Collapse of the Capital Markets.

Image by wallyg via Flickr

Over the past six-eight years the MildGreens have often made the claim that were illicit drugs to be globally legally regulated, the capital markets would collapse. (cf: Narcodollars for Dummies, introduced to NZ’s SCOOP by the MildGreens). While our comment was aimed at the fiscal risk created by pump and dump when black money is laundered, the destabilised banking markets we see today are inseparable.

In a ringing endorsement of that claim the following headline substantially agrees.

U.N. crime chief says drug money flowed into banks
Reuters
Sunday, January 25, 2009

VIENNA: The United Nations’ crime and drug watchdog has indications that money made in illicit drug trade has been used to keep banks afloat in the global financial crisis, its head was quoted as saying on Sunday.

Vienna-based UNODC Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa said in an interview released by Austrian weekly Profil that drug money often became the only available capital when the crisis spiralled out of control last year.

“In many instances, drug money is currently the only liquid investment capital,” Costa was quoted as saying by Profil. “In the second half of 2008, liquidity was the banking system’s main problem and hence liquid capital became an important factor.”

Image via Wikipedia

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime had found evidence that “interbank loans were funded by money that originated from drug trade and other illegal activities,” Costa was quoted as saying. There were “signs that some banks were rescued in that way.”

Profil said Costa declined to identify countries or banks which may have received drug money and gave no indication how much cash might be involved. He only said Austria was not on top of his list, Profil said.

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Clean-Out Police HQ [Cactus Kate]

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Blair Anderson said…

>We need a clean-out in Police HQ starting at the top and going a long way down.

I would start with the twats that were behind the BERL drug harm index. They are self interested and thus dangerous. They are resource guarding. I would follow with a sideways ‘amputation’ of the arm they call national drug ‘intelligence’. Why? Well, hell, what on their watch has been measurably accomplished, other than a palpable belief in a bottomless pit of money while clamouring for more resources, and a selfless disregard for reality endangering not only themselves but the public at large.

So far the best we get is an attempt to redeem themselves with advertising real-estate. (so much for getting better work stories, like humping swathes of pot back to the helicopters).

Thank Gawd, the new Class D regulations legalising recreational psychoactive soft drugs is administered by the Ministry of Health. (Nov6th 2008)

That will do more to restore confidence in Police (and Health) than any MadMan can achieve.

see link at Cactus Kate, 10:24 PM, January 23, 2009

(it remains enigmatic that NZ Police, who on one hand advertise “community policing” but are poker faced when it comes to listening to authoritative opinion and scientific evidence from ‘the community’. Case in point, National Drug Intelligence refusing point blank to as much as meet visiting Law Enforcment Against Prohibition [www.leap.cc] speaker Judge Jerry Paradis. No time for as much as a coffee, a drug in and of itself ranked more dangerous (harmful/addictive) than cannabis. To busy writing inane ‘police reports’ or surfing the net looking for the latest drug threat to postulate ‘will be invading’ the country, or fraternising with inumerable other grifters like customs and border control who mysterioulsy appear ‘in numbers’ around the “Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs” [EACD] table when ever a ‘health issue’ needs voting on. /Blair )

• Canvassing for Opinion: BERL, POLICE, JUSTICE and headbanging
  The BERL DRUG HARMS report and the subsequent Police Intelligence claims that cannabis is the problem bring the POLICE once again into disrepute.
• Canvassing for Opinion: Milestones in Drug Policy, Homegrown …
  The BERL Drug Harms report, commissioned by Police, was released quite purposely on … This is in direct contrast to the BERL/POLICE assertions.
• Canvassing for Opinion: Criminal Drug Intelligence We Pay For
  This is why the Police have resisted any cost benefit accounting based on first principles and are hiding behind the BERL report commissioned by….
• Canvassing for Opinion: 2008/12
  ALCP Challenges Government to show some spine · BERL’s BoonDoggle · Drugs a ‘ pernicious evil’ – Judge Ingram · The Law, Logic and the UYB
• Canvassing for Opinion: Shrooms Good? Can’t be, they are OUTLAWED!
  6 Jul 2008 … BERL, POLICE, JUSTICE and headbanging · BERL’s BoonDoggle · United Nations Driving Shapelle Mad · Tougher laws may make young
• Canvassing for Opinion: Drug Sanity revisited, by Dave Currie
  BERL’s BoonDoggle · BERL, POLICE, JUSTICE and headbanging · Swiss approve heroin scheme but vote down marijuana law · ‘Drug Sanity Revisited’ by Dave
• Canvassing for Opinion: Putting People in Prison For Their Genes!
  Nights of extreme Stupidity in Christchurch Drug P… BERL, POLICE, JUSTICE and headbanging · BERL’s BoonDoggle · United Nations Driving Shapelle
• Canvassing for Opinion: UN Conventions Unintended Consequences & HR
  Nights of extreme Stupidity in Christchurch Drug P… BERL, POLICE, JUSTICE and headbanging · BERL’s BoonDoggle.

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[Dread Times] Another view on Obama.

FORWARD OPERATING BASE KALSU, IRAQ – JANUARY 20: US Army Staff Sgt. Beverlee Burton of Cleveland, Ohio cries as she watches Barack Obama sworn in as the 44th President of the United States of America…

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Blair Anderson has left a new comment on the post “Another view on Obama“:

BHO’s references to unfolding the ‘clenched fist’ seems to have been interpreted as focused on foreign targets, whereas the problem resides at home with a legacy of rebellion from the African American sector still the target of racist policy (80% of Police stops with search in NY, African American/Latino!). That this leads to unintended outcomes including ‘death by ballistic invasion’ of otherwise law abiding citizens, and a massively disproportionate representation in the justice system.

It is notable that NZ media never visit this question either. Such is ‘white privilege’.

My fear, despite an earnest ‘hope to the contrary’ is that BHO may yet be seen as the highest ‘Uncle Tom‘ in office.

I believe that the USA has to revisit its drug policy before ANY progress can be made in truly emancipating its folk of colour.

Consider, the Mexican Border (war) has claimed more lives in the past year than Americans have lost in Iraq, and twice that of 9-11. Columbia similarly. Hamas and Hezbollah earn their weapons by trading in certain lucrative agricultural substances (mainly cocaine)
Image via Wikipedia
whereas elevating the USA presence in Afghanistan correspondingly raises yet again the question of the role of drug policy, institutionalized corruption, arms and the Taliban.

Perhaps the USA needs a lesson from Class D. (smile)

Posted by Blair Anderson to Dread Times at January 23, 2009 6:59 PM

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Magistrate encourages his drug habit

• Man in court on drug possession charges
• Says marijuana eases burns pain
• Magistrate encourages his drug habit

LIFE of pain … burns victim Jason Bernard Young, of Queensland, says marijuana helps him sleep.

see http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24946461-5006786,00.html

A MAGISTRATE has encouraged a regular marijuana user to attempt to get his drug usage legalised, because it was the only substance that numbed his pain after his whole body was badly burned.

Image via Wikipedia

Jason Bernard Young, 31, from Coolum Beach on the Sunshine Coast, appeared in the Maroochydore Magistrates’ Court yesterday on two drug possession charges after he was found with 2g of marijuana at his home in December.

Young was intoxicated when he fell off a train bridge in 1995 and sustained burns to 95 per cent of his body after he grabbed hold of the electrical wiring above the Bald Hills train station in Brisbane. The court was told Young had tried numerous drugs and pain killers but marijuana was the best substance in stopping his aches and pains.

Magistrate Bernadette Callaghan said his case was a “tragic” one and advised Young to contact his member of Parliament to try to get his drug usage legalised.

“There are very, very few people who cannot get help through normal medication,” she said.

“I think you should write to your member of Parliament about this.”

Outside court Young said his life was a continuous struggle and he was going to seek help about getting his drug usage legalised.

“I’ve been on pain killers and sleeping tablets for a long time but in the end it just ruined my body, and with some tablets I put on weight which stretches my skin and it starts tearing,” he said.
Image by Landahlauts via Flickr
“I’ve found something that fixes it (my pain) but it’s illegal.

“I used marijuana four times a day and it pretty much relaxes my muscles and relaxes my body so I can breathe easier. It doesn’t take away all the pain but it takes away enough to get me moving and mobile and most of all it helps me sleep.”

Young said he was going to contact the Member for Maroochydore Fiona Simpson about the issue.

He was put on a good behaviour bond for one month.

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Compassion, Health and Justice

Maori traditional healers are being funded by the Ministry of Health at a cost of nearly $2 million a year.

see http://www.stuff.co.nz/thepress/4821162a6009.html

They are the only alternative-treatment providers directly receiving public health dollars.
Rongoa is a traditional Maori system of healing that includes rakau rongoa (native herbal remedies), mirimiri (massage) and karakia (prayer), as well as spiritual support.Image via Wikipedia

“The mere fact that people use rongoa and go back to the practitioners is testament that the services they are given are contributing to their wellbeing.”

Healers were required to report to the ministry quarterly and submit an annual report, but the practitioners and their health outcomes were not reviewed. “It’s not unusual to fund on outputs. It’s extraordinarily difficult to report on outcomes,” Wall said.

Rakau rongoa herbal remedies were not covered by the Medicines Act and the ministry did not require them to be tested as part of its funding policy.

Mother Mary Joseph [Suzanne] Aubert (1835-1926) might have wondered whats going on here?

Famous for founding the Sisters of Compassion (a Wellington landmark and Institution) Mother Mary’s rongoa was a recipe of herbs and cannabis, a formulary adopted and sold, albeit fraudulently, when demand required Thomas Kempthorne to dilute it (later to become a famous New Zealand Pharmacueticals and Fertiliser partnership known as Kempthorne Prosser & Co, and one of my early computer clients before Ravensdowne Fertiliser purchased it and disposed of its ‘drug making’ assets. /Blair) .

Perhaps the Minister of Health (and notably a former Minister of Justice), Hon Tony Ryall should explain the present ‘difficulties’ given that Maori are substantially under the gun for herbal ‘cannabis’, most recently in Northland. see POLICE URGE PUBLIC: Dob in those dope growers

Blair Anderson
http://mildgreens.blogspot.com/

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Judge, A Heartless Bastard "Beneath Contempt".

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A cannabis campaigner [and ME sufferer/Blair] who admitted supplying the class C drugs to other pain sufferers has escaped a jail sentence – but received a stern warning from a judge. During sentencing at Plymouth Crown Court, Judge Francis Gilbert made it clear to Stuart Wyatt – who wants to see cannabis legalised for use in pain relief – that he was not above the law. During an exchange with Wyatt’s advocate Ali Rafati, Judge Gilbert responded sharply to the news that the 36-year-old’s “use of cannabis was ongoing” to mitigate the pain he constantly suffered.

Judge Gilbert replied: “Well, that’s his misfortune, isn’t it? I’m afraid the reality is your client is or has been acting illegally and breaking the law.”

“You must understand cannabis is an illegal drug, whatever view you have about it,” he said. “It’s not your privilege to choose whether what you do is lawful or illegal. There is no excuse. You’re subject to the law like any other person.”

He then sentenced Wyatt to eight months for producing cannabis and 12 months for supplying cannabis, to run concurrently, before suspending it for two years.

Outside court Wyatt, supporting himself on two walking sticks, said: “I’m shocked that after two years of trying to get a dialogue or debate within Government, I’m not allowed to say a word in court.

“I’m stuck in the position that the only drugs available to me – anti- psychotic or anti-depressant drugs with pain-killing effects – would cause damage to my mental health. My mental health is the only healthy part of my body that remains”, he said.

http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/news/Campaigner-using-cannabis-walks-free-court/article-621063-detail/article.html

One could wonder at this Judge’s sense of propriety when in a previous case he gave a sentence of nine months (suspended) for importing >600kg of tobacco a known killer!!

Stuart Wyatt’s case was all the more interesting for the fact that he wasn’t caught doing anything wrong.. he was caught because the police were investigating another matter and just happened to find his weed.

—
Blair Anderson ‹(•¿•)›
ph (643) 389 4065 cell 027 265 7219

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CAYAD Objectives and Ottawa Charter

CAYAD Objectives

• to develop innovative grassroots action, including creative forums for expression that contribute to youth development with special focus on resiliency and community connectedness
• to work towards holistic development and strengthening of families as central for building social capital and addressing drug and drug related harm issues
• to raise community awareness on drug and drug related harm and increase their capability for responding to the issue
• to promote an intersectoral and collaborative response that facilitates better cooperation at local level and contributes to linking the local, regional and national level strategies and action
• to facilitate the development of policy, guidelines and commitment towards innovative initiatives that promote safe and healthy environments for young people.

Sounds all a bit "MildGreen" to me…. but I hasten to add "Imagine all the treatment 'folk' who, in a post CLASS D world would loose the grift, yet are happy to feature on their office wall's THE OTTAWA CHARTER?" 

 

Especially the paragraphs about identifying and removing obstacles, barriers and impediments to public health promotion.!  

 

—
Blair Anderson  ‹(•¿•)›
ph (643) 389 4065   cell 027 265 7219

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Reform, A Political Opportunity

Image via Wikipedia While much of the discussion (and protest) for change is very US centric it must not be forgotten that on a global scale the US acts cravenly, often under arms but more subtly through ‘international relations’ and delegations. Uncle Sam’s goal is to pervert the required ‘resolving of the tensions’ pushing its largely moral reformist (thus religious) policy position.

Americans pay dearly for this ideology, but so to does the rest of the world.

“It is often forgotten that health is the first principle of drug policy.” – Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

Marijuana Law Reform No Longer a Political Liability, It’s a Political Opportunity

January 13th, 2009

Voting ended late last week on the President-Elect¹s website Change.gov. As was the case in December, questions from the general public pertaining to marijuana and drug policy reform proved to be extremely popular.

Of the more than 76,000 questions posed to Obama by the public, the fourth most popular question overall called on the incoming administration to cease arresting and prosecuting adults who use cannabis. And in the sub-category “National Security,” the most popular question posed by the public pertained to amending U.S. drug policies as a way to try and halt the ongoing violence surround illicit drug trafficking in Mexico and other nations. ( for more see http://blog.thehill.com/ article by Deputy Director Paul Armentano, National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws )

The continuing arrogance of the US Congress/administration and its political and religiously deluded vehicle for maintaining the international ignominy of the “War on Drugs”, the Single Conventions and covenants, stands as the single biggest unresolved issue on this planet. It is in the way of even climate change and peace… so long as it is the single largest ‘fixable’ contributor to destabilised nation states, institutionalised corruption and chronic and systemic racist, ageist and sexist human rights abuse. Without wholesale reform of the drug laws the rest is just pretence for expediency. Non-feasance on a planetary scale. Seriously, political arses should be whupped for this devious practice of ‘self interest before others’.

Repudiate the Single Conventions on Narcotics – ‘for God’s Sake’

Blair Anderson
http://mildgreens.blogspot.com

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The Touch Paper is of our Own Making.

Image via Wikipedia There remains within and without the dialog over the Palastine/Israel question the unresolved contribution to the dysfunction created by the War on Drugs and all that it entails.

With the cash crisis created by the non-payment of 70,000 Palastinian civil servants (it has only just been resolved.) the trade in easily concealable fungable commodities in exchange for essential supplies is tempting enough, but the ‘drugs’ linkage to the Hamas/Hizballah arms trade is endemic in [but not retricted to] the geography of the Middle East. The influence is much much larger.

“One of the most prominent regions where the drug-terror nexus is at its strongest is the tri-border area in Latin America, where the borders of Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay join. Both Hamas and Hizballah are active in this region, where it is possible to make a profit of $1 million from the sale of fourteen or fifteen kilos of drugs, an amount that could be transported in a single suitcase.”

(see Drug Trafficking and Middle Eastern Terrorist Groups: A Growing Nexus? Washington Institute)

Also see Syria after Lebanon: Hooked on Lebanon

When one talks about International Drug Policy and Global Human Rights one needs to have a very large brief and a great deal of courage. No one wants to touch this litmus paper, least of the USA or the UN.

Blair Anderson
http://mildgreens.blogspot.com

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NZ Police Intel ‘New Cannabis’

The 102 page report is on the Police website at

http://www.police.govt.nz/resources/2008/Cannabis_Strategic_Assessment_Final3_2007_mirror.pdf

It is written in the traditional Image via Wikipediaprohibitionist style, is poorly referenced, makes numerous sweeping declarations (one sample 4.2.4 below), and is effectively a call to arms against cannabis, and by implication, the cannabis law reform movement.

It makes use of SHORE’s data, cherry picks a little from others, but treats statements by the INCB, Kofi Annan, Mario Costa as data.

Some sections, including some recommendations , are withheld , under the OIA act. (heads up thanks to BrandonH)

4.2.4 Cannabis Hospital Admissions by Gender and Age

The abuse of cannabis by young New Zealanders is a key focus of this assessment primarily because of the widely held perception that cannabis is a harmless drug. Many young people know national policies on cannabis vary from country to country that includes partial legalisation in some countries which portrays confusing and conflicting messages about the perceived harms posed by cannabis. Such messages ultimately undermine the credibility of the international drug control system and the findings of inquiries such as the 2003 Health Select Committee Inquiry Report on Cannabis

A keen observer of the human condition would clearly identify the acute irony in this Police interpretation of the 2003 Health Select Committee report.

extract:

“Based on the evidence we have heard in the course of this inquiry,” the committee concluded, “the negative mental health impact of cannabis appears to have been overstated, particularly in relation to occasional adult users of the drug.” “Evidence received in the course of this inquiry has raised serious doubts about commonly held beliefs about cannabis,” wrote the committee. “Evidence received during the inquiry supports the view that there can be subtle cognitive impairment in cannabis users,” the report says. In this respect, the committee drew to a large extent on the work of Prof. Wayne Hall of the Australian National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, who was commissioned to report on scientific research in this area. He found that long-term use of cannabis may cause subtle impairment in the higher cognitive functions of memory, attention and the organisation and integration of complex information. The committee said the evidence also suggested that cannabis did not cause behavioral difficulties, but rather that cannabis was frequently used by youths who misbehaved; neither was it a cause of suicide. “

Perhaps if Police Intel would read BHO’s quote heading this blog then they might acquire some ‘intelligence’ they seem to seek. (on our tick at that!)

“Because the truth is that promoting science isn’t just about providing resources — it’s about protecting free and open inquiry. It’s about ensuring that facts and evidence are never twisted or obscured by politics or ideology,” – Pres Elect, B. Obama

If Police Intel would like to pay me $600wk for ten years, I would inform ‘them what is wrong with their strategic assessment , and who said it’. /Blair

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