Lo ammetto. Mi è stato piuttosto difficile valutare che video avrei potuto mettere in “collegamento” con la recensione dei The War On Drugs, visto che non è che sia proprio addentro al genere del gruppo; volevo mettere qualche video “indie” buttato lì a casaccio ma alla fine ho preferito andare a sbirciare un pò la biografia dei TWOD per conoscere un pò le loro influenze… ed ecco usciti i My Bloody Valentine, gruppo irlandese “indie” ante-litteram:

Libertarianism, wherethehellfore art thou?

That’s what I felt like screaming after reading Jacob Sullum’s execrable description of his salvia hallucinations.  The print edition of the December Reason isn’t available online yet.  [Update: IT LIVES...! Here.]  You should thank whatever god you believe in for that little fact.  [Update: If you watched some of the lame "tripping on salvia videos, please don't try clawing your eyes out.]

I almost can’t stand reading Reason anymore.  I feel miserable about that.  I want Reason to be better than it is.  Not New Yorker better, or Harper’s better, or whatever the beturtlenecked metrosexual literati think is “better.”  Just better somehow.  I don’t know.  They could start by dumping their senior editor’s lame descriptions of mind-altering substances.

Sullum’s little fantasia is dispiriting.  While liberty is being assaulted from angles too numerous to count, Aldous Sullum had to spend a weekend staring at—I’m not making this up—“the head of a human-sized cat wearing a knight’s helmet, a wizard with a flowing beard, and a wolf with glowing eyes.”

Too much of the wacky tobaccy and you become a caricature.  That’s what Sullum has done.  Sullum’s goofy little vision quest is prima facie evidence why libertarians will never have much political clout in this country.  I’ve known plenty of people whose M.O. was “mind expansion.”  I’m sure their inner space was overpopulated with leaping gnomes and gentle bedposts, but their outer space usually reeked of condescension, cigarette smoke and week-old underwear.  None of them were leaders, though they fancied themselves as such.  Most slept late and spent their best brain cells trying to rationalize why other people didn’t “get” them.  Doing all that requires more time than your garden-variety ardent political activist has to spare.  Hence the national wheel-spin that is libertarianism.

Don’t get me wrong on this; I’m anti-war on drugs.  The war on drugs is a win-win-win for government, drug cartels and users.  Governments win because the war on drugs gives cover for their less legitimate acts; it gives them plenty of raisons d’être and distracts us all from their thievery.   The cartels win because the illegality of buying and selling drugs keeps competition at a minimum, and thus prices high.  Users win because they get something to complain about and a cross to bear: “Oooh, I just need this one release—and the man just keeps me from [getting high, communing with god, seeing the black dog, dropping out, etc., etc. ad-freaking-infinitum].”  Were drugs legalized, all three parties would suddenly get back to business.  Government would start enforcing legitimate laws.  Drug cartels would stop doling out Columbian neckties and lacing hashish with Tide and get to producing cheaper, higher quality products.  Using would suddenly be bereft of counter-cultural cache.  No longer able to wax awkwardly poetical about their drug-induced visions, users would either drop the habit entirely or retreat into their own worlds, sparing us their cringe-inducing self-reverential lameness.

A year or so ago, at the height of mania about his book Liberal Fascism, I sent a frustrated fanboy email to Jonah Goldberg about a nascent liberaltarianism—a freakish mixture of liberal activism and libertarian wish-fulfillment.  Goldberg never responded—why would he?—but the point of my email was that liberaltarians were canaries in the mine shaft.  They were proof that the statist-corporatist-fascist vapors of the current political zeitgeist were strong enough to convince certain members of the libertarian vanguard that individual freedom wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be.  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.  As a recovering quasi-liberal, I returned to libertarianism thinking it a bracing astringent.  Instead I found some of its principle exponents ready to make peace with paternalists and statists.  Having read Sullum, I now know the terms of the truce: we’ll let you have your bloated, over-weening state, as long as its fat folds don’t press too hard against us while we’re tripping on salvia.

The idea I’m trying to get at is that work like Sullum’s, and Kerry Howley’s, tells me that libertarianism has lost its way.  It isn’t the job of libertarians to prove drugs should be legal by doing drugs and implicitly bragging about it; it isn’t the job of libertarians to actively undermine other people’s cultural norms.  The job of libertarians is to argue over and over again that banning stuff diminishes the freedom quotient rather than expanding it; that a diminished set of behavioral choices means a diminished individual.  You don’t need to smoke pot to realize that keeping people from choosing not to stunts their growth as individuals.  People define themselves by the choices they make—unfortunately for Sullum and his chivalric man-cat—and that’s precisely why libertarians should calmly step away from the salvia plant and the idea that promoting “alternative lifestyles” is more important than promoting freedom in general.  The sad thing about Sullum’s creepy sidebar is that the larger piece in which it is featured is pretty good.  Sullum is up in arms over hair-trigger legislators itching for pre-emptive salvia bans and exaggerating the effects and prominence of salvia use.  The piece is well-written and well-researched, and none of the points he makes in it would be diminished if his personal experience with salvia were not included.  But he includes it anyway.  Why?  To be edgy?  For shock value?  Hearing users detail the wonders of their drug of choice doesn’t help the movement.  It’s called bias, and there are rational reasons why straight-laced bible thumpers think twice before believing a pothead’s list of the virtues of his beloved cannabis sativa. Potheads are similarly skeptical about the virtues of life sans-herb.  That’s their prerogative.  As libertarians, let’s dig into the virtues of this mutual prerogative and promote it as a means to the end of individual freedom and growth.

–––

Kurt Vile – Freak Train

If only Kurt Vile would come and seduce me with his long and bobbing grunge hair while playing his stoney freak-psychedelia-americana at my street corner. I would be so happy and calm. I would stand there all day and stare with lazy amazement. I would reconsider drugs.

“Freak Train” is from Kurt Vile’s upcoming album Childish Prodigy. Check out his myspace if you can’t wait to hear it all. Oh, he plays and sings in the very awesome band The War on Drugs too.

EDIT: It’s already out. DOH!

In the October 28^th Washington Missourian, guest columnist Sgt. Jason Grellner of the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department takes on critics of Washington’s new anti-methamphetamine ordinance, which requires a prescription to purchase pseudoephedrine.

Grellner’s piece covers – I am not exaggerating – three-fourths of the back page of Section D. Unless you’re an Evelyn Wood graduate, you might want to block out a full day on your calendar to read it.

Or you can just skip it. I hate to break this to you, Sergeant, but it is all irrelevant.

Much has been written about the wrongheadedness of the War on Drugs. If you haven’t been exposed to the sensible arguments against it, see here, here and, specifically about meth, here.

The city of Washington has been patting itself on the back for becoming the first town in the nation with a pseudoephedrine prescription ordinance.

Now, like crazed cult members, they want to spread their great idea to the rest of the country. The city of Union recently joined up. Government gets more power, we become less free, and the illegal drug trade continues with barely a sniffle.

A retired farmer once told me in private that he thought the War on Drugs was dumb. A big waste of money, he said. This devout Christian, who was born on his farm, has lived there all his life and has never had a computer or internet access, is no flaming radical. And like me, he has no interest in using these drugs. But by applying his knowledge of human behavior and some simple logic, he has concluded that this war is a pathetic failure. He might not realize it, but he understands more about the economic reality of illegal drugs than all the government nannies in D.C., Jeff City, Washington and Union combined.

Another important point my friend understands is that saying “Drugs should be legalized” is not the same as saying “Everybody should use drugs.”

Getting back to Grellner’s column, he is sick of stuffy-nosed people whining about their right to buy pseudoephedrine over the counter. He lists other rights that he says are more important: The right of children not to be endangered by meth-cooking parents, the right of farmers not to have their anhydrous ammonia stolen and the right of hunters not to trip over meth labs and related hazardous waste in the woods, to name a few.

What is lost on Grellner is the fact that if meth weren’t illegal, none of these problems would exist. Left alone, the free market’s division of labor probably would have meth being manufactured in a neat building in an industrial park, with ingredients delivered safely by conventional modes of transport. No need for amateur chemists to fumble around in the dark with Vise-Grips trying to coax a dangerous, pressurized gas into rusty used refrigerant cans. No need for toothless addicts to risk blowing up their kids by brewing the stuff in the upstairs bathtub.

And what of the violence associated with the drug trade? Again, this is caused solely by the fact that these sought-after products are illegal. It is exactly the same as prohibition. When the 21^st Amendment was ratified, the horrible crime associated with illegal alcohol disappeared overnight. When was the last time you heard of someone being killed in a beer deal gone bad?

Grellner states as fact that there is no substitute for pseudoephedrine in making meth. He is an expert, so I’ll take his word for it. But even if restricting access to that key ingredient did cause the supply of illegal meth to dry up (I’m not holding my breath), the drug market probably would just find a replacement for meth altogether.

And since the crudely-manufactured version of this drug became so popular only because it serves as a substitute for higher-quality drugs that, being illegal, are prohibitively expensive, meth might just disappear on its own in a post-drug-war free market.

I’m sure Sgt. Grellner is sincere about serving the public, but I doubt he’ll ever see this issue my way. The War on Drugs is his livelihood. It’s what he does. He has become the darling of drug-war-worshipping reporters, and the name he’s made for himself in the national spotlight can’t help but put more wind in his sails.

The market will prevail, Sergeant, whether we like it or not. It always does. Do us all a favor: Learn something about economics and stop wasting our time and money on your vast project. It is based on half-vast ideas.

Update 11/5/09: Judge Andrew Napolitano of Fox News recently interviewed Jack A. Cole, a former drug warrior for the New Jersey State Police who is now executive director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.

always felt that kurt vile was rather unfairly connotationally lumbered with the same tags as yr times new vikings and eat skulls and all that noised up siltbreeze lot when, as has become increasingly obvious, his music’s got a distinctly westerberg (on overnight religion particularly) or van zandt bent.  or when the violators are involved (kurt vile & the violators it’s all a bit oi! ain’t it…) they raise a distinctly crazy horse-esque squall.

so the electronic excursions and abstractions from the god is saying this to you record are gone.  and in their bedroomed place is a rather cocksure muscular swagger.  which isn’t to say this shit is all seventies fm rock (not that there’s anything wrong with that kindofthing) as the whole thing’s slightly warped, swamped in fuzz and a hazy roky erickson trad-psyche fug.  reverb and echo and fx a-go-go-go.  but the heart that beats at it’s murky core is a distinctly rock and roll one.  the same dark cardiology that powered suicide as much as it did creedence as it did blind lemon as it did neu as it did the ramones.   y’dig?

once you get yr noodlesac round that philosophy it’s easy to get to grips with the scattershot jumps from hunchbacks lurching slo-mo garage moves to the thurston moore / mick jagger chimera of dead alive to the seven minute drawling fried krautrock of freak train to the fingerpicking loveliness of blackberry song to the monged blooze throb of inside looking out.

all of which brings to mind the filthy squall of royal trux.  which in turn brings to mind keith richards narcotics ingestion and pre-war record collection taken to its natural conclusion.  and all of which says to me that warping, jiggering, fucking with and reconstructing the traditional is as much of a tradition itself.

so essentially a decidedly tasty record.  as forward looking as it is backward looking.  and as succinct a musical statement as i can recall since the wand born bad lp.  yup, that good.

vilespace / matador / testotertunes / thewarondrugs

“A-at least I made a difference…” The effort sends blood flecking the boy’s lips. His lungs are slowly filling with blood spilling into Sarge’s lap with every cough. No, you fucking didn’t, Sarge screams, you’re just another useless fucking casualty. But the boy doesn’t hear. His eyes have gone out like the night’s last embers.

Sarge gets to his feet, the sack of meat slumping face down into the dust. He walks to the Command tent, passing rows of moaning men with filthy needles hanging from their arms. Brushing aside the tent flap, he takes out his pistol and sends a bullet into the General’s skull. A captain and lieutenant have their guns instantly trained on him. The lieutenant moves his gun hand away and shoots the captain in the stomach, his electric blue eyes inexpressive. Sarge’s moss green gaze flickers to the lieutenant’s bruised cephalic vein. “I shoot up with a saline solution,” the lieutenant says, going outside to see if anyone has heard the shots. He returns shaking his head. “We better get out of here. They won’t be too happy once they find out.”

“There’s something I want to do first,” Sarge says. He sweeps the ringstained maps from a trunk and takes from it a chunk of plasticine. The lieutenant looks at him for a moment before nodding. They arrange to meet at the outskirts of camp in fifteen minutes, and Sarge leaves for the doctor’s to cancel his prescription.

It was a maze of barbed wire and trenches stretching to the east and to the west. It smelled like a latrine. Sentries were fast asleep at their posts, guns pointed at the ground. A dog has died days ago, its bone etched flank squirming with maggots. When Sarge arrives, he finds the lieutenant with some guns, two packs of rations, and what little fresh water he could find. They look at the world their grandfathers left for them. Sarge spat on the ground.

“Let’s go north. I hear elk hunting is good at this time of the year,” says Sarge, pressing the detonator. At the center of camp the dwindling supply of heroin goes up in a pillar of fire, and the traitorous pair can hear the keening moan of the vast junkie army left without a fix. “The fresh air’ll be good for us,” the lieutenant says, smiling for the first time in years.

www.narconews.com/en.html

Both the city of Eugene, Oregon and Lane county are experiencing budget cuts in the face of an increasing need for public safety and human services.  Eugene and Lane County Budget Committee member, Mary Ann Holser, presents the budget crisis and the dilemma concerning a lack of jail beds in a May, 2009 article in the Register Guard.  Holser points to an increase in crime due to lawbreakers believing that they will not be jailed.  She also writes that judges are ceasing to impose meaningful sentences because they know that they will not be carried out.  Holser has a long history of working with drug- and alcohol-dependent offenders and argues that, “Short and effective consequences for early-on lawbreakers can prevent escalation to more unlawful behavior.”

Now that the new director of the National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske, has ended the “war” metaphor for our nation’s struggle with drug abuse, his focus includes treatment and prevention.
The Parents. The Anti-Drug website is an example of an informational site that parents can utilize to prevent drug use among youths.  The website is highlighted by a new awareness campaign concerning teens misusing prescription drugs. The site claims, “While illicit drug use by teens is declining, now there’s a threat from the family medicine cabinet: The abuse of prescription and over-the-counter drugs.”

Kerlikowske provides  insight into the nature in which drug-related issues are deeply connected with healthcare reform and international relations.  He is a member of the Cabinet, and will be working directly with the President to reform healthcare with a specific focus on reducing prescription drug abuse.

Above the Influence.com presents the risks of drug use through an entertaining and fun website.  It is full of quizzes, puzzles and interactive media links, which are intended to engage the viewer and to appeal to logic with the use of anecdotes from peers.  Chillfarm.com presents the argument that sites directed at the prevention of drug abuse among teens may actually promote drug use.  One example of such a statistic is, “Teens who use drugs are 5 times more likely to have sex than those teens who do not use drugs.”

The United States must now emerge from a forty-year war and formulate new strategies in order to alleviate the collateral damage of the war on drugs.
-By Max Edmonds

The Register Guard-http://www.registerguard.com/csp/cms/sites/web/news/sevendays/14354427-35/story.csp
National Journal-http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline/ii_20090526_6945.php

The Anti-Drug-http://www.theantidrug.com/

Above the Influence-http://www.abovetheinfluence.com/fun/default.aspx?path=nav

Chillpharm-http://www.chillpharm.com/antidrug.html

Dimarts 26, en una de les sessions que serveixen per presentar l’imminent Primavera Sound 2009, els nordamericans Reigning Sound tocaran a la Sala Apolo. Els de Memphis, amb el seu rock que va des de l’americana fins a un so més garatge, ens presentaran les cançons del seu 6è treball d’estudi, Love and Curses, que es posarà a la venda al juliol a través del segell In The Red Records.

La banda liderada per Greg Cartwright, es va formar al 2001, any del seu primer disc: Break up, Break down, on ja s’apreciaven bones melodies, encara que el so de la banda no quedava del tot definit. Amb Time Bomb High School (2002) arriba la consolidació del so; les melodies de Cartwright són brillants, i temes com I don t’ believe serveix per confirmar la banda. A Too much Guitar (2004) retornen al so més garatge amb temes totalment 60’s com We repel each other o I’ll cry. La consolidació arriba amb Time For Orphans (2005); balades com If you can’t give everything o el preciós mig-temps de What could I do adornen un àlbum que els confirma com una banda a seguir. Temes com Medication #2 o If Christmas can bring you home no els fa qualsevol. Dos discs en directe i un amb la Shangri-La Mary Weiss completen una discografia molt recomanable.

El rock americà està d’enhorabona. Bandes com Dr. Dog, Magnolia Electric Co (els veurem al Primavera), The War on Drugs o Reigning Sound han sabut recollir els fruits dels Dylan, Byrds, The Count Five o The Seeds entre d’altres, han afegit altres influències, i han sabut sumar tot el que els ha inspirat i motivat per fer música.

Aquí va un dels nous temes:

The Boys, and I mean “boys,” (hey, I could’ve legitimately used, “old white boys”) are in serious danger of becoming irrelevant, and one way they could become a viable party again is to invite some girls into the Club. But that’s narrowcasting, and here I’ll try to broaden the appeal, AND get some wimmen-folk-vote.

Some background: I am no product of classic liberalism. Hell, I still consider Atlas Shrugged a helluva piece of work, as much as I’ve come to mock it for its lack of realism w/r/t the human condition and abjectly horrific level of teh funny, which to me is critical to the aforementioned human condition. I grew up in rural IL in the 60’s, and most everyone I knew was white, quietly Christian, and my best friend’s family among many others were the products of “white flight” from Chicago. Overtly racist. (My folks, FSM bless them, didn’t cotton to that crap.)

I have worked in Corporate America for 25 years on Thursday. Not exactly a bastion of liberal thought.

Mostly what I do is engage. I loves me some debate, and I’m not afraid to tell The Man they’re all wrong.

So, anyway:

Taxes: Everyone, and I mean everyone, both sides of the ideological aisle, cannot stand and deeply mistrusts our existing tax code. Let’s be real: Our tax code is a monument to special interests, indecipherable by even tax “experts,” in short, a universally (in my experience) despised clusterfuck of institutional mistrust. (Which I stipulate is not good for either Dems or Republicans, the “institutional mistrust” idea.)

And when I say everyone, I mean everyone I, Regular Average Joe (you can call me John), engages on the subject. Several prominent Republicans, Dick Armey and Steve Forbes have taken the issue on–apologies for casting Steve Forbes as “prominent”–there have been others that it isn’t important to name. The point is they’re on the right track, but just can’t get past their apparently genetic inability to give a shit about middle class or especially poor people.

So, how about a starting point that goes something like this? (Insert some sensible Republican for the Clinton’s here, if you can find one; it’s sort of critical to the argument, and for the record, it’s an old pet-peeve of mine, so should probably be updated without Billary.)

The guiding principles that must be the foundation of a new tax system:

Everyone should be able to figure out everyone else’s taxes. In other words, someone like me, who hates the American tax code to the core of my being, should be able to calculate what Bill Gates owes/paid.
Any income category so defined by the Congress (I say only two are necessary: Earned and Unearned Income) has a 0% tax rate for those under $X dollars of said category.
The top rate gets first dibs on all future tax cuts.
A monument to Democratic machine political ineptitude is that they haven’t figured out that they can outflank the GOP on the right simply by performing one of those Capital-Steps PR events where, in this case, they just burn the Tax Code in effigy. They should, while they’re at it, invite every Republican they can talk into being there. They’ll get a few.

The U.S. Tax Code is a monument to every governmental principle our Founding Fathers tried to anticipate and circumvent; it is far longer than The Bible, and even harder to interpret precisely. This is patently ridiculous, since ultimately we are simply exchanging cash for services.

So, here’s where we start on the new tax code. Earned income is tax free for everyone up to $XX,000 (I say 36; $3K/month should provide for a decent set of choices on feeding, housing, and clothing your family). The 16 year old burger-flipper and Bill Gates both get this $36K ($XXK; the concept is far more important than the numbers, which should be debated vigorously).

The next flat rate starts above $XXK and goes to $XXX,000 (I say $200K to start) and is say, 20% or, XX%, and is again applicable to everyone who is working for money.

Above $XXX,000, the rate starts (year 1) at a percentage required to equal the prior year’s tax revenue figure. We could add higher rates, conceptually, using the same principles.

This would sell because, if you’re poor, what’s not to like, and if you’re rich, you control American politics anyway so you suddenly have lots of incentive to make some wise and responsible budget decisions. Even the Red State voters get this simple fact.

If you have to keep the Social Security tax, give up on the cap, for God’s sake. It’s the most regressive tax we have by a mile, since those with incomes unlikely to need SS are the ones who avoid lots of the taxes that fund it, year by year, as we go. Insane.

Unearned income works the same way. Allow Mr. 0% tax bracket to invest like Mr. Big does, and give him $X00 (say, $100/month) of his unearned income tax free. This benefits everyone, since now Mr. Poor has incentive to stimulate the economy by investing.

Again, trying to be simple and fair here, the next one up starts at X+1% (21% in this example–don’t we want more incentive to earn income than not earn income, collectively?) up to $XX,000. Above that, it gets taxed at a rate that combines with the top bracket of the earned incomer to be revenue neutral to the prior year, or whatever amount Congress and the POTUS can compromise on, budget wise.

It should work the same way for business. Define small, medium and large businesses by number of employees (my preference) or gross revenue—again, completely and sensibly debatable—and give them their first X% of earned income, tax free. Have two other brackets in which the tax remains flat in each earned and unearned income level, one for the medium sized company and the highest for the biggest companies, however (SIMPLY!) a big company is defined. Once again, if there is budget room down the road, the biggest companies get the first break on the tax rate.

No other deductions. It is the only fair way to do it. Every special and powerful interest group must hate it equally. This basis for debate is important.

The speech on Capitol Hill should be read, probably, by Bill Clinton, though he and Hillary are slaves to the Code anyway, so it would never happen, but if it did, it should start as the Code catches fire, and it should go like this:

“Ladies and gentlemen, fellow citizens, we are here today to mark a historic event in American politics.”

“Our current tax code, the one burning before you, is the Mount Rushmore of American special interest politics. You could spend you’re whole life trying to figure it out, and you would never finish your task.”

“There is not one person in this country that doesn’t on some level understand that this monstrosity is most beneficial to the most privileged in our society, since they are the only ones who can afford to pay someone else to take advantage of it.”

“Also, they are the ones who have written it.”

“The Democratic Party is going to fight for a tax code that is less than 20 pages long, that anyone with a high-school education can understand, provides confidence and hope for a better future to everyone, and that favors NO ONE.”

“We want to restore faith in our political system, and we believe this first step will go a long way towards doing so. There is no Enron, no World Com, no Arthur Anderson, no corporate scandal rooted in the complexity of the tax code if we join together to build one that is sane.”

I would let Bill take it from there.

It will never happen. It’s a big reason so few of us vote.”

There is no other national issue except the next one where The Man has exerted more control.

The War on Drugs:

This is the Holy Grail of irrational politics, where a “small” issue meets Teh Stoopid and loses the battle of reason. The very definition of bad government: Policy that wastes taxpayer money without improving the problem the money is alleged to mitigate.

More self-reference, since boy, what a drag to try to restate it:

There are too many small institutional absurdities to cover without being more boring than I already am, like the warning label we pay for on the fishing lure that says, “Harmful if swallowed,” [12] but a few of the bigger, laughably expensive ones deserve some analysis. My two favorites are the tax code and the War on Drugs, which President Bush re-declared in his lame 2004 State of Union speech.[13]

The laws of the land that say you can lose your life and possessions to marijuana while alcohol and tobacco remain legal are patently absurd. These laws effectively allow me to go home from work, chain smoke and get drunk every night,[14] while simultaneously having (in a perfect legal system—you know, our LAWS—what we use to officially determine right and wrong) at some point in time routed 80,000,000 Americans through the criminal justice system on MJ charges, at X (it’s a really big X) cost to the cherished taxpayer. Incredibly, only about a third of America sees this as absurd.

There are simply no rational grounds on which to defend this paradox. Was alcohol “moral” before Prohibition, “immoral” during, and “moral” again when the 18th was repealed by the 21st not 20 years later? What a marvelously flexible take on morality![15] What fantastic intellectual rigor! Meanwhile, an entire city of 500,000 to 1,000,000 political prisoners rots in jails, costs us many billions, and takes up space that should be used for those that do the rest of us harm.

Virtually every average Joe has seen or been someone too drunk to be in public. Joe knows alcohol is a drug, and Joe, or someone Joe likes pretty much and thinks is a good human being, enjoys it in excess (gets drunk) from time to time. In private, Joe feels exactly the same way about marijuana. Joe can’t really say this out loud, though.

“Drugs,” I’m shocked to need to report, have no inherent moral component, and which ones are “good” or “bad” is entirely a matter of culture, history date, and use habits, whether the substance is legal or not (See Rush Limbaugh). You can look it up. Start with early 20th Century America, to make it easy.

What percentages of Americans know how hard it is to get an Amendment passed and then repealed? Of those that DO understand how difficult this sea change is to legislate, can they imagine how big the mistake had to be to reverse it in a historical nanosecond? How many can connect the dots to the laws of today? As an old college professor of mine used to say, “the masses are asses.” (Big kudos here to the government propaganda machine: This is your brain if you think marijuana laws have any association with Reason, in an environment of legal alcohol and tobacco.)

After a generation and a half of this horrible corrosive and destructive thing called drug abuse, wouldn’t we as a nation have by now already broken down if all the claims about the danger to society were true? It isn’t like the War on Drugs has created much in the way of results over that period of time. Those youngsters always seem to be coming up with new ways to get high.

The definition of bad government is spending a fortune in tax dollars to make an existing problem worse (or at minimum no better) than it already is. How much money is the government’s credibility worth? Iraq, Schmiraq! 80,000,000 of us are ex- or current criminals according to the law. Now that’s protection from the tyranny of the drinking majority! Who, of course, get treated medically, instead of criminally.

Legalizing MJ or any other drug is not the point here. The point is that the War on Drugs is the best current illustration of how power and money work with absurdity and hypocrisy to create indifference, then scorn, and sooner or later detachment. The best example we have to examine of how Power and Wealth flaunt Reason to steal more Power and Wealth. It’s what happens when “I know what’s best for you” marries Truth (sort of, in this case—we haven’t been able to vote for a lifelong drug free person for POTUS in quite some time), but keeps Hypocrisy as a mistress.

Joe knows society would probably be a little less dangerous if no one drank, too. Didn’t work then, not working now. Joe thinks politicians are idiots.

The 4th Amendment of our Constitution has been eviscerated by this war; the police can now set up random roadblocks to make your sober self late for dinner, and barge through your door if they have reason to suspect “drugs” are involved; the burden of proof is not even on the government when they take all your stuff via asset forfeiture. You must have purchased that car your kid’s friend left a seed in through “drugs.” Innocent people get killed mistakenly all the time. Abuse runs rampant, because most of us don’t use illegal drugs, so why stick your neck out for those that do? It’s a beautiful thing if you’re the one getting fed by the $40,000,000,000 annual budget we devote to our 35-year-old war against an almost universal element of minority human nature, against, literally, ourselves.

And our politicians cry in the background, “We have to be more responsible with the People’s money!” At the same time, neither party makes any noise about changing the War on Drugs in any serious way, unless it’s expanding it. That’s just good politics.”

Shorter last section: The GOP won’t BELIEVE how much support there is out there for leaving people the fuck alone in their personal lives, which the 4th Amendment (if only the GOP worshipped #4 like they do #2), in my “originalist” interpretation of the Constitution was crafted to codify. The locals will handle most all abuse of this freedom just fine, in broad terms. Abuse of the authority can be taken up in the courts. (Said courts, sadly, will generally rule in favor the The Man in its current incarnation.)

Abortion:

Ah, the great litmus test. The thing I’ve never been able to understand is why either GOP or Dem politicians have been generally unable to frame this debate in religious terms. (To Obama’s credit, he’s done better than most..see his Notre Dame speech.)

Here’s how you do it:

But I have an Invisible Sky Wizard of my own.

Mine is a big-picture deity. I think the evidence is extraordinarily clear that whichever God you happen to believe in, He/She/It does not sweat the details. Horrifying things happen to wonderful people all the time; this is as much a part of life as death itself. War kills thousands and tons of people who plain couldn’t care less about the politics that caused it. Young, kind, decent people get horrible diseases through no fault of their own. It is difficult to imagine my own personal Deity getting involved in the Micro.

But IF there is a Deity, and since He/She/It is omniscient and omnipotent this Deity certainly wants us to at least doubt His (for the sake of discussion, we’ll go with “His” though my She and It designations remain viable) presence, because He certainly has the power to put that doubt to rest, so, if real, He must care about the Macro. (What’s the point of having one if not?) So, consider my god a big-picture kind of deity. Presuming One exists, which to my mind, He/She/It had every intention of us questioning.

MY God is far more concerned about overpopulation than abortion. MY God is far more concerned about global warming than oil production. MY God cares about us as a species, not us as individuals. Again, the evidence on this is clear in my eyes.

Both overpopulation and massive climate change represent a far bigger threat to God’s children than abortion or even war, though the latter is surely a symptom of too many people on the planet, as is plague and earthquakes and horrible micro-things, from any religious or Mother Natural rational perspective.

What are “miscarriages?” God’s abortions? Doesn’t that suggest that God has a plan for all these lost souls? How do we know otherwise? Why would we even question it?

Death, it seems to me, is a critical part of “God’s” plan. I’m very pro-death. I don’t understand keeping death-row inmates alive who prefer death, I don’t understand the politics of keeping the terminally ill alive against their wishes. I don’t understand an anti-abortion stand for rape and incest victims.

My God separated the rest of His creatures from us by reason. He/She/It gave us noggins, a beautiful, wonderful, fabulous world with which to work, and expected us to use and handle that most precious gift, the gift of rationality. (Save for the gift of “time,” which is the most precious of God’s gifts of all.)

My God will understand my approach. And I won’t kill anyone for believing in their Invisible Sky Wizard of choice. My God will dig me for that.

Update: If I had to bet the farm, I say death equals “lights out,” and I would also bet that if I’m wrong, my deity will understand.”

In general, the GOP needs to figure out that actual born women, who have paid some degree of dues, enjoy more rights than blastocyst-Americans.

Ah, shit. This post is already my most epic ever, I think. I’ll be back when the Blackhawks game is over, or tomorrow or the next day to offer some more free advice to Republicans everywhere, because I’m a giver. And I’ve given them enough to chew on already.

Update: I am fully aware that most of the GOP leadership will need to die of natural causes for any of this to happen. Anathema, overall, to the old white Catholic and/or Evangelical GOP base. But they’re going to die sooner or later, like we all do.

Should drug use be a criminal justice issue, or a public health issue?

Prohibition increases drug related crimes, especially drug related homicide. The same trend was evident during the time that alcohol was prohibited in America, so the government decided alcohol prohibition wasn’t the way to go.

Well, what about marijuana? What about other drugs? Should drug possession even be a crime? We know many drug users who are routinely arrested for drug possession are addicts. Sending them to jail over and over does nothing to address the problem of drug addiction. Why are we turning these addicts into criminals, instead of helping them recover from their drug addiction? Doesn’t that seem counterproductive?

The ACLU advocates taking drug use and possession out of the criminal justice system and putting it into the public health system, where it belongs. Addiction is a disease, not a crime! 1 million children in the United States are without parents, because the parents are incarcerated for drug offenses. That’s a whole lot of families ripped apart because of our failed approach at solving the drug problem in this country.

The drug problem will never be solved. As long as the human race survives, there are going to be people who want to consume mind-altering substances. There will always be those who become addicted, but we need to find a better way to deal with the situation because right now things are only being made worse by the “War on Drugs” that’s been raging in America for the past few decades.

Mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines that put small-time drug users behind bars in federal prisons for non-negotiable periods of time are hurting us, not helping! There are several bills being introduced in Congress this year that would help these non-violent, often first time offenders to get out of prison and back home to their families, where they belong. The first is H.R. 1466 – or The major drug trafficking prosecution act of 2009. This bill would remove mandatory minimum sentences from minor drug offenses. Another is H.R. 61 -The Federal Prison Bureau Nonviolent Offender Relief Act of 2009. The full text of both bills can be found at GovTrack.us.

Get involved! There are literally handfuls of web sites on the internet where you can reach out to your legislators about issues of importance to you. GovTrack.com allows you to track a bill, see the committees the bill has been referred to, and visit the web sites of the committee members where you can obtain their contact information. It’s important to stay in touch with your legislators. Lobby for or against issues you feel strongly about. This is an issue that affects so many families in America, please write to your legislators in support of both these bills. Better yet, write directly to members of the committees assigned to each bill and urge them to get behind this legislation and get it passed. It’s long overdue.

How can we claim to be the “land of the free” when we have the highest incarceration rate in the world?

You’ve gotta do something. Don’t you?
-Rebel Without A Cause (1955)

Tereu Tereu, all tangled up. The Fredericksburg, Va., quartet plays DC9 on Tuesday.

5.13 The Thermals @ Black Cat
Now We Can See, the Portland trio’s fourth album (and first for Kill Rock Stars), trades the vitriolic spasm of 2006’s The Body, The Blood, The Machine for a more triumphant outlook, complete with oh-way-oh sing-alongs. But none of this is at the expense of the band’s sharp, cynical wit, suckerpunch anthemics and fitful energy. Indeed, even as the outlook seems brighter, The Thermals keep a healthy dose of cynicism barbs their quiver. “When I Died” mocks humanity’s arrogance, even as the album’s title track promises optimism.

• The Thermals – “Now We Can See”

5.13 Rodriguez/The War on Drugs @ Rock & Roll Hotel
Tracing the end of 1960s psycheldelic Bacchanal, Rodriguez release two albums: 1970’s Cold Fact and 1972’s Coming From Reality. Both flopped. That is, until they caught ears half the world away, goign platinum in South Africa (unbeknownst to Rodriguez, who never saw a cent in royalties). Having been discovered a day-laborer in Detroit in 1996, Rodriguez’s twin classics have been re-released and the mysterious troubadour sent into the world. Notable in its blank, plaintive delivery, Rodriguez’s music speaks to social suffering, drug cutlture gone awry, divorce and gun sales soaring, the dream of an optimistic generation dashed to pieces. Flourishes of psychedelic noise puntuate Rodriguez’s songs, adding color and abrasive textures to his straightforward approach, but his voice speaks with a deadpan calm, chilling to this day. The decidedly younger War On Drugs mines influence from the heartland rock of Springsteen and Petty, Dylan’s city-blues and iconic Americana, as it pushes folk rock through a filter of indie rock guitar fuzz. Also on the bill, Donny Hue & The Colors.

• The War On Drugs – “Taking The Farm”

5.13 Red Collar @ Velvet Lounge
Earlier this month, Mine That Bird, a horse with 50-1 odds, won the Kentucky Derby in the second-biggest upset in Derby history (behind Donerail’s 1913 win at 91-1). As a fan (and, for the sake of full-disclosure, a friend) of Durham, N.C.’s Red Collar, Mine That Bird’s miraculous victory seemed more metaphor than chance. Like the horse, Red Collar has set itself against the odds, taking the band on the road full-time, pulling for an upset. But for these underdogs from Durham, every show becomes a miraculous victory, a sweat-drenched triumph of rock & roll conviction. Echoes of Fugazi’s angularity, Bruce Springsteen’s narrative bent and Mission of Burma’s thunder ring in the air left behind by Red Collar’s whirlwind shows. I’ve seen this band more times than I can remember and it has yet to disappoint.

• RYF interview with Red Collar’s Jason Kutchma

5.15 Southern Culture on the Skids/Los Straitjackets @ 9:30 Club
Longtime cult favorites Southern Culture on the Skids lay on the trailer park kitsch like no other, penning heartfelt odes like a greaseball Neruda. Witness the unassuming beauty of plastic seat sweat, banana puddin’ and the 1969 El Camino. Also, there’s a high likelihood of projectile fried chicken. How, you might ask, does this not fall to the obscene wayside of trivial novelty? And the answer is, simply, conviction. Though their tongues might be planted so far into their cheeks as to be confused with a ball of chaw, SCOTS commits to the bit until it becomes sincerity. And Rick Miller’s blazing guitar leads don’t hurt a bit, either. Same goes for Los Straitjackets, instro-surf revivalists whose luchador-masked faces never sing and never have to. The recently released Future Adventures of Los Straitjackets shows the quartet at its lightning-hot best, riding the nose on clean leads overtop a frothy overheader of a rhythm section. Fuzz-toned riffs open just enough for these melodic diversions, clean-cut tube-rides to aural immediacy.

5.15 Hammer No More The Fingers @ Rock & Roll Hotel
It’s not outlandish to claim that lyrics rarely matter in pop music. Great artists are forgiven for winding words with too little logic to glue them together. That’s what the melody is for, right?. It lets Stephen Malkmus get away with lines like “You’re my fact-checkin’ cuz,” and pass it off as a fart of genius. This pertains to Durham, N.C.’s Hammer No More The Fingers, precisely because it doesn’t. At first blush, this band, like so many, would toss off absurdist riddles in the form of songs, using words as a propellant for a melody to counter its intricate-but-catchy guitar-bass-drums interplay. Then the images start to reveal themselves, Duncan Webster’s stories begin to play out. Details are scratched and muddled in metaphor or personalized reference. But an ode to hallucinogenic mushrooms becomes a plea for validation, a pair of roommates dodge love, or a homeless man becomes an icon, as immutable as the asphalt upon which he sleeps. For Hammer No More, it’s all fun and games, and then it’s not.

5.16 Impossible Hair @ Velvet Lounge
References abound for the attentive listener playing Impossible Hair. But such games of sonic hide-and-seek, while fleetingly amusing, often end up being a reductive exercise that detracts focus from the topic at hand. Impossible Hair, remember? Indeed, it wouldn’t be difficult to draw lines of lineage from the band’s approachable pop template. Bits of new wave bounce and indie-pop absurdity flash intermittently, but the central trait of Impossible Hair’s musical offerings is a solid batch of midtempo pop-rock, not too clean, nor too sloppy, but just off-center enough to maintain interest.

5.17 Dan Deacon/Future Islands @ 9:30 Club
Splitting sides of a marbled purple 7-inch made one thing clear about the relationship between Dan Deacon and Future Islands. Both embrace a very audible, and very appealing sort of sonic whimsy. But they do so through divergent means. Deacon’s color-shocked tendencies toward the cartoonish lead to a sort of sugar-buzz immediacy, ecstatic in bursts, but quick to crash. Although, to be fair, his latest, Bromst, moves much more fluidly and singularly than its predecessor, Spiderman of the Rings, without sacrificing too much of the visceral excitment that oozed from Spiderman’s brightly colored bursts of sound. Future Islands, meanwhile, lay a more straightforward foundation in ’80s synth-pop, utilizing camp and vocal conviction to elicit a similar sort of ecstatic reaction from listeners. But even if Deacon’s sonic concoction explodes like pop rocks and Coke, and Future Islands’ goes down like a spoon full of granulated sugar, the two approaches lead to the same result, which is, almost invariably a physical one.

• Dan Deacon’s Porky Pig EP (9 mp3s)
• Future Islands – “Old Friend”

5.17 Prabir & The Substitutes @ Galaxy Hut, Arlington
Good-times garage-pop like a long-lost ’60s mother lode, all swoony melodies and ragged rave-ups, Richmond’s Prabir & The Substitutes turbo-charge a live set with rambunctious energy, like they’re the band that should be playing/rescuing every lame party. It’s a cold, shriveled heart that doesn’t pump a little faster upon exposure to these jangle-n-chime guitars, cool breeze harmonies and casual instrumental interplay.

5.18 XMC @ Black Cat
Boasting former members of The Holy Rollers, Negative Approach and The Meatmen is one way to assert your punk pedigree, but the music still has to speak for itself. XMC’s superfuzz guitars and sludgy rhythms sling grime like Mudhoney or early Nirvana. Bitter cynicism and screeching guitars give fire to “Dogs,” while “Killing Time On The Radio” leans into an uncharacteristacally clean post-punk bass groove. Such detours aside, XMC’s a frayed wire spewing sparks and rusty flecks, and resurrecting grunge like it had stayed underground.

5.19 Edie Sedgwick/The Poison Arrows @ Black Cat
Behold the fever and the fury. Edie Sedgwick’s cynical tomes on celebrity (each song named for a famous person), set to spare, electronically-based arrangements, read like twisted tabloids, an agitated thorn in the side of our American “culture.” This, even as Sedgwick (nee Justin Moyer, ex-Antelope) embraces said pop-culture as a means to express his pansexual, post-ironic pop music. Confused? The concept gets dense, but the product stands its ground. Dancey, lo-fi gems flip phrases like hotcakes and dig grooves to beget shaking booties. As Paris Hilton would say (and so often does), “That’s hot.”

Hot, also, is Chicago trio The Poison Arrows, albeit in a much different way. The wound-up fury to Sedgwick’s let-loose pop, The Poison Arrows blast mathy post-hardcore befitting band culling members from Atombombpocketknife and Don Caballero. The band’s debut long-player, First Class, And Forever, stretches its tendrils across 51-and-a-half minutes of winding guitars; throbbing, belly-deep bass; and a veritable firing squad of precisely devastating drums. Smart and brutal. The brawn to Sedgwick’s razor tongue.

• Edie Sedgwick – “Sissy Spacek”
• The Poison Arrows – “Total Beverage”

5.19 Tereu Tereu/Roman Candle @ DC9
Pop music takes many shapes, as evidenced by this pairing of Virginian quartet Tereu Tereu with Nashville-via-Chapel Hill outfit Roman Candle. Where Tereu Tereu’s output moves in jagged lines, taking cues from Talking Heads’s sonic breadth. Roman Candle, on the other side, builds from a more structured template, injecting Neil Young’s rustic-soul into pop- informed Americana. The two are unified in the chorus, treating it as the crux of the song. Both arrive slinging new albums, Tereu Tereu’s long-awaited All That Keeps Us Together, and Roman Candle’s Oh Tall Tree In The Ear. Also of note, Roman Candle’s new LP was preceded by three free EPs, available here.

5.19 Elvis Perkins In Dearland @ Iota, Arlington
The ever unassuming Elvis Perkins creeps casually along like his songs – his gentle, wistful gems – destined to be underappreciated. Beautifully rendered, Perkins’ music shuffles like a shy boy, thoughtful and calm, even in the face of heady themes. Indeed, that’s a major part of the appeal. Still nursing the lingering scars revealed on Ash Wednesday, Perkins’ latest, Elvis Perkins In Dearland(the name denotes both album and band) is an often mournful series of ruminations, though this mournfulness takes many shapes. The horn-led standout “Doomsday” mourns like a New Orleans funeral, while “How’s Forever Been, Baby?” stumbles and mumbles its drunken sadness. Ample nuance within a narrow emotional scope could be called Elvis Perkins’ calling card. So could great songwriting.

Ron Paul communicates his opinion regarding the reformation of federal drug policy at the PBS Republication Presidential debate in 2007.  His proposals are straightforward and he uses examples from history to validate his ideas.  Paul makes provocative statements which express his opinion of the injustice within America.  He states, “If we had equal justice under the law I think it would be a big improvement.”  He then focuses on communicating his opinion that the current drug laws are the cause for the mistreatment of blacks on a nationwide scale.

Paul alludes to the Prohibition era to make  his point clear, “Prohibition didn’t work and prohibition on drugs hasn’t worked either.”  He refers to drug users as people who have a disease.  The judicial system sees alcoholism as a disease and does not severely prosecute abusers of alcohol as it does drug users.   Paul vocalizes the inequalities within the American judicial system and asserts that the War on Drugs is simply not working.

President Obama is moving in a new direction to reform laws which criminalize the use of marijuana.  According to Bill Piper, national affairs director of the Drug Policy Alliance, Obama stated before he was elected President that marijuana should be treated as a health issue rather than a criminal justice issue.  A February 2009 article from The San Francisco Chronicle indicates that Obama will end government raids on marijuana dispensaries in California.  He is also working with Congress to provide all states the ability to make their own rules regarding the medicinal use of marijuana.
Information on the internet concerning the war on drugs and its collateral damage is represented heavily by the organizations and citizens who have been affected, directly or indirectly, and are taking the initiative to make their voices heard as an attempt to change American drug policy.  The website entitled  StoptheDrugWar.org is an example of an organization using the internet to provide a voice for citizens who feel that the government is abusing its power.
The L.E.A.P. organization (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition) is directed by cops, judges and prosecutors who speak at forums around the country in order to persuade the public to abolish the prohibition of drugs in America.   LEAP compares drug prohibition to the alcohol prohibition of the 1920s.  LEAP relies on donations from its members to fund its public speakers.
Information on the internet representing  the anti-drug point of view is mostly presented as factual and is either provided by the government or a government institution.  The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) website contains an entire library of multimedia resources which express the dangers of illegal drugs.  The data consists of  statistical information from surveys and the findings from scientific studies which detail the dangers of illegal drugs.
Anti-drug rhetoric is largely represented by the government, while decriminalization rhetoric is generally represented by a demographic which expresses dissent.  This trend is an indication of a war that is gaining momentum as time passes.
A March 2003 article from Eugene, Oregon’s The Register Guard titled, “Glass Artists’ Arrests Stoke ‘Culture War’”,  details an example in which two young entrepreneurs were secretly investigated by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration which led to the arrests of the owners.  The artists believed that they where conducting a legal business.  They faced three years in prison and $250,000 fines, as well as forfeiture of their businesses and homes.  The arrests raise a number of issues for American citizens concerning our relationship to our government.  The “War on Drugs” has developed its own synonym: “The Culture War”.
-By Max Edmonds

Stopthedrugwar.org-
http://stopthedrugwar.org/reader_blogs/2009/apr/18/deprivation_of_rights_oppression

U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration-http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/multimedia.html

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition-
http://leap.cc/cms/index.php?name=Content&pid=5

Cannabis News.com-
http://cannabisnews.com/news/15/thread15678.shtml

Palm Springs Bum.com-
http://palmspringsbum.com/bbs/viewtopic.php?p=5578&sid=ddba7ba8189583f8a70428f1834b403b

Allison Kilkenny is a political humorist, blogger and co-host of Citizen Radio, an often derisive and never indecisive radio program described as being “like CNN, but with WAY more swearing.” Her work has appeared in The Nation Magazine, Huffington Post, The Daily Beast, 23/6, and her own blog, http://allisonkilkenny.wordpress.com/. Recently, we discussed topics ranging from overcrowding in prisons to being G. Gordon Liddy’s “Twitter buddy.”

Progress, she says, is “Telling the truth and being truthful with ourselves. It’s hard to approach these big questions when you start with a big lie like, ‘America brings freedom to the world.’ We don’t. We bomb them and ruin their societies to reach our imperialist goals. We imprison our own citizens at a greater rate then any other country in the world. America has 5% of the world’s population, but 25% of the world’s prisoners. Most of those prisoners are non-violent drug offenders. We’re an imperialist, prison state. That’s the truth. Let’s start with that truth and work toward fixing it.”

Connelly: Have there ever been moments when you have had trouble finding the humor in a particularly serious situation? Have you ever felt later that you may have went “too far” when talking or writing about a certain subject?

Kilkenny I have a hard time joking about the torture memos that just came out. It’s not that it can’t be done, but I truly believe Addington, Yoo, Cheney, Feith, Bybee, Bush, Rumsfeld, and Haynes are war criminals and deserve to be in jail. So it gives me pause, and I have to step back and regroup before I can write a punchline. I don’t think there’s such a thing as “too far,” but there is such a thing as “not funny.” Any subject can be funny in the right hands, just like pretty much anything can be offensive in the wrong hands. I’ve heard and read hacky jokes and pieces that I find extremely offensive simply because they’re unfunny. See: anything by Maureen Dowd.

Connelly: Bill Moyers recently asked on his program if Jon Stewart gets away with saying things that others in the media can’t because Stewart is a comedian. Is this your experience? Does it become easier to make controversial statements if you use humor?

Kilkenny Absolutely. People in power never harass the clowns like they harass serious journalists.. Humor as a form of dissent is an extremely powerful tool because it can only be used by the repressed of a society. You never hear rich people doing shtick like, “What’s the DEAL with poor people?” simply because they wield all the power, so it wouldn’t be funny. Humor only works if it’s the repressed poking fun at other repressed people, or the repressed poking fun at the elite. That’s the genius of the Daily Show and Jon Stewart. Stewart’s whole gag is based on one little comic poking fun at the entire global establishment.

Connelly: You once wrote that what was needed was someone to carry on George Carlin’s torch, someone to thumb the proverbial eye of the establishment. Who do we have like that today?

Kilkenny There are a lot of comics and performers that do this, John Stewart and Stephen Colbert being a couple of them. If I can be wildly bias for a moment, my boyfriend, comic Jamie Kilstein does it… It’s not like people are less brave or less clever than they were back in Carlin’s heyday. It’s just that it’s more difficult to hear a diverse range of views because of our corporately controlled media. That’s what we call the mainstream media. It’s the homogenization of opinion. You really have to go off the grid or think independently to find unique perspectives.

Connelly: Many in the media behaved in what you described as a “hawkish” manner concerning the recent incidents of Somali pirates. You even called out liberal pundit Rachael Maddow. What do you think is being ignored in this story? Why do you think these facts have been under reported?

Kilkenny Western industrial fishing ships have been overfishing Somali waters for years, and also dumping nuclear waste into Somali waters. Somalian fishermen rely on fishing for their survival. Suddenly, the fish were gone. Not only that, but the United Nations reported that over 300 Somalians then developed radiation sickness and died from all the nuclear waste poisoning their water. Many of those fisherman got together and formed what they call a coastguard. We call them pirates. That’s one thing that goes under-reported. Another fact that goes under-reported is the age of these pirates. Some of them are quite young (15, 16 years of age).
Now, imagine if China came to the United States eastern coastline and began stealing our fish and dumping nuclear waste in our waters, killing 300 New Yorkers. What would we do? I think forming a coastguard would be a very tame response to such an atrocity.
The caveat I always attach here is that it’s never acceptable to take hostages. Never. However, I think it’s important to examine the causes of these conflicts, or nothing ever gets better.

Connelly: Your recent article about the Somali incident, “In Defense of Pirates,” has drawn a lot of criticism on the Internet. I’ve read some of the comments, and they are downright threatening. It reminds me of something that Betty Winston Baye once said, “after a while, if they don’t come at you with a gun, you can sort of laugh about it.” How do you react to threatening comments? Why do you think that this article angered so many people?

Kilkenny It tells me I hit a nerve, which is a good thing. War resisters drew an enormous amount of criticism during the lead-up to the Iraq war simply because an anti-war position was an unpopular stance to take. When the mainstream media keeps regurgitating the message that Navy Seals are awesome, and dirty pirates are evil men with no sane motivation, then of course some blogger writing about defending pirates looks absolutely batty. It’s something they’ve never heard or read before, maybe. It’s upsetting. It radically challenges their world view. So it’s good that they are responding so strongly to it.

Connelly: Speaking of angering people, G. Gordon Liddy is apparently not a fan of yours. Please share the story of how you ended up angering the former Nixon-ite.

Kilkenny We’re Twitter buddies! G. Gordon Liddy is on Twitter, and he calls himself “Gman,” on all his Tweets, which I find really gross and juvenile, so I wrote him to tell him so. I said, “Calling yourself Gman on your tweets makes me feel nauseous,” to which he responded with something like, “Well, your writing makes me want to vomit, so we’re even.” So now I’ve had a criminal say my writing makes him want to vomit. I hope to continue the conversation one day. I want to ask Liddy what prison food tastes like.

Connelly: Returning to the treatment the story of the Somali pirates has received in the media, one of the reasons you gave for Rachael Maddow not being more evenhanded in the story is that NBC is run by GE, a weapons manufacturer. Hypothetically, if there were an Allison Kilkenny Show on MSNBC, would you have done things differently?

Kilkenny No, because there can’t be an Allison Kilkenny Show on MSNBC. Or there could be, but it would be watered-down and pointless. I couldn’t talk about anything important because the big, important ideas challenge corporations and the military-industrial complex, two things that are pretty dear to NBC and GE. Even “important, anti-war voices” like Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow only criticize war to a point. They never go an extra step and start bashing the corporations making vast sums of money from building weapons. That would be too radical, so it’s not allowed. Maddow even alluded to being censored about the conflict in Gaza. She said something about finding it difficult to criticize Israel, and she gave sort of a wink and a nod to the camera. I’d wager she’s censored constantly, but what she has as a result is a pretty lukewarm show that occasionally covers an under-reported story. I’m sure it could be groundbreaking and marvelous if it wasn’t corporately controlled because Maddow is a brilliant lady.

Connelly: What do you think the most important story going uncovered by the mainstream media is?

Kilkenny: There are a lot, but just a few are the pointless War on Drugs, overcrowded prisons, corporate mergers (corporate media,) white-collar corruption, poverty, the failing educational system, the stagnated minimum wage, the death of unions, and American imperialism.

Connelly: You have interviewed, and have scheduled interviews with, some very interesting people, Noam Chomsky and Glenn Greenwald, for instance. Who is the one person you’d most like to have on Citizen Radio?

Kilkenny: Amy Goodman, which may happen soon. We have mutual friends, and we’re trying to lasso her for an interview. She’s a tricky one to get a hold of because she’s so busy.

Connelly: Who do you feel the most important thinker in modern society is?

Kilkenny: Noam Chomsky. He’s almost maddeningly logical, and he’s had an “open door” policy about debating anyone for decades. I can’t imagine the man has ever lost his temper. I admire that. He’s quietly confident with his knowledge. If you want to see some amazing debating, Google Chomsky debating William F. Buckley. Buckley doesn’t know what to do with him. It’s great.

Connelly: In a recent Huffington Post article, you stated “the most brilliant trick the rich ever pulled over the poor was when they reinforced fractures between the serving class,” and reminded the reader of the railroad strike of 1877. What is preventing unity among the poor today? What could end this disunity?

Killkenny The creation of meaningless categories. The elites are very aware that most of the American citizenry are poor, so it’s important to keep them divided and bickering amongst themselves. That’s why the issue of immigration is played up so much. Union members aren’t losing their jobs because corporations are shipping their jobs overseas to save money. It’s those dirty immigrants! Those immigrants are taking your jobs (that no longer exist anyway)! Of course, if those immigrants were legalized, and the unions (along with immigrants) collectively fought for a living wage, then everyone would benefit. But no one thinks of doing that because the media (with an assist from pundits like Lou Dobbs) continue to stoke in-fighting among poor people. The elites thrive on perpetuating the lie that there isn’t enough to go around for all poor people. Well, no, there’s not enough to go around if 1% of the population hordes 90% of the wealth. But that’s not a very moral thing to do anyway.

For more information about Kilkenny and Citizen Radio:
http://allisonkilkenny.wordpress.com/
http://breakthruradio.com/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/allison-kilkenny

For more information about her boyfriend, the comedian Jamie Kilstein:
myspace.com/jamiekilstein

According to the Associated Press, President Obama’s cabinet has joined forces with U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton to put an end to one of the most hotly debated drug laws in America.

Under current law, possession of 5 grams of crack carries the same mandatory minimum sentence as possession of 500 grams of powdered cocaine.  This has frequently been cited as proof of systemic racism within our country’s drug laws, as crack is often associated with minorities, particularly African-Americans.

Crack, a crystalized version of cocaine, is usually smoked with a pipe, while powdered cocaine is typically snorted or smoked from aluminum foil.  The effects of crack and powdered cocaine are nearly identical, regardless of the method of ingestion.

During the “crack epidemic” of the 1980’s, when the federal government was likely manufacturing quite a bit of crack themselves, congress passed the law requiring harsh punishment for possession.  They claimed that crack was more addictive than coke, and that the people who used crack were more prone to violence than their coked-up, slightly paler and wealthier brethren who appreciated a line of blow every once in a while.

They were wrong, yet no one seemed to mind.  The jails filled with “dangerous” black men.  Over 80% of crack convictions have been placed square on their shoulders, although estimates indicate that only 25% of crack users are african-american.

Assistant Atty. Gen. Lanny Breuer testified before the Senate Judiciary committee, stating that “this administration believes our criminal laws should be tough, smart, fair and perceived as such by the American public.”

He also explained that the laws were based on faulty assumptions, and that crack users have not been shown to be more dangerous at all.  The Administration and the Justice Department agree that stricter sentencing should be reserved for people who commit violent crimes.

The idea was well-received among democratic senators, but they are cautious about the effects of a retroactive law, as it would likely flood the courts with crack-related cases.

-by Josh Clark

Forbes magazine just released their list of “AMERICA’S MOST DANGEROUS CITIES” and apparently not only have the top 10 stayed about the same 10 repeat offenders as years past but all top 10 cities have been connected by the FBI to the Mexican drug cartel as transit points.  Just what we need, so people can start blaming violence SOLELY on Mexican drug lords.

1)–Detroit, Michigan.  (No surprises here.)

2)–Memphis, Tennessee.  (Really?  Well, I don’t know much about Tennessee, or do I?)

3)–Miami, Florida.  (Oh another, “no surprises here” city.)

4)–Las Vegas, Nevada.  (All that gambling and whoring and overdosing will eventually lead to trouble.)

5)–Stockton, California.  (I’ve never heard of this place??  I’m heading over to wikipedia.)

6)–Orlando, Florida.  (Busted!  I live in Orlando and let me tell ya, people are angry a lot here.  I have violent outbursts from time to time too, people fear my Dragon’s fire.  Though I don’t know anything about Mexican drug trafficking, I swear!…….where’s my lawyer?)

7)–Little Rock, Arkansas.  (Little Rock?  Aren’t they god-fearing Christians over yonder?  Demons are taking over!)

8)–Charleston, South Carolina.  (Oh yes, most definitely.  Them people are crazy violent, and I only know because I’ve talked to them over the phone and the kind of language used by them folks is exactly the kind this Disney-approved, family-oriented blog does not stands for.)

9)–Nashville, Tennessee.  (Well they drink alot, not that I’m saying alcohol has anything to do with it, but you go ahead and mix alcohol, shotguns, and two-timing-good-for-nothing-spouses and see what happens.)

10)–Baltimore, Maryland.  (Have you ever watched HBO’s “The Wire”??)

11)–New Orleans, Louisiana.  (Oh my beloved New Orleans, I miss you.  I know I haven’t visited in like 3 years but I’m coming, you’ll see.)

12)–Baton Rouge, Louisiana.  (I’ve never been to Baton Rouge but I’ve only heard good things about it.  Well, with the exception of this here list of course.)

13) West Palm Beach, Florida.  (Yes!  Those damn old retirees are freaking rude and violent.  You should see the way the drive up and down I-95, scary!)

14)–Charlotte, North Carolina.  (Oh yeah, for the same reasons I pointed out above on item number 8.  Everybody knows that if you are driving up I-95 you stop in Georgia, get gas and then you drive straight through ’til you reach Virginia.  Don’t speed though, the troll on both South and North Carolina are always out to get ya, and they are always pissed about something, threatening jail time for back-talkers.  You’ve been warned.)

15)–Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  (The city of brotherly love, my ass.  San Francisco called and they want their slogan back.)

Isn’t it funny, how Detroit seems to always be number 1 on this list yet no other Michigan city ever makes it to this list….well, at least not on the top 15?

By my counts, it seems that Florida is the most violent state with 3 entries here, more than any other state…and yet everyone wants to retire in Florida!  Crazy fools!  Louisiana and Tennessee follow with 2 entries each.  As a matter of fact, most of these cities are all in the south.  Oh you violent, drug addicted southerners, you! (I live in the south, I can say that) so much for that southern hospitality uh?  Blame it the constant heat.

Forbes does not gives you any more rankings than 15.  I’m surprise that meccas like Los Angeles, New York City, and D.C. aren’t on this list.  And speaking of people not on this list, where the hell is Texas???  We all know how trigger happy they are!

Discuss.

For the first time since crack cocaine sparked a war on drugs 20 years ago, the number of black Americans in state prisons for drug offenses has fallen sharply, while the number of white prisoners convicted for drug crimes has increased, according to a report released today. Read the entire story by clicking the link below:

http://www.letstalkhonestly.com/blacknewsblackviews.html