Our first guest is Jenifer Talley PhD who teaches courses in substance abuse treatment with a focus on harm reduction at The New School University.
Via Nigel Brunsdon
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Resolving the Tension, Creating the Solution
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MildGreen Initiative
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Rescooped by MildGreen Initiative from Drug Use Harm Reduction onto Cannabis & Drug Policy Reform |
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Via Nigel Brunsdon
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(snip) Secondly, people must actually care. Apathy has a strong grip on the New Zealand psyche, and it doesn’t help that many of us think that cannabis legalisation is, at best, only about freedom of choice, or at worst, the idealism of a minority group of hard-core stoners. Drug law reform is far more important than most people realise. (end snip)
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MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Big ups to the Police, just ensuring that the members of the public who are prepared to take the greatest risk premium (gangs etc) get the 'price' asked... not that 10,000 plants will make any difference to the price in the market or put a dint in the 200 tons of groomed pot traded to the 540,000 consumers in New Zealand.....
The Police are good at 'better stories', that is indisputable.... Delete the scoop?
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3News NZ New synthetic cannabis to be tested ASAP 3News NZ New synthetic cannabis products that hit the market today, replacing products banned on Thursday, are going to be tested as quickly as possible. Via Sandra Fuller
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
This is not synthetic cannabis anymore than a Granny Smith is likely to be made in a factory. Language is important. Delete the scoop?
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What was your favorite badaboom in President Obama’s routine at the White House Correspondents dinner? Here’s mine, from when he was talking about how “the media landscape is changing so rapidly”: You can’t keep up with it.
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Oh Bummer! Delete the scoop?
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Time to End the War on Drugs
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Important today, submissions are due on the the Psychoactive Substances Regulations. These displace the "Restricted Substances Regulations" 2008 regarded as the worlds best rules surrounding drug use. They are a cumbersome wolf in sheeps clothing failing to integrate National "All Drug" policy framework fail to measure the unintended consequences that can only be described as a driver to drink and illegal drugs...... Delete the scoop?
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The Guardian Online highs are old as the net: the first e-commerce was a drugs deal The Guardian In 2013, some people are asking: why even break the law when you could just commission a Chinese lab to synthesise a synthetic marijuana substance...
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The dependency of international banking on cashflow would mean the collapse of the capital markets if drug 'laundering' was to dissapear overnight.
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Penal Reform International is an international non-governmental organisation working on penal and criminal justice reform worldwide. Via Julian Buchanan
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
And the Howard League (NZ's equiv.) is where on this issue?
The clowns at Sensible Sentencing kicked this fellow out of the organisation for 'just' mentioning the role of drug policy in crime prevention, deviancy amplification and alienation from rule of law. 
Gart Valenc's comment,
April 18, 7:33 AM
It's time we jettison «unintended» and start talking about «Inevitable Consequences of Prohibition & the WarOnDrugs» instead! http://bit.ly/KRafSZ
Julian Buchanan's comment,
April 18, 8:30 PM
indeed .. the maybe intended even? In the sense that the agenda isn't to tackle drugs but some other law order control power agenda
MildGreen Initiative's comment,
April 19, 12:59 AM
"powers to which they are not entiled" Minister of Health, Tom McGuigan, 1975 (Hansard, MOD Act debate).
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ReGenUC's curator insight,
April 4, 6:42 PM
At least when it comes to marijuana, the war on drugs is over. Two states have passed marijuana legalization laws that fly in the face of national drug policy. Polling on the issue shows a rejection of prohibition. The opinions of law enforcement commanders has begun to shift. Delete the scoop?
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Below are the excerpts of the 2010 American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) white paper republished by The Journal of Global Drug Policy and Practice about
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So, we need to know more?
How exactly does prohibitions on use, possession and cultivations improve the quality or quantity of epidemiological data? Delete the scoop?
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Via Julian Buchanan
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
And we let the treatment industry and its stooges rule the fowl house. Just look at the make up of New Zealand's "Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs", loaded with Corrections, Justice, Treatment, Border Control and Drug Testing interests. It supports and encourages the pretense cannabis use 'bad' and thus cannot be tolerated. How naive. That the policy holds some 400,000 kiwi consumers hostage to a lie and political expediency is an injustice that makes racism, sexism and ageism look good.
Julian Buchanan's curator insight,
March 24, 5:45 PM
This has implications for drug testing and abstinence only Drug Courts.
The author argues "any bolshie academic who speaks out of turn is likely to get the chop" Delete the scoop?
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A 31-year-old city man is facing drug charges after police smelled him smoking marijuana from his apartment bathroom Friday night. He was trying to blow the smoke through a vent to avoid being discovered by his wife, police said.
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Despite the appearance of guns and pot (which relationship depends on prohibition) the facts remain, cannabis, its cultivation, storage and trade is not criminogenic. It occurs across the world in a remarkably benign way, largely undetected despite its prevalence and use. This case was discovered by accident of the nose being in the right place at the (wrong) time a joint was being enjoyed. There was NOTHING criminal evident (other than a technical breach of a law) and no complaint, no injury or loss.
What part of stupid don't we understand. ? Delete the scoop?
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The HCLU interviewed Peter Dunne, the Minister of Revenue of New Zealand. He explained to us the innovative legislational approach of his country to new psyc... Via Julian Buchanan
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Listening to Dunne's speech in Vienna and that he and his boss, Tony Ryall have flatly refused to even mention the 2008 legislation that placed drug use under the ambit of the Ministry of Health suggest that he enjoys and delights in the poisoned chalice he was handed as Assoc. Minister of Health. And this from a man who, were he caught and convicted for his (admitted) use of cannabis in his former pre-political capacity he would likely be nothing more than a small time shopkeeper or insurance salesperson. Whatever, his station in life now is quite different, travelling the world merchandising the most dangerous idea of all, more dangerous than his 'drug of the moment', pure uncontrolled hypocrisy. There is nothing innovative in that.
Julian Buchanan's curator insight,
March 22, 5:26 PM
It's a great move in principle - but Peter Dunne describes a process designed to curb demand and says the process will be sufficiently lengthy and costly to deter a number of suppliers from proceeding. The threshold for proving the drug 'safe' is going to be 'a very high test'. This doesn't give much hope that the law is intended in good spirit to allow new substances to become legal and regulated. Will the framework be used to deter, stifle and set the bar so high that few if any substances will gain approval?
Other countries may look to New Zealand as world leaders in the managements of legal highs - but it may not be all it appears to be - the new regulation could be used as just tweaking the war on drugs and engineered a clever political move that effectively makes it less hassle and stress by banning every 'legal high' in one legislative move, - unless they can be proved safe - which no substance is (even water could be deemed lethal and therefore unsafe - as in excess it has killed people). So if the threshold is very high will anything be able to meet the approval criteria? If they system for approval is little more than a scam then the chemists will continue with the underground market as before.
NZ drug policy is certainly not progressive, will any new legal highs be regulated - we'll see! Delete the scoop?
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A majority of teens see marijuana as risk-free
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
There is no better impediment to credible (anti) drug education than the double standards surrounding alcohol. By ANY standard of evidence there is little that validates the cannabis/IQ interpretation made from the NZ study, largely deduced from small numbers and conflated by the reports own data source where 80% of youth have tried cannabis >5 times and have come to no apparent harm. 'Causation' has not been established whereas for alcohol and IQ it has... suggests the researchers may have had a mother who liked her 1st trimester tipple. Teenage brains are 'more' resiliant than adults. And risk taking necessary for maturity. Some applied science might benefit the researchers.... expand their narrow view of the world and add something to the academic storehouse than make stuff up. The also highly respected longtitudinal & multidiciplinary study (Christchurch) found that any aberation to mental health that resulted from cannabis use was to 1% of 1% of cannabis consumers and then ONLY measurable in laboratory type conditions (that is, unable to be replicated outside of controlled and conditioned testing) due to the subtle nature of the effects and that it is indistinguishable from 'life', factors that variously affect all of us anyway. And that is before we consider, on balance, how light, moderate and heavy pot consumption may be displacing other harms from legal intoxicants. Or how the harms that acrue from prohibitions unintended consequences directly and indirectly harm the mental health of those who do 'pot' and those who do not and are otherwise innocent bystanders in the disfunction the rules create. Delete the scoop?
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Marijuana users had significantly lower levels of the hormone insulin - indicating better blood sugar control - according to research published in The American Journal of Medicine.
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
And they learned all this from ? Whaa, asking people who smoked cannabis?. I mean, what would these low life, amount to nothing, wasters know? Nothing prohibitionists do not? Spell 'epidemiology' you clowns. Delete the scoop?
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MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Joining 17 other States. (And NZ continues to believe there is no political basis to even discuss pot regulations! Its off the agenda! - like that fixes anything? ) Delete the scoop?
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MildGreen Initiative's insight:
The epitome of toughness must be the absurd three strikes (and your out!). Someone forgot these prisoners of political experimentalism have to come out someday.
ReGenUC's curator insight,
May 5, 8:47 PM
Former Vic Attorney General, Rob Hulls, stating the obvious.
MildGreen Initiative's comment,
May 7, 5:46 AM
The epitome of toughness must be the absurd three strikes (and your out!). Someone forgot these prisoners of political experimentalism have to come out someday.
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MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Editorial: It may be legal but is it right? Asks Rotorua newspaper.
(see http://www.rotoruadailypost.co.nz/news/editorial-it-may-be-legal-but-is-it-right/1852270/ ; followed up by an excuse for journalism "Battle lines drawn over synthetic cannabis" )
MildGreens present to the Select Commitee 'consulting' on this rushed Bill which WIPES NZ's world class restricted substances regulations off the books.... without as much as a discussion why no one could fault them. Delete the scoop?
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Pot crops down due to drought New Zealand Herald It is expected the drop in crop size will impact on the prices paid for marijuana this year. (Yeah Right!)
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Pupils in drug bust
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> among a growing number
laughable language.... a growing number pretends there is a growing number. When there is 4:5 young people, or more, and it remains about constant, the Drug Foundation and in particular Ross Bell is without authority. They pretend concern when no concern is warranted. There will always be new entrants to the pot experience, and others who cease or defer to mortgages, kids and legal hard drugs like alcohol.
What would have been better of them is to ask is; so how does prohibition stack up as a measured response? Does it limit or ensure new entrants to the pot culture? And given that the numbers are huge, exactly where is the harm again? That is not to say there are no harms. But proportionately to alcohol, pot looks benign. Delete the scoop?
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Officials in New Zealand, British Columbia, and multiple U.S. states have openly wondered whether pot tourism might help fill their own coffers. Sorting out new laws.
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
I am not sure how representative of New Zealand's situation is that officials are considering much at all.....they are to busy managing leaky emails and pontificating 'economic theory' to justify selling everything but Pot. Yet, that same economic theory is exactly why we should regulate Cannabis. As an island nation pot tourism would be easy to manage.....easier than land border states. Delete the scoop?
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POLICE say a beach blitz north of Noosa has put the brakes on drink-driving and has also uncovered young campers using drugs. Via ReGenUC
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
Another feel good story pretending to be a 'success' in the war on some drugs.... Delete the scoop?
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http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/8487057/Police-hunt-out-cannabis-crops A police operation has netted nearly 6000 cannabis plants, which police say makes ''significant headway'' in the fight against illicit drugs and organised crime. Stuff was granted special access to join police on their drug-seizing operation throughout the Central District. The district stretches from Taranaki down to Otaki and across the Tararua Range. Police, with the help of the air force, spent 11 days pulling up cannabis plants throughout the lower North Island as the final phase of a months-long operation to eradicate outdoor growing in its peak season. Police pulled up 5918 cannabis plants across the district this year - 289 more than last year. Via Julian Buchanan
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
And the evidence this made an iota of difference is? Significant headway is a pork pie. A self admitted fun time for Police and Media whose collective comprehension of the word eradicate is laughable. In these austere times, perhaps the proportional cost of the media joy ride and whom ever else was along for the ride should be accounted for, for as the Police would have us believe, all we spend banning it is a burden of social harms, and they have just added to it. Curiously, with new 70million dollar helicopters and more seats, they will be able to take More media for a ride. They have been doing so since way before the 1975MoDA. A well known Judge once said "an orchistrated litany of lies", with the Police in disrepute they could'nt do better than cease and desist this endless patronising silliness, but that would take Hon. Tony Ryal to think! For it is he that holds the warrant to surveil and sieze, impose and incarcerate..... to accomplish diddly, except maybe help Police tell better stories.
Julian Buchanan's curator insight,
March 28, 6:55 PM
...instead of catching criminals?
ironically tomorrow I'm doing a tour of the Tuatara Brewery who produce a much more dangerous substance, but I don't imagine I'll see the police helicopter flying ahead. Delete the scoop?
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Long-term marijuana could have zero effect on IQ -- original data of negative study gives opposite result
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Some would argue that the displacement of alcohol (and tobacco) related harm coupled with the anti-anxiolotic qualities (self medication) provides a net benefit. Delete the scoop?
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United Nations: Three-Quarters Of World's Illicit Drug Users Consume Cannabis
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4/5ths of New Zealand <38yrs old demograph have done it more than 5 times **. Sheese it couldnt be more popular of it was made compulsory! / Blair
** CHDS, Healthy Christchurch Presentation, Baptist Church, 2010 Delete the scoop?
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ThinkProgress
MildGreen Initiative's insight:
This is the same lady who gave New Zealand the worlds first legally regulated recreational psychoactive drug policy law. Google ("restricted substances regulations" 2008)
Julian Buchanan's curator insight,
March 21, 7:00 AM
The 'Scarman Lectures' at the Department of Criminology, Leicester University, England on 13 June 2012 I examined 'The damage caused by drugs, or the damage caused by drug policy?
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