricks his Jewish consciousness. He recognizes a similar “demonization of a minority,” he says, the same “great fear” of being forced to live like the rest of society or face destruction.

Growing up he wanted to be a policeman on horseback, an artist and then a professor, which he became and might have stayed if not for President Ronald Reagan’s War on Drugs — when Congress considered sending users to a remote prison in Alaska and the drug czar argued that “marijuana leads to homosexuality, the breakdown of the immune system, and therefore to AIDS.”

'The problem here is prohibition'

One day in June 1987, Nadelmann found himself on a drug policy panel at Bolling Air Force Base in Washington, D.C., sitting with the head of enforcement at the FBI and some other Reagan hands, and he flipped.

“Look, let’s face it,” he remembers saying. “The problem here is prohibition. You’re essentially no different from the Prohibition agents of the 1920s.”

Most of Nadelmann’s debate points are standard issue: Prohibition is bad, and drugs are here to stay, so let’s focus on harm reduction. But he plants his flag in the highest possible ground, consistently making grander, more fantastic connections. He ties decriminalization to “freedom of consciousness,” and then to same-sex marriage and abortion rights, and ultimately to the rights of the First Amendment.

“If you look at the fears about broader legalization,” he says, “the fears are almost identical to the fears that were expressed by authority figures and others if you were allowed freedom of speech two hundred years ago.”  Other times he compares drug hysteria to the fears of letting women vote, or abolishing slavery. For Nadelmann, the right to take drugs isn’t a fringe issue for the party set but the issue beneath all others — and now, more and more, the issue is connecting with a big tent of reformers.

Many of them seemed to be in the audience of his Princeton talk, where a woman in pearls sat next to a man with a tie-dye beard. In the days that followed, Nadelmann traveled to Atlanta, where he strategized with former President Jimmy Carter, lectured at Emory’s School of Public Health, advised the governor’s office, addressed a theological school and pitched cable ideas to Sanjay Gupta at CNN.

“We’re the people who love drugs, the people who hate drugs and the people who don’t give a damn about drugs,” Nadelmann likes to say of his movement. These days, however, he always comes back to his continuum of drug policies, directing people to the sliver between decriminalization and outright legalization. That’s Nadelmann’s sweet spot.

With every sale of cannabis in Colorado and Washington that sweet spot will grow, pushing America toward Portugal, if the new markets work, or dragging it back toward Singapore and Saudi Arabia, if the new markets fail.

“I’ll know I’ve succeeded,” says Nadelmann, the day the debate between decriminalization and legalization becomes the national debate, “and I’ll look forward to stepping back and watching all my allies take out their knives and fight with each other over the details.”


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleSociety
Mmmm... pizza
 User Gallery


Registered: 07/03/04
Posts: 14,300
Loc: Flag
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: dokunai] * 3
    #19196715 - 11/27/13 02:13 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

“I’m always telling my marijuana reform allies, when they say we need to legalize marijuana and get tougher on the other drugs, ‘shut the hell up,’” he said




:congrats:

Seen Nadelmann speak; wish his general ideas were more prevalent in the drug war debate and advocacy.


--------------------
Delicious Pizza


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineJacksonMetaller
Stranger

Registered: 03/13/11
Posts: 13,361
Last seen: 1 year, 2 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Society]
    #19196825 - 11/27/13 02:40 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Society said:
Quote:

“I’m always telling my marijuana reform allies, when they say we need to legalize marijuana and get tougher on the other drugs, ‘shut the hell up,’” he said




:congrats:

Seen Nadelmann speak; wish his general ideas were more prevalent in the drug war debate and advocacy.




This. Saw him last month and my gf saw him the week before at the CO international conference. It's so refreshing to see an advocate who realizes the real issue and isn't just fighting for their personal drug biases


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleRepertoire89
Cat
Male


Registered: 11/15/12
Posts: 21,773
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: JacksonMetaller] * 3
    #19197018 - 11/27/13 03:27 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Fucking aye, and this in the "land of the free".

Prohibition should have never happened.


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineRiparianZoneJunky
hunter/gatherer
Male


Registered: 10/30/11
Posts: 3,055
Loc: Oregon
Last seen: 3 years, 6 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Society]
    #19197019 - 11/27/13 03:27 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Society said:
Quote:

“I’m always telling my marijuana reform allies, when they say we need to legalize marijuana and get tougher on the other drugs, ‘shut the hell up,’” he said




:congrats:

Seen Nadelmann speak; wish his general ideas were more prevalent in the drug war debate and advocacy.




Drug advocacy/drug users' rights are the next frontier of progessive social change.  Seeing how difficult the path is and has been for the LGBT movement, I'd say this is going to be a long, uphill battle.  However, the recent successes on the marijuana front are very good signs that there is hope.  All I can say is that I pray I live long enough to see legalized LSD.  Would be nice to be able to pop down to the old Drug Depot and buy some pharmceutical-grade crystal. 
:fuckinawesome:


--------------------
RZJ's Tea Tek
RZJ's Tradelist


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleMagicman69
All About the Benjamins
Male User Gallery


Registered: 05/29/13
Posts: 6,876
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: RiparianZoneJunky]
    #19197065 - 11/27/13 03:41 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

CO and WA are true pioneers. Hats off to everyone who voted to pass such profound legislation. More States are to follow that's for sure.


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineKonyap

Registered: 06/30/07
Posts: 33,945
Loc: Planet Piss
Last seen: 4 years, 3 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Magicman69]
    #19197665 - 11/27/13 06:22 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

In a country that is built on suing people this likely will never happen the way he's intended, though I think chemistry can make anything work.


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineAvernus
Avy


Registered: 07/02/13
Posts: 15
Loc: WA
Last seen: 9 years, 8 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Konyap]
    #19197772 - 11/27/13 06:43 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

this man gets it, now for the rest of em
I love WA :blazed:


--------------------
:lsdabc: + :bongload: = :trippinbawelz:
You can call me Avy. I'm mostly nice.


Edited by Avernus (11/27/13 06:44 PM)


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleNWlight
Just look


Registered: 01/12/10
Posts: 18,686
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Avernus]
    #19198558 - 11/27/13 10:18 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

There's a fine line between legalizing all chemicals and ruining all the progress that the FDA has made...
its important that certain things can't be sold because they are legitimately bad for us and some people will sell those things regardless.


--------------------
:wizard::deemsters:


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineHagbardCeline
Student-Teacher-Student-Teacher
Male User Gallery


Registered: 05/10/03
Posts: 10,028
Loc: Overjoyed, at the bottom ...
Last seen: 7 days, 21 hours
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: NWlight] * 1
    #19198747 - 11/27/13 11:15 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

:facepalm:


--------------------
I keep it real because I think it is important that a highly esteemed individual such as myself keep it real lest they experience the dreaded spontaneous non-existance of no longer keeping it real. - Hagbard Celine


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineRiparianZoneJunky
hunter/gatherer
Male


Registered: 10/30/11
Posts: 3,055
Loc: Oregon
Last seen: 3 years, 6 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: NWlight] * 1
    #19198797 - 11/27/13 11:30 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

NWlight said:
There's a fine line between legalizing all chemicals and ruining all the progress that the FDA has made...
its important that certain things can't be sold because they are legitimately bad for us and some people will sell those things regardless.



:trollcop:


--------------------
RZJ's Tea Tek
RZJ's Tradelist


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineKonyap

Registered: 06/30/07
Posts: 33,945
Loc: Planet Piss
Last seen: 4 years, 3 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: RiparianZoneJunky]
    #19198805 - 11/27/13 11:33 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

The FDA is a big reason people still get shot for smoking weed.


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineSnowDaze
Probably Relapsing on Heroin
Male User Gallery

Registered: 02/24/13
Posts: 5,996
Loc: Home, Home Again....
Last seen: 6 months, 5 days
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Konyap]
    #19198848 - 11/27/13 11:52 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Illyabo said:
The FDA is a big reason people still get shot for smoking weed.




who in america gets shot for SMOKING weed


--------------------
:gd_icon: If you get confused, listen to the music play :gd_icon:

:smugjerry: :feelswierman:

:wook: :barbershreds: :scumbagsteve:


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineKonyap

Registered: 06/30/07
Posts: 33,945
Loc: Planet Piss
Last seen: 4 years, 3 months
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: SnowDaze]
    #19198855 - 11/27/13 11:55 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Lots of people get shot because they smoke weed


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineAlan RockefellerM
Mycologist
Male User Gallery
Registered: 03/10/07
Posts: 48,312
Last seen: 3 days, 13 hours
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: NWlight] * 2
    #19198893 - 11/28/13 12:10 AM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

NWlight said:
There's a fine line between legalizing all chemicals and ruining all the progress that the FDA has made...
its important that certain things can't be sold because they are legitimately bad for us and some people will sell those things regardless.





Are you talking about tobacco?


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleSociety
Mmmm... pizza
 User Gallery


Registered: 07/03/04
Posts: 14,300
Loc: Flag
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Alan Rockefeller] * 1
    #19199897 - 11/28/13 09:09 AM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Alan Rockefeller said:
Quote:

NWlight said:
There's a fine line between legalizing all chemicals and ruining all the progress that the FDA has made...
its important that certain things can't be sold because they are legitimately bad for us and some people will sell those things regardless.





Are you talking about tobacco?




And fried Oreos?


--------------------
Delicious Pizza


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Offlines240779
Male Unread Journal User Gallery
Registered: 12/07/10
Posts: 12,880
Last seen: 3 months, 3 days
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: dokunai]
    #19199971 - 11/28/13 09:35 AM (10 years, 2 months ago)

:congrats:


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleNWlight
Just look


Registered: 01/12/10
Posts: 18,686
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: Alan Rockefeller]
    #19200528 - 11/28/13 12:16 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Alan Rockefeller said:
Quote:

NWlight said:
There's a fine line between legalizing all chemicals and ruining all the progress that the FDA has made...
its important that certain things can't be sold because they are legitimately bad for us and some people will sell those things regardless.





Are you talking about tobacco?



No, I'm talking very specifically about medicines and specifically banned medicines.


Some medicines which are VERY effective are also incredibly dangerous.

One example is DNP.  It was popular as a diet pill in the 30s because it caused a huge surge in your metabolism rate, helping you to lose weight.

However, it effects everyone differently and only a little bit too much kills you.  DNP is now illegal to purchase due to the FDA.


There are countless examples of this, where companies would likely resume selling these harmful products again, should every chemical be legal


people on these drug discussion sites often have tunnel vision for the parts where it infringes upon their 'rights' and how the FDA is being hypocritical, while overlooking all of the good that is done by the FDA as well.


--------------------
:wizard::deemsters:


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Offlinedokunai
Cactus, Cannabis, Cubensis

Registered: 01/31/10
Posts: 1,878
Loc: Hyphal Heights, USA
Last seen: 7 years, 1 month
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: NWlight]
    #19201025 - 11/28/13 02:16 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

NWlight said:
Quote:

Alan Rockefeller said:
Quote:

NWlight said:
There's a fine line between legalizing all chemicals and ruining all the progress that the FDA has made...
its important that certain things can't be sold because they are legitimately bad for us and some people will sell those things regardless.





Are you talking about tobacco?



No, I'm talking very specifically about medicines and specifically banned medicines.


Some medicines which are VERY effective are also incredibly dangerous.

One example is DNP.  It was popular as a diet pill in the 30s because it caused a huge surge in your metabolism rate, helping you to lose weight.

However, it effects everyone differently and only a little bit too much kills you.  DNP is now illegal to purchase due to the FDA.


There are countless examples of this, where companies would likely resume selling these harmful products again, should every chemical be legal


people on these drug discussion sites often have tunnel vision for the parts where it infringes upon their 'rights' and how the FDA is being hypocritical, while overlooking all of the good that is done by the FDA as well.




I agree that there should be regulations on what can be sold as medication, and that efficacy, risks, and side effects should be reported by the FDA.  DNP was bad news, and should not be presented to people as a diet pill.  On the other hand, if I want to take the risk of ingesting DNP, I have a hard time imagining how that's any of your business.  It's even more of a stretch for me to understand how people think someone should be incarcerated, stigmatized, and have their career ruined for possessing or ingesting ANY substance that doesn't pose a direct threat to someone else.  I sure wouldn't like it if my neighbor was stockpiling radioactive material or explosives in his garage.


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleNWlight
Just look


Registered: 01/12/10
Posts: 18,686
Re: Legalize all drugs? The man behind loosening pot laws in US eyes new goal [Re: dokunai]
    #19201060 - 11/28/13 02:27 PM (10 years, 2 months ago)

sorry to say it but people are dumb.  they don't care how the drug works, they don't care what the electron transport chain is or what uncouplers are.

i think mommy government truly needs to protect people from their own ignorance sometimes so that companies can't prey on their stupidity.

a fat stupid person would take DNP out of desperation even knowing the risks, and then become a liability.


i don't care if people eat DNP, you see.

i just don't think that it should be legal to make and sell


--------------------
:wizard::deemsters:


Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Jump to top Pages: 1 | 2 | Next >  [ show all ]

Shop: Bridgetown Botanicals Bridgetown Botanicals   Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order   Original Sensible Seeds Autoflowering Cannabis Seeds   North Spore North Spore Mushroom Grow Kits & Cultivation Supplies   MagicBag.co All-In-One Bags That Don't Suck   Kraken Kratom Kratom Capsules for Sale


Similar ThreadsPosterViewsRepliesLast post
* Pot laws DO NOT apply to medical users!!! DazedSol 1,882 1 12/26/03 11:49 PM
by DailyPot
* New pot law to be delayed motamanM 2,007 1 05/14/03 08:17 PM
by sir tripsalot
* Legal Drugs Pose Highest Health Threat Sheepish 2,163 4 03/23/04 05:40 PM
by DailyPot
* (Canada) Liberals Plan Pot Law Reforms trendalM 3,853 5 04/25/03 03:28 AM
by GratefulDread
* Bill to protect medicinal pot users falls short in House motamanM 4,156 4 08/17/03 08:21 PM
by Demiurge
* Update on Canadian Pot Saga WildCardsRevenge 3,750 8 02/06/03 08:23 PM
by Mitchnast
* MARYLAND GOV. EHRLICH SIGNS MARIJUANA LAW motamanM 5,282 3 05/27/03 06:27 AM
by Seuss
* The Drug War Goes Up in Smoke (lengthy but worthwhile read) Demiurge 5,379 2 08/14/03 06:17 AM
by TheHobbit

Extra information
You cannot start new topics / You cannot reply to topics
HTML is disabled / BBCode is enabled
Moderator: motaman, veggie, Alan Rockefeller, Mostly_Harmless
2,904 topic views. 0 members, 5 guests and 2 web crawlers are browsing this forum.
[ Show Images Only | Sort by Score | Print Topic ]
Search this thread:

Copyright 1997-2024 Mind Media. Some rights reserved.

Generated in 0.025 seconds spending 0.006 seconds on 13 queries.