Is America winning the “war on drugs?” I don’t think so, and apparently, neither does the White House.

According to a recent statement from the White House reported at thebostonchannel.com, the U.S. government's drug strategy should focus more on treating addiction and less on imposing harsh prison sentences. This would include more drug education classes and counseling.

The White House office submits an annual report to Congress, and this year’s suggests a new national approach that includes criminal justice system reforms aimed at stopping the revolving door of drug use, crime, incarceration, and recidivism.

One issue from the White House report that I totally disagree with is that overall drug use in the United States has "dropped substantially” over the past 30 years. While cocaine consumption in the United States had decreased 40% from 2006 to 2010, and methamphetamine use had dropped 50% in that same period, the use of marijuana and prescription medications have replaced them.

President Barack Obama has said point-blank that the prescription drug abuse problem in America is especially worrisome.

It is nice that the White House and the Obama Administration see the need to change their tactics. Obviously, as a counselor for both in-class and online drug classes I think education and support is the best way to help get people off of drugs and stay sober

The time has come for the entire world, secular and non-secular to band together to fight the scourge that plagues our society – drug addiction.

In an effort to rid the planet from drugs one of the most notable religious figures is actively joining the fight. Pope Benedict is taking the fight right to one of the main arteries of the problem - Mexico

Pope Benedict arrived in Mexico last week promising as reported in Reuters to "unmask the evil" of drug trafficking in a country ravaged by gang violence that has killed 50,000 people in the past five years.

The Pope made strong accusations about Mexico’s serious problem with the drug cartels and how they are losing the fight in the drug war!

The 84-year-old Pope’s words could not have been stronger when he said, "We must do whatever is possible to combat this destructive evil against humanity and our youth.”

The Pope's strong words on the drug menace should offer comfort to Mexican President Felipe Calderon, who has staked his reputation on beating down the cartels. Calderon hailed Benedict's arrival, saying it was of great significance at a time of "many hardships" for Mexico.

If somehow Mexico’s drug cartels can be beaten down a serious dent in the world drug problem might cease to exist. Hopefully faith can bring us together and help wipe out drugs. And a little education through a 15 hour drug class probable can't hurt either. The people are the power.

What are your thoughts of partisan politics? Are your views so strong you are unwilling to bend on absolutely any issue?  That sure seems to be the case today with the US Congress. I don’t know about you, but the all-or-nothing mentality in Congress these days has me pretty pissed off!

The "designer drug" law written in 1986 prohibited classes of drugs before they could even be invented and before they could be found to be beneficial or harmful. The presumption behind this ban, that any new drug would be "dangerous" and "bad," stigmatizes and deters discovery of new potentially beneficial drugs. Like most of the other provisions of the 1986 law, this one failed to do anything to prevent the spread of "ecstasy," synthetic cannabis such as "spice" and "K2," and stimulants marketed as "bath salts."

The National Forest System Drug Control Act of 1986 was supposed to protect the National Forests from marijuana cultivation. It was a fine idea, but the "protection" was not thought through. Expanded surveillance of urban electricity usage and scanning for temperature anomalies by drug agents encouraged by the potential riches from property forfeitures led to large-scale and destructive marijuana plantations over-running more than 61 National Forests by 2009.

For years after 1986, America's foreign relations were poisoned by the requirement that the U.S. president certify that other nations provided "maximum achievable" cooperation to our drug fight. This was not pass-fail grading, this was "A+ or fail" grading. The arrogant law offended our neighbors and allies. When the U.S. "decertification" humiliated Colombia, it played into the hands of Colombian terrorists -- the FARC, ELN and AUC. After extensive behind the scenes protests by our allies, Congress finally eliminated this requirement.

Today, heroin profits fund the Taliban enemies of U.S. troops. Mexico is awash with the blood of more than 40,000 drug war victims. HIV is still being conveyed to tens of thousands of Americans each year due to lack of access to new needles. Fatal drug overdoses exceed deaths due to motor vehicle crashes. After twenty-five years, the drug problem is more lethal than ever.

Members of Congress said ad nauseam the Anti-Drug Abuse Act was "sending a message" of zero-tolerance toward drugs. Yet every year since its passage, America has grown thousands of tons of the world's strongest marijuana, produced hundreds of millions of doses of synthetic drugs, and sent tens of billions of dollars into the accounts of drug traffickers around the world.

In reality, only one side of the street paid attention to Congress's message: law enforcement. In minority communities, the sincere effort of most police to protect and serve became invisible behind the language and conduct of the war on drugs, with many officers routinely treating people of color as drug-tolerating scum. Every year, pursuant to search warrants, tens of thousands of doors were broken down, homes were ransacked, family members were held at gun point and pets were shot. "Sweeping the streets" has stained the legitimacy of the justice system.

At last rejecting zero tolerance, many police are curtailing homicide and drug market chaos with enforcement strategies that effectively communicate deterrence. As anti-violence pioneer David M. Kennedy reports in his new book, Don't Shoot, these strategies work in every size city and with every drug market.

When justice agencies communicate credible threats of punishment for significant violations, even long time offenders change behavior. Judge Steve Alm's Hawai'i's Opportunity with Probation Enforcement (HOPE) program got most hardcore addicts to quit once they understood his message that a failed drug test always meant some time in jail. This type of honest, direct communication is the opposite of Congress's claim to be "sending a message" to people who don't read newspapers and don't watch C-SPAN.

The panic of 1986 is gone. The Gallup Poll reports a majority of adults support legalizing marijuana. Harvard professor Jeffrey Miron estimated the 2008 federal tax revenue would yield $5.82 billion if marijuana were legal. Saving the $4 billion spent on federal marijuana enforcement annually, legalization could reduce the deficit by almost $10 billion per year. I've suggested this deficit-reducing idea to Congress's Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction. The House Co-Chair acknowledged my letter.

Of course, the "super committee" is moving very quickly to find $1500 billion in savings, perhaps too fast to give serious consideration to a controversial change like marijuana legalization. Yet whatever monumental recommendations the Committee does make to change the federal government, the Pentagon, tax law, health care and the rest of the economy will be subject to hasty and superficial consideration, utterly insufficient to evaluate the potential consequences before Congress votes (if it votes at all). After all, whatever is proposed may likely be rejected through more partisan paralysis.

If Congress were functioning properly, it would take the time to consider the many potential improvements in drug policy that could save lives by preventing overdose, reducing the spread of HIV, and lessening violence, preventing crime, and saving money. With a commitment to governing, instead of grandstanding, Congress could make a careful analysis and weigh the alternatives. Getting this kind of analytical background is the idea behind creating a National Criminal Justice Commission. Senator Webb thinks that the Commission idea has suffered a setback, but is not dead. Perhaps its life is in hands not on Capitol Hill.

Do you think something needs to be done? Do you think an online drug class would be effective?  I welcome your input.

I don’t know about you, but I am sick and tired of partisan politics! Regardless of your political affiliation, it is insane how little compromise our nation’s “leaders” are willing to give. It makes me totally sick!

Not surprisingly, today, the 112th Congress is stalled, mired in partisan conflict. It seems to have been the case since I have been old enough to understand and follow anything to do with politics.

Partisanship has led Congress to move too fast, and that produced trouble. Twenty-five years ago last Thursday (Oct. 27), President Reagan signed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, after less than ninety days of jockeying between the Democratic House and Republican Senate.

The political wrangling was triggered by the cocaine death of Maryland basketball star Len Bias on June 19, 1986 as he celebrated signing with the Boston Celtics. In the media blitz following his tragedy, House Speaker "Tip" O'Neill from Boston spotted political opportunity for Democrats to claim anti-drug leadership in time for the election. Eager to complete a package before the August campaigns, the bills were very hastily written.

Flaws in the Laws!

The law's best known blunders were the long sentences for small amounts of drugs. Congress finally acknowledged the unfairness of crack sentencing and its racial disparity when it passed the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. But many other features of the 1986 law were also bad policy.

Total Waste of Money

The Drug-Free Schools program of 1986 got about $12 billion over twenty years. Every evaluation found it did not reduce drug use. The Administration finally eliminated this waste last year when the proof of its ineffectiveness at last overcame its political attractiveness -- $500 to 600 million per year in contracts and salaries. Now that truly is scary. They wasted money for 25 years before finally saw the light of a wasted $500 Million or more!!

The statistics show that marijuana consumption is on the rise. Logic dictates that legalizing the drug for “medicinal” purpose has made it that much easier for stoners to get high.

Some local anti-medical-marijuana officials believe an increase in marijuana use in California is the result of relaxed state laws toward medical marijuana.

In evaluating the statistics, it shows states that have a medical-marijuana program have a significant increase in use of those who are using marijuana.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration released its 2010 National Survey on Drug Use and Health last month. It details substance-use patterns and consequences for people ages 12 and older.

From the survey, the rate of marijuana use statewide and nationally increased significantly, driving up overall rates of illicit drug use.

The Statistics

The 2010 survey reported 17.4 million people who said they had used marijuana in the past month. That compares to 14.4 million in 2007.

Between 2007 and 2010, the percentage of people who used marijuana increased from 5.8 percent to 6.9 percent.

The percentage of youths ages 12 to 17 who used marijuana also increased, from 6.7 percent in 2007 to 7.4 percent in 2010.

Why Has Weed Become Acceptable?

It is disturbing to see an increase among kids. Society is getting to the point where marijuana is more and more acceptable. It's why we're so adamant not to allow it. We want to keep it out of the hands of kids.

In 2010, then-Governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law Senate Bill 1449, which downgraded possession of an ounce or less of marijuana from a misdemeanor to an infraction, with a $100 fine but no jail time.

Lanny Swerdlow, a Riverside County marijuana activist and radio host, said the increase in usage "probably" is from states legalizing the drug for certain uses.

Swerdlow said in his quick read of the national survey he found there was an increase in marijuana use along with a decrease in alcohol use. Unlike alcohol, Swerdlow said, marijuana does not make someone mad, angry, fight, vomit or black out.

The Medical Argument

Jan Werner, vice president of The Clearview Lake Corp., which runs marijuana collectives in Bloomington and Corona, said marijuana usage was up because baby boomers have found medical marijuana to be an alternative to other drugs for their ailments.

With no valid recommendation by the FDA or the AMA, making this drug legal has been a total fiasco. California is now in the process of shuttering their dispensaries. Colorado banks no longer accept deposits from dispensaries. It is only a matter of time before the pendulum swings the other way. You heard it here first – medical marijuana is on its way out.

Of course the title to this article is naïve. The corrupt Mexican police force that is on the take from drug cartels needs a lot more than an online drug class to curb cartel power and violence.

Raids

Mexican President Felipe Calderon's office did not respond for requests for comments on the CNDH findings, but it says his strategy is showing results with the capture of major gang leaders and a drop in homicides in violent cities like Ciudad Juarez, where murders fell to 1,550 so far this year from 3,622 killings in 2010.

Still, the overall number of drug-related murders is still rising and improved security in some places has not cured a deep mistrust of the police.

Forty-six percent of Mexicans surveyed said they have little or no confidence in federal police and local police fared even worse at 60% in a survey last month on security perceptions by the national statistics agency.

Denting public support is a big jump in unauthorized raids by security forces, which have more than tripled from 2005, including one on the home of a well-known, elderly poet in August.

Even more raids go unreported. Do you know why?

In one case last month, a convoy of two dozen federal police burst into the home of "Amelia" in a lower middle class neighborhood in Mexico City in search of her nephew, who has suspected links to organized crime.

Guided by two bound suspects in the back of their trucks, and no search warrant, federal agents entered her family's small compound hunting for the 21-year-old, forcing her husband and son to kneel at gunpoint.

"They had (my nephew's) wife on the ground splayed out like Christ pointing a machine gun at her head ... His brother was sleeping with his baby and they dragged him out, hitting him with their pistols on his head and back," said Amelia.

When it was all over, the law enforcers left with no arrests but not empty-handed - nearly $450, an iPad, a leather jacket and several cell phones were missing, she said.

Nice, the police are both corrupt (on the cartel payroll) and thieves! Perhaps a good online drug class or online stop theft class might start the ball rolling in the right direction. I appreciate your thoughts on curbing police corruption and cartel power.

Police and law enforcement will always have to battle illegal substances and those using and abusing them.  It helps when the state and the federal government are on the same page in fighting illegal drug activity. 

The State of Ohio has been trying to criminalize and ban the newer “recreational drugs” hitting the market.

They currently have tackled two of these new synthetic drugs, but who knows how many to go.

A law that took effect this summer places substances known as "bath salts," "spice" and "K2" on the state's list of controlled substances. The three products mimic the effects of already banned drugs like marijuana.

Because the three substances had not previously been listed as illegal drugs, they could be sold openly - and were. Now, those who sell "bath salts," "spice" and "K2" can be arrested and charged with crimes. Penalties are similar to those for possession or sale of marijuana.

A Good Step in Fight

It's a good step - but, again, it won't stop sale and use of new compounds intended to produce the same effects as illegal hallucinogens. Rest assured that within a few months, substances with different names and chemical compositions will be available legally throughout the Buckeye State.

The war against drugs has been compared to Prohibition, when millions of Americans broke the law by producing and consuming then-illegal alcoholic beverages. But there is a critical difference now: Instead of manufacturing alcoholic beverages, clearly identifiable and illegal because of the main ingredient, drug abusers are constantly finding new chemicals to make them high. That isn't illegal until the substances have been identified and specifically banned as controlled substances.

Law enforcement agencies and state legislatures find it nearly impossible to keep up with the inventiveness of drug abusers. The fact that "bath salts" and the other two products were available legally in Ohio for so long makes that clear.

It may be a losing battle, but it is one police and lawmakers in Ohio should continue to wage by acting quickly and decisively against whatever replacements for "bath salts" are invented and marketed. If that requires frequent new legislation to identify and ban the hazardous drugs, so be it.

As teens and seemingly everyone else looks to get high anywhere they can, bath salts are becoming the latest drug rage. If you follow this blog, which I know many of you do from the countless comments on both it and my onlinealcoholclass.com blog, you know I have written about this a couple of times already.

As it becomes a bigger problem here in the United States it is nice to see the legal system stopping the sale of a substance that is lethal, though never intended for recreational drug use. The most recent state to ban the sale of bath salts – Ohio.

Ohio retailers will no longer be able to sell synthetic recreational drugs marketed as bath salts and K2 or spice, and use and possession of the substances also will be banned when a new state law goes into effect Monday.

The legislation signed by Gov. John Kasich in July adds synthetic marijuana known as K2 or spice and six synthetic derivatives of cathinone that have been found in bath salts to the list of Schedule 1 controlled substances. The products have been sold legally at convenience stores, tobacco shops and other businesses.

The K2 or spice contains organic leaves coated with chemicals that provide a marijuana-like high when smoked, and bath salts drugs are crystalized chemicals typically snorted or injected that provide a cocaine-like high. The substances have been known to cause reactions including hallucinations, paranoia, severe agitation and seizures, and that bath salts reportedly have been linked to deaths in Ohio and elsewhere.

As more people around the country have experimented with the synthetic drugs, more medical problems have been reported and more efforts have begun to ban the substances.

The American Association of Poison Control Centers reported last month that the number of calls to the country's poison centers rose dramatically from 303 in 2010 to more than 4,700 in the first seven months of this year. The American Medical Association has come out in support of national legislation to ban bath salts, and several states have implemented their own bans on bath salts and K2 or both.

Under Ohio's new law, penalties for possession or trafficking of K2 or spice will be the same as those for marijuana — a minor misdemeanor for possession and a felony for trafficking in the vicinity of a school or juvenile. Possession and trafficking of bath salts would fall under the normal felony penalties for Schedule 1 controlled substances such as cocaine and amphetamines.

There's a perception that these products are somehow safer than street drugs because they come in eye-catching packaging and are sold in gas stations, convenience stores and novelty shops. The reality is, these substances are dangerous and can have life-threatening consequences.

Colorado is one of 14 states that have legalized marijuana for medicinal use. Like every other state, Colorado is wrestling with legalizing a drug in the state the remains illegal under federal law.

For some Colorado residents, the divisive debate about medical marijuana goes beyond hazy public policy questions; it's personal.

Mary Hesterman is an outspoken supporter of Question 300 on the Nov. 1 election ballot that would ban medical marijuana businesses from Fort Collins, Colorado.

Hesterman said the presence of marijuana dispensaries sends a message to the community's youths that drug abuse - which nearly led her 16-year-old daughter to suicide - is acceptable.

But for Jim Dunlap, who has battled increasingly severe neurological symptoms for years, medical marijuana has provided relief from pain and nausea where prescription medications failed.

Having a reliable dispensary in town that can supply the strains of marijuana he needs has given him great comfort, he said. Instead of being bedridden with pain, he can interact with his family and friends and lead a better life.

A mother's worry

Hesterman's work with Concerned Fort Collins Citizens, which put the proposed ban on the ballot through a petition drive, stems from her daughter, Becky's, experience with drug use.

Becky began experimenting with marijuana as a student at Fossil Ridge High School. She went from being an engaged, happy student to one who frequently skipped classes and fell in with a new crowd of friends her family didn't know.

Her grades fell and she became increasingly detached and depressed. Counseling and the imposition of more rules did no good. Becky snuck out of the house at night and got into trouble at school. She dabbled in a variety of illegal drugs, including heroin.

Her mother said drugs turned her into a pathological liar with absolutely no conscience.

Becky sunk so low she posted a suicide note on Facebook that was noticed by "somebody's mother - I still don't know who," Hesterman said.

When police arrived, Becky was headed to her room and a large stash of pills.

After receiving mental-health treatment in Fort Collins, Becky was sent to a residential program in Utah, where she has flourished and remained sober. The treatment program is not covered by insurance, so the family took out a second mortgage on its house to help cover the $5,000-a-month bill.

Hesterman does not link medical marijuana dispensaries to Becky's drug problem, but she does believe the businesses give youth the impression marijuana is safe when "nothing could be further from the truth," she said.

The Other Side of the Medical Marijuana Story

Shutting down dispensaries won't curtail marijuana use any more than Prohibition stopped alcohol use, Dunlap said.

How’s this for logic? If medical marijuana shops are bad for the city's image, he said, so are its many tattoo parlors and liquor stores.

Dunlap, 51, is a former Realtor and a competitive cyclist. Around 2000, he began to experience disturbing symptoms, including numbness, flashes of phantom pain in his chest and extremities and nausea.

Doctors told him the neurological symptoms might be attributable to multiple sclerosis, but tests have not come up with a clear diagnosis.

He continued to suffer a variety of ailments, including weakness, searing pain and intestinal disorders. He can walk short distances, but often uses a wheelchair.

A friend suggested trying medical marijuana. First, he had success using a marijuana-infused cream to ease pain in his arm. Then, he tried edibles.

A recovering alcoholic, he was hesitant to smoke marijuana out of fear it would lead to another addiction. But working with a local dispensary, he found a strain of marijuana that gives him energy while keeping his head clear. Another strain helps him sleep.

Question 300 from both sides

If voters approve Question 300, the city's 20 existing businesses would have to shut down within 90 days. Many other cities in Northern Colorado recently have banned dispensaries, and every bank in the state will no longer accept their money.

Supporters say the dispensary model that has flourished across the city and state since 2009 was not what voters intended when they approved a constitutional amendment allowing the use of marijuana to treat certain debilitating medical conditions.