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June 20, 2010
Fear of the Feds: Still more PC than sane
One of the reasons a public policy as incoherent and unsuccessful as the war on drugs has retained support for so long is fear. In that respect, American drug policy invites a comparison with Nazism, perhaps the most terrifying repression of modern times; also one of the most rapid in terms of gaining total control over an advanced, well-educated polity. Yet, as I learned in two recent casual conversations, just making that comparison opens one up to being called a crack-pot, anti-semitic, or worse; thus demonstrating yet again how reasonable ideas can be misinterpreted by listeners with different points of view.My first awareness of a serious comparison between Nazism and the drug war came from two books by Richard Lawrence Miller, an American historian who is also Jewish. The first was Nazi Justiz, Miller's analysis of Nazi exploitation Germany’s vulnerable legal system to gain total control of the nation within a few years of taking power. The other was his analysis of how the US drug war bureaucracy has long been using similar techniques to enhance its power.
I recently came across an interesting example of just how pervasive fear of offending the federal drug war has become; when I searched Wikipedia for anxiolytic, a well-understood medical term coined by the makers of Valium in 1962 to advertise their product, I was delivered to an article that was exceptionally complete except for its failure to mention that cannabinoids, especially when inhaled, are powerful anxiolytics.
I consider the anxiolytic properties of "reefer" very important; precisely because they were what led to its sudden popularity with Baby Boom adolescents in the Sixties, a phenomenon drug war supporters have yet to even notice, let alone explain coherently.
The good news was that medical use of cannabis was recognized when a "medical marijuana" initiative was passed in 1996; the bad news is that almost fourteen years after the most populous state in America created an opportunity to study the very population that has been such a source of confusion, their "criminal" behavior is still considered too politically incorrect for "respectable" research.
Instead, that population's needs are being administered by"pot docs" who may soon be rendered redundant by another voter initiative.
Doctor Tom
Posted by tjeffo at June 20, 2010 05:52 PM