Tuesday, November 13, 2007

THE RESTORATION OF HUMAN HERITAGE ACT

The assertions of this act stand to represent the historical, cultural, and scientific facts related to the use of psychotropic substances as a natural element of human heritage. The purpose of this act encompasses the reform of the Controlled Substances Act, the Marihuana Tax Act, and all other subsequent legislative policies of the War on Drugs. The Restoration of Human Heritage Act seeks to reclassify the scheduling of controlled drugs by establishing a new classification for ethno-medicinal plants while leaving the classification of synthetic or refined drugs intact. In order to understand the necessity for reclassification, the facts of human drug use and the government’s attempt to control it need to be considered.

THE WAR ON DRUGS
In America today, The U.S. Congress runs a War on Drugs using the blueprints of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, otherwise known as the Controlled Substances Act (1), while in Texas, the three branches of state government follow the guidelines of the Texas Controlled Substances Act, a document that mimics in language the standards of the federal policy (2). Both documents schedule the illegal drugs according to addictive and medicinal potential, while outlining the procedures for prosecution and punishment.

According to the Drug Policy Forum of Texas, America has the toughest drug laws and the highest addiction rates in the world (3). To date, the American justice system has incarcerated twelve times more prisoners for drug offenses than it did in 1980, yet the price of illegal drugs on the street has gone down, while the traffic of illegal drugs has gone up (3). As of 2005, it is estimated that over 112 million Americans (or 46.1% of the general population) age 12 or over have used illegal drugs at least once in their lifetime, while over 35 million Americans (14.4%) in the same demographic have used illegal drugs within the last year (4). These Americans represent more criminal activity than the U.S. justice system can possibly handle.

Between 1995 and 2003, 40 percent of inmates in federal prisons were incarcerated on drug related charges (6). In 2002, of the 125,655 incarcerated citizens in Texas, 41% were Black, 28% were Latino, and 31% were white (5). Whites constituted 52% percent of the total Texas population that same year, while Blacks constituted 12%, and Latinos made up 32% (5). According to these numbers, minority groups in Texas take up a disproportionate amount of prison space. The War on Drugs began as a means to control and incarcerate minority groups that most frequently used psychotropic drugs, including Blacks, Mexicans, and Asians. The skewed demographic statistics that color the Texas and U.S. prison populations suggest that the racist policies of the War on Drugs continue in full effect.

As of 2005, in total, the U.S. federal government has spent over $17 billion to fight illegal drugs, while the state of Texas has spent over $26 billion (3). As a consequence of these prohibitive acts of legislation, any human on American soil that controls or uses the scheduled illicit substances, without the approval of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, engages in criminal behavior. This includes scientists, doctors, patients, the mentally ill, religious and spiritual leaders, and their communities of believers.

THE WAR ON MEDICINE
The three branches of the federal government and the Food and Drug Administration, by classifying Cannabis sativa as a Schedule 1 drug, have declared that cannabis has no legitimate medical use in the United States and that it is addictive (10,p52). A statement on behalf of the DEA suggests, however, that “patients” that might stand to benefit from cannabis derived-drugs may legally buy the patented pharmaceutical drugs Marinol (11). This inconsistent policy position stands contrary to the historical record.

Cannabis as an herbal medicine has a four thousand year history of recorded medicinal use (7,p94). Cannabis has been used for medicinal and spiritual purposes in ancient Europe (8,p27), China (8,p17), India (8,p20), Africa (16,p94), Egypt, (8,p23), and the Middle East (8,p38). It is considered to be a divine sacrament according to Hindus and Buddhists (8,p21), and a blessing from God according to Coptic Christians (20,p53), Rastafarians (8,p263), and Sufi Muslims (8,p41).

The government of the United States has already investigated any negative side effects of cannabis use and found little evidence to justify the classification of marijuana as a schedule 1 substance. A 1925 tribunal by the U.S. Army Medical Corps in Panama concluded that marijuana posed no “appreciable deleterious influence on the person using it” (8,p132). The 1944 New York City Mayors Committee on Marihuana found that cannabis was not chemically addicting, that its smoke does not constitute a social hazard, and that its use is not detrimental to the health of the user, even over long periods of time (9,p325). The 1973 Shafer Commission came to a similar conclusion, and suggested the decriminalization of the possession of marijuana (8,p246). In 1988, after viewing hundreds of government documents related to marijuana substance abuse, DEA judge Francis Young stated that, “marijuana is one of the safest therapeutically active substance known to man” (20,p35).

In 1975, anthropologist Vera Rubin, under the funding of the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, published a report entitled “Ganja in Jamaica” that investigated the potential dangers of the frequent short-term or long-term use of marijuana among the people of Jamaica. The study concluded that marijuana use was responsible for the decrease in alcohol consumption within the population, that the long-term use of marijuana had no hazardous effects on mental or physical health, that there was no link between marijuana and crime or harsher drug use, and that the open-environment of marijuana use among Jamaican communities created cultural control mechanisms that governed the drug’s use (8,p259). These taxpayer-funded investigations resonate with the conclusions of scientific investigations spanning decades of research with good reason.

Medicinally, Cannabis is very healthy. Cannabis seed oil is high in essential fatty acids like Omega-3 and Omega-6, and protein, all of which are necessary to the human body for building strong cells, and more importantly, healthy nervous and brain tissue (10,p58). Cannabis oil and resin can be used topically to treat bruises, small infections, eczema, arthritis, body aches, and many kinds of pain (20,p37-41). Cannabis oil and resin has a very low toxicity and can be used internally to alleviate or treat glaucoma, stress and anxiety, depression, insomnia, epilepsy, and post traumatic stress disorder, as well as to treat many of the symptoms of debilitating disorders like AIDS, and Multiple Sclerosis(10,p49-51), Alzheimer’s (28), and Parkinson’s Disease (29). Furthermore, the cannabinoids of marijuana seem to have anti-cancer properties (20,p37). Recent research from scientists in the United Kingdom suggests that THC molecules produced in the resin of cannabis sativa actively “switch off” the growth of cancer cells in laboratory tests (12). If this holds true of human cancer cells, then humanity can add cancer to the long list of diseases and disorders treatable by cannabis sativa. Unfortunately, American scientists are impeded in their medical research on cannabis sativa. The War on Drugs has made legal access to this age-old medicinal plant difficult at best.

Like cannabis, coca, the source of refined cocaine, has a long history of medicinal and subsistence use by native communities in Central and South America. The U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime has published an ethnographic study on the effects of coca consumption by the native people of Peru (13). The study concluded that the consumption of the raw leaves of the coca plant revealed no addictive consequences. The study confirmed that the consumption of coca leaves supplements the native diet with calcium, and other nutrients that may be hard to obtain from other subsistence resources. The study suggested that the usage of the coca leaves promoted the physiological adaptation to life in high altitude environments. Despite these scientifically sound arguments, under the War on Drugs, the U.S. government has continued to spray herbicides onto the farmlands of coca growers in order to curb the influx of cocaine, an activity that is certain to create future enemies of our neighbors to the south (25).

Another botanical “drug” classified as a Schedule 1 substance is dimethyl-triptamine (DMT) (1). Nature has found a way to produce DMT within an untold number of plant and animal species, including the human brain (14,p42). Interestingly, DMT is but one hallucinogenic molecule among a broad triptamine-class of molecules found in nature, including psylocibine from the Strotopharia family of ‘magic’ mushrooms (14,p36), lysergic acid mono-amide (LSA, a relative of LSD-25) from the Ipomoea ‘Morning Glory’ (17,p97), and the human neurotransmitter serotonine (15,p34).

Under the Controlled Substances Act, peyote, like DMT, cannabis, and coca, is listed as a Schedule 1 addictive drug with no medicinal potential (1). In reality, this is not true. Members of the Native American Church use peyote to treat alcoholism in their communities to a significant degree (17,p106). Peyote is viewed as a religious sacrament, and a vehicle of communion between the peyote user and any sacred spirit or ancestral relative encountered during a vision quest (7,p154). Under U.S. law, only members of the Native American Church may harvest, possess, and consume peyote (17,p106). This expression of U.S. law violates the establishment clause of the 1st Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by establishing the Native American Church as the sole sanctuary of legal shamanic expression.

THE WAR ON SPIRIT
According to the policies of the War on Drugs, shamanism, humanity's oldest and most globally widespread indigenous religion, is illegal to practice (22,p39). This is because shamanism may typically, though not always, entail the consumption of "illegal" natural psychoactive substances like psylocibe, peyote, DMT, coca, and cannabis within the context of a healing ritual or vision quest (16,p108).

The Controlled Substances Act also prohibits the consumption of shamanic medicines produced by plants that, although they contain powerful scheduled substance, remain legal to cultivate in the United States. These would include, among many others, common garden plants like Datura and Brugmansia (7,p140), San Pedro cacti (7,p59), Morning Glories, and Acacia, Mimosa, and Phalaris grasses (7,p116).

Shamanic traditions and their floral accessories are found among nearly all indigenous people on every continent of the world, while shamanic symbols permeate the mythologies of the world's leading religions today (22,p29). A cultural truth regarding human ancestry is that all people alive right now are descendants of hunter-gather/shamanic communities (18,p133). It appears that the antiquity of humanity's quest to "expand" the mind with environmental compounds reaches far beyond the boundaries of history (22,p29).

Anthropologists have recorded ethnographic surveys from around the world illustrating the indigenous use of psychoactive substances within shamanic rituals (19,p113). A recent cross-disciplinary interpretation of prehistoric rock and cave art, some dating as far back as 40,000 years, suggests that the expressions of prehistoric abstract thought are shamanic in origin (18,p96). The symbols and motifs of prehistoric rock art are similar throughout the world, despite the geographically vast distances separating them. It is clear that ancient cultures shared a link that transcended their regional isolation, and this link is the genetic architecture of human consciousness (18,p173).

According to the recent theories of art historians, the motifs of prehistoric artwork represent recreations of the “vision quest,” a shamanically induced altered state of consciousness used to commune with spirits and heal sickness (18,p174). If this revolutionary theory of rock art is true, and it appears to be the best explanation yet for the prehistoric “creative explosion”, then humanity’s use of psychotropic drugs may extend to the dawn of human symbolic intelligence.

THE WAR ON SCIENCE
Humans get “high” from cannabis, coca, DMT, peyote, psyilocibe, opium, and datura, among hundreds of other plant and animal substances, because the human nervous system is genetically designed to accomodate psychotropic chemicals (14,p52). The human body naturally produces and metabolizes many of these compounds. For example, the human nervous system produces endorphins that govern the body’s sensitivity to pain and pleasure. The word "endorphin" is derived from the phrase "endogenous- morphine”, morphine being a compound produced in the sap of the opium poppy, and “endogenous” meaning a compound produced within the human body (24,p198).

Scientists have also recently identified the human endo-cannabinoid system featuring anandamide, or THC, the active agent in cannabis 'marijuana' (27), and scientists have identified the existence of endogenous DMT in the pineal gland of the human brain (14,p55). Furthermore, many botanically produce substances mimic the action of human neurotransmitters. Nicotine from Nicotiana 'tobacco' mimics acetylcholine (26), caffeine from the coffee plant mimics adenosine (26), and mescaline from the peyote cactus mimics adrenaline (25,p26).

These drugs easily slip through the body's protective "blood-brain barrier”. This barrier filters to some degree many toxins and fats from passing into the brain with the flow of blood (14,p52). Psychotropic “drug” molecules operate on human consciousness because humans are genetically hardwired to accommodate these substances; the brain readily accepts them, not necessarily as a toxin, but rather as a natural, metabolic member of the nervous system. The human nervous system produces and accommodates these chemicals endogenously, and they drive the very core of conscious experience on a fundamental level (26). Under the Controlled Substances Act, the nervous system of every human in America is inherently an illegal drug producer and user of the “scheduled” substances popularly known as morphine, DMT, psilocybine, THC, mescaline, and the amphetamines. How has it come about that so many plants from around the world are producing chemicals that function as natural human neurotransmitters within the human brain?

THE WAR ON THOUGHT
Throughout human existence on Earth, entheogens, or “spirit-evoking” drugs, have been a significant resource for personal survival and of social, and more importantly, personal empowerment in society, especially with respect to the health of the individual (19,p117)). Within the great and diverse history of human culture, the pattern remains that the controllers of the drugs have the most power.

The policies of the War on Drugs have established a power struggle between the government and the vast network of parties consequently founded within “underground” criminal markets. The individual citizens of America are caught in between these feuding factions, and have little real power over the beneficial attributes of our oldest ethno-medicines. The millennia-old traditions of respect and reverence that governed the drug-induced state have been practically wiped clean, thus paving the way for a society wallowing in addiction and substance abuse. Lost in the fray is the power of science to analyze and quantify the medicines of our ancient past and their influence on the evolution and function of the human mind (14,p28).

If an “inalienable human right” encompasses those elements that define what it means to be human, such as “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” then the power to use the medicines of the Earth to heal the mind and soul is a right inherent to the ideals of the American democracy. An important, unifying element within the Texas and U.S. Bill of Rights is the notion of an individual's "freedom of thought." After all, there can be no civil liberty in the form of free speech, freedom of faith or press, or freedom to assemble and petition government without the freedom of the individual to cognitively choose a means of expression. In this manner, when there is no freedom of thought, there is no freedom of expression.
Cultural stress, in the form of poverty, oppression, work, economic debt, or the demands of modern mainstream society, precipitates numerous negative conditions within the mind of the individual. This stress effects the body in numerous ways: it can weaken the immune system, strain social or familial relationships, lead to nervous breakdowns, uncontrolled outbursts, and violence. Healing the mind of stress is an inalienable human right, and one necessary to the well being of society in general.

Cultural stress is a natural byproduct of the function of human consciousness. In ancient times, humans employed the medicines of the Earth using the techniques of shamanism to “reset” the mental illnesses of cultural stress and heal the physical body of sickness. Modern science uses essentially similar techniques to do the same. Such techniques, like communicative therapy, meditation, hypnosis, and pharmaceutical prescription, continue to assist the individual unable to cope with cultural stress. It is through the medicinal and spiritual techniques of healing that the individual maintains a “freedom of mind” that restores the greater potential for creativity, social integration, and expression.
Although both the Texas and the U.S. Bill of Rights latently protect the Freedom of Thought, the actual operation of thought remains a scientific mystery. Science knows more about the functions of the electron than it does about the functions of the human mind. This has not stopped the interests of legal drug companies from broadly promoting psychotropic drugs like alcohol and tobacco to the general public, nor has it stopped the prescription of legal mind-altering drugs like Adderall to school-age children. Political policies that mandate standards for cognitive behavior have no basis in scientific fact, at least not while the chemical functions of consciousness remain a mystery. The fact remains that there is currently no complete scientific theory of human consciousness.

HEMP FOR VICTORY
According to the 1942 U.S. Department of Agriculture documentary, “Hemp for Victory,” the industrial use of cannabis for civil society stretches beyond the classical Greek empire and into antiquity (21). Hemp cordage and sail clothe powered the Earth’s greatest navies, and catalyzed the expansion of Europe across the globe, while “Old Ironsides”, the U.S.S. Constitution, had over 60 tons of hemp rigging and sail clothe on board (21).

Cannabis in the form of hemp was necessary to the founding of the American nation. The rough drafts of the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution were drawn up on hemp paper, and the pioneer wagons that explored and settled the American West were adorned with hemp canvas and rope (21). In 1942, when the U.S. went to war against the Axis powers, the U.S. government trained farmers to grow “hemp for victory” (21). U.S. leaders, recognizing the importance of hemp to American military power, created a program to educate farmers and workers in how to cultivate and process cannabis stock to support the war effort (21). Thomas Jefferson, Founding Father and author of the founding documents of the United States, once said, “Hemp employs in its rudest state more labor than tobacco, but being a material for manufactures of various sorts, becomes afterwards the means of support to numbers of people, hence it is to be preferred in a populous country” (20,p58). Under today’s American drug laws, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, both hemp farmers, would be felonious criminals serving time in overcrowded prisons (8,p34).

Cultivated cannabis is a dynamic and dependable crop. Its deep taproot can penetrate compacted or rocky top soil (21). Cannabis requires a rich soil to germinate, but once it gets established, little fertilizer is required to keep it growing (21). Cannabis in the form of hemp can be grown extremely close together, thus eliminating unwanted weeds (21). During its course of growth, cannabis plants drop many lower leaves, thus mulching and composting the topsoil (21). In parts of the U.S., hemp crops can be grown and harvested many times a year, and they don’t need to be rotated as frequently as other staple crops (21). Hemp can be grown just about anywhere on U.S. territory.

According to the U.S.D.A., one acre of cannabis can produce the equivalent wood pulp of four acres of trees, and being that cannabis is a long lived annual, it can produce it in one year (20,p10). Using cannabis for wood pulp and paper would save many forests in America, while providing the public with a paper product of better quality than current standard (20,p7). Hemp wood pulp can also be combined with lime or concrete to produce long lasting brickwork, and hemp timber is stronger than wood (20,p10). In addition to its nutritious edibility, cannabis oil can be used to make plastic, as well as oil-based paint (20,p10). Cannabis oil can also be refined into a living biofuel (20,p10).

Between carbon-absorption properties of the living cannabis fields and the fermentation of the biomass before fuel conversion, the agricultural and energy industries could take a tremendous step toward reducing America’s carbon footprint by cultivating hemp for industrial and energy uses (20,p8). It has even been estimated that if twenty one percent of America’s agricultural fields were devoted to growing hemp for biofuel, then America could replace its dependence on fossil fuel (8,p289). Regrettably, all of these possibilities are pipe dreams at the moment.

Industrial hemp is still scientifically classified as Cannabis sativa, the same as “marihuana”, and although hemp produces negligible amounts of THC, it can still produce offspring that can in turn be cultivated to produce THC-rich marijuana plants (8,p14). The difference between “hemp” and “marijuana” is a difference created in how the plant is cultivated. For this reason, Congress cannot legalize hemp without also legalizing marijuana.

As a political policy, the War on Drugs has done little for the good of the American public. Instead, this policy has undermined low economic communities, restricted the investigation and application of natural medicines, censored scientific research, censored the “free market economy”, violated the Bill of Rights, limited the growth and production of American agriculture, and established the U.S. as a world leader in prison incarcerations. The Controlled Substances Act and the equivalent Texas act represent outdated and under-informed policies that need to be reformed according to reasonable and scientifically sound facts. For the health and well being of our democracy, especially during a time of war, we must introduce reform.

THE RESTORATION OF HUMAN HERITAGE ACT
Why do illegal drugs continue to be a problem in our society? Humans have used "drugs" for an extensive time in our ancient past, and humans will continue to use "drugs" in the future. This is a truth worth recognizing when addressing the above question.

Today, as it has been through history, humans enter “altered states of consciousness”, be it in the form of drug using, or the experiences of music, dance, entertainment, storytelling, and religious expression, to “reset” or protect the personal mind from the chaos and stresses of the broader cultural society. The capacity for “altered states” is inherent to our species, and only the adaptive and informative forces of family culture can regulate this behavior. Human consciousness is founded upon a teeming symphony of altered states; it is the inalienable human right of every person to manage the states of his or her individual mind. This is the heritage of our collective human race, a heritage waiting to be recognized and restored.

The political application of prohibition violates the inviolate promises of the American Constitution in numerous destructive and belligerently intrusive ways. Most importantly, however, the War on Drugs censors information that might otherwise govern what have now become the destructive elements of drug use. Once the blinding forces of prohibition are lifted, those same millennia-old systems that governed drug use on an individual and community level will return, and humanity will again have the cultural means to control the tendencies of addiction.

Under the Restoration of Human Heritage Act, the natural “drugs”, in the biological form of cannabis, peyote, psylocibe, coca, and opium, are reclassified as “Entheogenic Ethno-botanicals”. These natural drugs, in the raw plant form, are often much safer, more beneficial, and less addictive than their refined or synthesized counterparts (17). These ethnobotanicals must remain relatively uncontrolled, to protect the integrity of progressive scientific investigation, and to provide allowances for the individual uses of ancient medicines.

Under the Restoration of Human Heritage Act, limited numbers of enthobotanical plants, to be determined according to local, state, and federal laws, are allotted for garden cultivation and home use, while special permits are to be issued, according local, state, and federal laws, for the mass cultivation of ethno-medicines by American agricultural, medical, and industrial markets. The legal age of use for the new class of drugs is to be determined by the states of the Union in a similar manner to alcohol and tobacco, with clear exceptions for any medicinal or scientific applications.

Under the Restoration of Human Heritage Act, the synthetic and refined drugs, such as crack/cocaine, morphine, heroine, crystal meth, PCP, and LSD-25 are regulated and scheduled as they are under the Controlled Substances Act, but with open allowances for scientific investigation. The results of this type of reform will be adaptively vast, and they will resolve a broad number of problems that plague our society.

First, the legalization of these plants will remove the power currently possessed by criminal parties of the control of cannabis, coca, and opium, and restore that power to the people of the United States. The Restoration of Human Heritage Act will reduce crime and the number of prison incarcerations, thus alleviating any “traffic jams” within the judicial systems of our nation and freeing up the resources of law enforcement to focus on real threats to personal and national security. It will set the stage for new industrial and economic markets, giving local, state, and federal governments multiple new taxing resources, while providing farmers with the legal opportunity to grow cannabis, the plant with over 25,000 known industrial uses (23).

Most importantly, The Restoration of Human Heritage Act will protect the living sanctity of the family unit, especially in low economic neighbors, by removing the dogmatic and senselessly negative stigma of the drug addict, while providing traditional medicines and techniques to treat the occurrences of addictive behavior. Society will no longer be required to incarcerate, what are essentially, the mentally-ill members of the American cultural society. Instead, citizens will be free to learn the healing methods of our past, this replacing addiction with the controls of applied knowledge. This means that fewer fathers and mothers will be removed from the households of America to isolated prison cells, and more families will remain intact.

Under this new reform, the sick and the stressed may be free, if they choose, to grow their own medicine, instead of depending entirely on government programs, confusing corporate drug plans, illegal street dealers and impure substances or economic debt. As the Baby Boomer generation settles into retirement, it is in the best interest of every American society to establish avenues for the use and application of humanity’s oldest natural medicines, lest our obsession with patented, for-profit drugs weigh down our capacity for economic health and well being.

Congress must reform the Controlled Substances Act, and lead the way to an effective and beneficial drug policy. Congress must take into account the historical uses of psychotropic drugs, and recognize that humans have an inalienable right to use, if they choose, the medicines of the Earth to heal the mind and body from the diseases of cultural stress and physical illness. Our progressive future must include the beneficial ways of our past. This is how we preserve and protect our human heritage on Earth, and how we build a stronger, healthier society for generations of Americans to come. If our collective human heritage is any indication, then the next great enlightenment awaits us at the threshold of reform.



REFERENCED MATERIALS
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TITLE 21 - FOOD AND DRUGS CHAPTER 13 – DRUG ABUSE PREVENTION AND
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http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/csa.html.

2 Texas Legislative Council.
HEALTH & SAFETY CODE SUBTITLE C. SUBSTANCE ABUSE REGULATION AND
CRIMES CHAPTER 481. TEXAS CONTROLLED SUBSTANCES ACT.
Date of Access: 11/29/06.
http://tlo2.tlc.state.tx.us/statutes/docs/HS/content/htm/hs.006.00.000481.00.htm.

3 Drug Policy Forum of Texas. THE DRUG WAR: A RECORD OF FAILURE.
http://www.dpft.org/failure.htm. Date of Access: 11/26/06

4 Drug War Facts. Drug Use Estimates. Date of Access: 11/24/06.
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5 Texas Politics. Profiling Texas Prison Inmates. Date of Access: 11/30/06
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6 Reid, Tim. Harsh drug laws drive sharp rise in prisoners. Times Online, UK.
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8 Comments:

Blogger sourmonkey said...

I'd like to hear comments, questions, or suggestions. Please post below:

10:12 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

We will continue to have a "drug problem" in this country as long as we stick with the current polices outlined in your post.

Follow the money. How much of the current policies are fostered by the "legal" pharmaceutical industry who want us to buy patented products from them rather then what we could cultivate from our own backyards.

It is really sad that a country that states quite clearly early in its constitution
that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof" that said country does exactly that. Prevents peoples from the free exercise of their beliefs.

7:25 PM  
Blogger sourmonkey said...

Thanks for the comment, John H.

Is this the same John H. that I use to get into trouble with in Waco?

Anyway. You are right about "follow the money."

I guess an article about who profits from the War on Drugs is next in my future.

Still, though, I don't think that will be enough to change the situation. I think the only thing that will bring about change at this point is a complete system crash: hyper inflation, government bankruptcy, and the end of the United State of America as we currently know it.

Too bad "waking up to the facts" is just not practicle in our society.

10:56 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yes, one in the same. Waco has not been the same...

I'm reminded of Thomas Jefferson who said "a little revolution every now and them is a good thing."

Running a business in this country has allowed me to see behind the scenes operations of our government that would make most people sick and what I have seen only goes minimally below the surface. That's a really scary thought...

JH

5:32 PM  
Blogger sourmonkey said...

House in da house. It's good to hear from you.

Scary thought indeed. No wonder no one wants to think about it, nevermind do something about it.

I had a conversation with my wife today about "follow the money", speaking of scary thoughts. If wealth moves the world, and wealth is subjective, then what moves our world is merely the ebb and tide of value relative to cultural and cognitive functions.

Wealth has no value outside of human consciousness.

Follow the money means a descent into madness.

Now, happy thoughts...

11:25 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Interesting to know.

7:51 AM  
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2:53 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Nicely said. You make good points about our human right to take these drugs, especially the plant based drugs that have been in use for 1000s of years.

I would add that we, and all mammals, have RECEPTORS in our brains and central nervous system for opiates and cannibus - how is that possible except for long term use?

We have eyes - are they going to say we cannot use LIGHT?

There is no logical or legitimate basis to continue the War on Drugs.... maybe it is time we assume they keep it going for the benefit of the BANKS than launder the drug $Billions, and for their friends in organised crime and Big Pharma and the prison systemn - those all profit from the prohibition.

a world full of evil people, we have no idea...

11:33 PM  

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