LEAP endorses petition in support of Perez Molina initiative – help needed for AVAAZ

Update on the Perez Molina Initiative and petition, 3/1/2012

Welcome to the new signers and thank you again to those who received the previous updates. I hope they are useful and informative. Most of all, I hope they keep you motivated and eager to do more to promote this initiative. Make no mistake folks, this is one of the most significant developments in drug policy reform in a long time, and we cannot afford to waste this opportunity.

Underneath, I will give you some hints on actions you can take to help spread the word. You can find more tips and links at: http://www.world-war-d.com/2012/02/28/petition-in-support-of-guatemalan-presidents-call-for-drug-legalization/. Feel free to be as creative as you want and come up with your own strategy. Let me know what worked for you, to share with others.

LEAP endorsed today the petition in support of the Perez Molina initiative. People can now sign directly from LEAP website http://www.leap.cc/. It will be broadcasted to their 50,000 + members over the next few days, so we should expect some amazing bumps in the numbers.

The petition is also posted on the ENCOD website (European Coalition for Just and Effective Drug Policies) http://www.encod.de/info/SUPPORT-GUATEMALA-S-PRESIDENT-S.html. Thank you to whoever posted it there.

I encourage everybody to contact any groups or forums that may promote the petition.

I contacted AVAAZ and could use your help to get their attention. You can go to http://www.avaaz.org/en/contact/ and fill up the form. The more request they get to support the petition, the more likely they are to take it over. There is the option to create a new petition on http://www.avaaz.org/en/contact/, but that wouldn’t give us just the AVAAZ platform, not the AVAAZ logistical support. It might be best to be consistent when we contact them. Underneath are the title and copy of my message:

Support the Guatemalan President Perez Molina Initiative for drug legalization

You may be aware of the recent developments on the drug policy reform front in Latin America, starting with the Tuxtla declaration on December 6th, and the recent proposal put forward by Guatemalan president Perez Molina, to raise the issue of legalization at the sixth Summit of the Americas on April 14-15, 2012. For the first time ever, legalization will be debated at a major international Summit, with the leaders of the 34 countries of the Americas in attendance! This is an unprecedented event. All activists should take advantage of this opportunity to generate massive mobilization of support for significant and meaningful debate on drug policy reform, especially as obstruction can be expected from the US.

In support of this action, was initiated on Monday February 27, 2012, a petition in support of Guatemalan president’s call for drug legalization http://signon.org/sign/support-guatemalan-president. Considering your history of support for drug policy reform, I kindly request your help for its promotion. Having the logistical support of AVAAZ would give this action the exposure it deserves. This can and should be one of the largest AVAAZ campaign ever, similar in scope to the action you had last year on drug policy reform.

Please feel free to contact me for any clarification you may need. Thank you for your consideration.

You may also contact AVAAZ founder Ricken Patel on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/#!/rickenpatel77

Update on the Perez Molina Initiative

Despite the hurried dispatch, one day ahead of Roxana Baldetti’s own tour, of Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano on a tour of the region on February 28^th to drum up support for the War on Drugs, Guatemala managed to get the support of Costa Rica so far. http://telenoticias7.com/detalle.php?id=122813

The UK government quickly aligned behind the US position, but the powerful British Inter-parliamentary group on drug policy reform was just as quick to warmly embrace the Perez Molina initiative. http://www.guatemala.gob.gt/index.php/2011-06-30-23-44-4/agenda/item/74-parlamento-brit%C3%A1nico-apoya-%E2%80%9Ciniciativa-p%C3%A9rez-molina%E2%80%9D

Colombia and Mexico are still on the sidelines and haven’t reacted yet to the Guatemalan proposal. A lot will depend on the attitude of these two most influential countries in the region. Should these countries decide to seriously explore alternatives to the War on Drugs and move resolutely towards more pragmatic and realistic policies, the balance of power would be drastically altered and other countries could be persuaded to align behind them, but nothing can happen without Colombia and Mexico onboard.

Therefore, if you live in Colombia or Mexico, or if you have friends and contact there, please sign and diffuse the petition. Reach out as much as you can in Latin America. Perez Molina talked about a regional meeting to discuss his proposal on March 6 and 7. Between now and then, we must drum up as much support as we can.

Finally, I have been sending press releases and 2 have been published so far. Feel free to send as many press-releases as you want. You can also write opinion pieces or letters to the editor. Feel free to use the material found on my blog (www.world-war-d.com) or write your own. If you could help me translate some of this material in Spanish, that would be great. You can reach me at jd@world-war-d.com

http://colombiareports.com/opinion/157-guests/22546-drug-legalization-must-on-the-summit-of-the-americas-agenda.html

http://www.guatemala-times.com/news/guatemala/2966-support-guatemalan-drug-legalization-initiative-at-oea-meeting.html

Feedback from signers

I got a lot of wonderful feedback and I apologize for not being able to reply to everybody.

LEAP co-founder and chair, Jack Cole wrote: “I am the co-founder and Board chair of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP). I am also a retired detective lieutenant—26 years with the New Jersey State Police and 14 in their Narcotic Bureau, mostly undercover. I bear witness to the abject failure of the U.S. war on drugs and to the horrors produced by this self-perpetuating, constantly expanding policy disaster. You have the backing of LEAP’s 50,000 police, judges, prosecutors and supporters in 86 countries.”

Neill Franklin: “As the executive director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), our organization of over 50,000 supporters worldwide, support this petition.”

Jude Hider, from the UK, summed up the sentiment of many: “Dear President Otto Perez Molina & Vice-President Roxana Baldetti thank you very much for this courageous action.”

Blueprint for legalization and control

One of pillars of the prohibitionist propaganda is the claim that legalization of the currently illicit drugs would create an addiction epidemic of biblical proportion, but this stickiest of prohibitionist fallacies doesn’t withstand closer examination. On the contrary, as I demonstrate in great lengths in my recently released “World War-D”, the current prohibitionist regime increases the harmful consequences of drug use and generates a whole set of harms of its own, chief among them, the narco-violence that is spreading like cancer all over the world. In fact, a properly regulated marketplace would not only wipe out narco-violence, it could contain and reduce substance abuse and dramatically reduce its societal harm. Focus should be placed on the real issue, which is problem use: abuse and addiction. Moderate use should only be addressed insofar as it may lead to problem use.

(Excerpts and comments from “World War D – The Case against prohibitionism, roadmap to controlled re-legalization” http://www.world-war-d.com/) – get

By Jeffrey Dhywood – jd@world-war-d.com

Pragmatic strategies for containment of abuse and control of psychoactive substances in a properly regulated marketplace

At the root of all the evils unleashed by drug prohibition and the War on Drugs are the illegal trade and the illegal marketplace it created and nurtured, out of which most other harms derive. Moreover, prohibition-induced harm far outweighs usage-induced harm. Consequently, the primary goal of any substance abuse reform should be black market reduction. With proper international coordination, the black market can be marginalized to the point of not being a significant threat.

Formulating clear and realistic objectives

In order to design effective strategies, it is critical to have clear and realistic objectives. Therefore, I propose the following hierarchy of goals:

To greatly reduce, dismantle and, if possible, eliminate the illegal drug market. To reduce the presence and influence of organized crime. To reduce drug-related crime. The dismantling and elimination of the illegal drug market requires the dismantling of the prohibition system that created it in the first place. Elimination of the illegal drug marketplace will not eliminate organized crime, but it will weaken it substantially.
To reduce harm to existing users through safe and controlled legal access. To reduce the number of abusers/addicts; to reduce drug related deaths; to improve the health of remaining users/addicts; to improve their social integration.
To reduce or eliminate the financial burden placed on taxpayers by the consequences of drug use and drug prohibition. To achieve taxpayer neutrality.
To control and greatly minimize access to minors; eliminating access to minors altogether might be a laudable goal, but it is about as realistic as absolute sexual abstinence to reduce teen pregnancy.
To reduce initiation, especially among minors. Long-term improvements are predicated on substantially curbing initiation.
To reduce harm caused by problematic users to their proximate environment and to society at large.
To prevent as much as possible moderate, responsible users from becoming problem users. To place reasonable access restrictions to the most damaging substances for new users and casual users.
To acknowledge the legitimacy of the non-medical use of psychoactive substances and the potential danger of their abuse.
To respect the civil liberties and lifestyle choices of informed, consenting adults as long as these choices do not intentionally endanger others. To end discrimination against users of psychoactive substances.

I believe these are realistic and attainable goals provided that the right policies are put in place. Unlike the fairly rigid prohibitionist model, there should be a lot of flexibility in the application of drug reform to allow for experimentation and adaptation to local realities. It should be obvious by now that those who wish to use psychoactive substances will go to great lengths to satisfy their desire and it is far more advantageous for society to satisfy their need than to let the black market take care of it. The guiding concern shouldn’t be whether it is moral or immoral to provide psychoactive substances to those consenting adults who which to use them, but what is the least harmful way to do it.

Policies shouldn’t be set in stone, but should rather be a work in progress, especially in the initial stage. Containment of abuse and reduction of the spread of use of the most dangerous substances should be the top priorities in the initial phase. Last but not least, regulations and policies should be practically and efficiently enforceable. Unrealistic goals based on faulty premises typically have disastrous unintended consequences for which society bears a heavy cost. Drug policies should strive to minimize the potentially harmful consequences of drug use and not create a whole set of far worse harms of its own.

A properly designed controlled legalization should be based on some basic facts and observations:

People have used psychoactive substances for medicinal, ritual and recreational purpose since the dawn of humanity and are not likely to give it up anytime soon.
The vast majority of psychoactive substances are already legal and more or less efficiently controlled. Such is the case for caffeine, nicotine, alcohol and prescription drugs. The legal status of particular substances does not appear to be related to their harmful potential. The regulatory framework for legalization is already in place and would just require adjustments.
The younger the age of onset of use of any psychoactive substance, the higher the potential for abuse in later life. People who haven’t used any substance by the time they reach their early 20s are very unlikely to ever abuse. Postponing the age of substance initiation is therefore the most efficient way to contain and reduce abuse. Paradoxically, under the prohibitionist regime, minors often have easier access to illicit drugs than adults. They are primary targets of drug dealers and foot soldiers and cannon fodder of narco-trafficking, especially in developing countries.
The prohibitionist regime pushes users towards the most dangerous substances and the most dangerous modes of administration. A properly regulated marketplace would nudge users towards the least dangerous substances by placing barrier of access commensurate to the potential harm of each substance and each mode of administration.
The accelerated industrialization of emerging countries brought about rapid and largely chaotic urbanization, causing social dislocation and breakdown of traditional norms. This in turn lowers barriers to deviance, providing a fertile ground for criminal elements to flourish and for the spread of substance abuse. As a result, illicit drug use is on the rise in most of the world, fueled in part by the global youth culture, permeated by drug culture from its pop stars to its sports stars.
The problem is exacerbated in transiting countries, as many drug transactions are paid in kind, feeding the local drug market, creating one where it previously didn’t exist. Thus, narco-violence in transiting countries is increasingly related to control of local markets rather than control of transiting routes. Latin America has been hit particularly hard, with casualties exceeding 50,000 in Mexico alone over the past 6 years, while all of Central America, especially Guatemala, Honduras and Salvador, is engulfed in narco-violence.
Emerging countries cannot afford to spare their already stretched resources on implementing efficient prohibitionist policies when even developed countries, despite all theirs resources, have been unable to do so.
Bottom line: Organized societies should be capable to do a far better job than organized crime at managing and controlling the currently illicit substances.

Understanding the illegal drugs market place

For all practical purposes, the illegal drug market place operates like a network marketing system. It is all based on contacts with each link usually knowing only those immediately before and after him; protection and secrecy increase as you move up the supply-chain. The substances reach the end-consumer through convoluted circuits with myriads of interconnected intermediaries where the last link in the supply chain are typically heavy users and addicts, who often resell to casual users in order to subsidize their habit. Just like with alcohol or tobacco, heavy users and addicts represent 80 to 90% of the market, depending on the substance. In the case of illegal drugs, heavy users and addicts supply 80 to 90% of the casual users, and do most of the recruiting and initiation. They are also, by far, the weakest link in the supply-chain. Removing heavy users and addicts from the supply-chain can shrink the market by over 90%. In order to fill the void, mid to low-level wholesalers, the typical suppliers to heavy users and addicts, and used to operating in relative shadow, would need to reach out to casual users or try to recruit initiates, an unreliable marketplace, and one filled with the most perils.

Trying to put all heavy users and addicts behind bars is not the solution though. It would be (and has been) an extremely costly exercise in futility. One key part of my proposed strategy consists in effectively and inexpensively removing heavy users and addicts from the supply-chain.

In order to remove abusers and addicts from the supply-chain and in order to reduce recruiting and initiation, abusers and addicts should have subsidized access, preferably conditioned to administration on premises in specialized establishments. This is, by far, the most efficient way to drastically reduce initiation, especially if high barrier of access are placed on casual use of the most damaging substances.

Such a strategy has the added benefit of reaching out to a frequently marginalized population. Once contact is established, it becomes possible to nudge the problem user towards treatment and bring him back to less harmful behavior and patterns of use or even abstinence altogether.

Strategic choices

Based on the acceptance that people will use mind-altering modalities, policies should nudge users towards the least harmful substances and the least harmful modes of administration, according to local conditions and cultures. Chewing coca leaves or drinking coca teas is vastly preferable to snorting or injecting cocaine. Ingesting or smoking opium is vastly preferable to injecting heroin. Marijuana is a relatively harmless substance that should have never been bundled with heroin, cocaine or metamphetamines. Regulation should reflect the differences between substances and modes of administration.

Therefore, regulations should differentiate between hard drugs (heroin, cocaine, metamphetamines) and soft drugs (cannabis/marijuana, coca leaves and preparations, opium in Asia).

Soft drugs should be regulated similarly to alcohol and tobacco, with added restrictions on advertising and packaging and adequate taxation to cover societal cost of abuse, but not to the point of reigniting the illegal marketplace. Taxation should follow international norms to avoid inter-countries smuggling.

Within hard drugs, differentiation should be made between injection, inhalation and other modes of administration. Hard-drugs should generally be dispenses through a prescription model.

Legalization and regulation is only the first step towards reducing the harms linked to substance abuse and addiction. It must be accompanied by efficient prevention and treatment policies.

Global legalization under a multi-tier “legalize, tax, control, prevent, treat and educate” regime is not only possible, it is the only long-term solution to this seemingly intractable problem. Far from giving up, and far from an endorsement, controlled legalization would be finally growing up, being realistic instead of being in denial, being in control instead of leaving control to the underworld. It would abolish the current regime of socialization of costs and privatization of profits to criminal enterprises, depriving them of their main source of income and making our world a safer place.

Weakening the global narco-traffic through global legalization will not solve all crime and violence problems, but it will relieve some pressure and remove a major source of corruption and lawlessness, allowing reallocation of resources to the most harmful criminal activities.

For a more detailed expose of the proposed roadmap to legalization and control, I refer my readers to the closing chapter of “World War-D”.

News from the drug policy reform front

The drug policy reform movement is gathering steam in Latin America and US activists are not even paying attention, even though it is happening at their doorstep!

I have said for a while that drug policy reform, or more precisely, legalization and control of the currently illicit drugs can only happen globally, or at least, it needs to involve enough of the key players of the illegal drug trade: producing countries, transiting countries and consuming countries. I have also said that Latin America is the only part of the world where can emerge a coalition of countries willing to legalize. Well, it looks like the process already started and is gaining momentum.

The latest event, which hasn’t received any press coverage in the US, might be one of the most significant in the long run. The International Forum “Drugs: A Balance to a Century of Their Prohibition” opened on Tuesday February 14^th at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, inaugurated by no less than Mexican first lady Margarita Zavala, the wife of Mexican President Felipe Calderón. Now I let you digest this for a while. Just imagine such a forum inaugurated by the US first Lady at the Smithsonian in Washington DC.

The forum is attended by various members of the Mexican government, including Secretary of the Interior Alejandro Poiré. The rooster of speakers includes many major tenors of the drug policy reform movement, including former presidents Cesar Gaviria from Colombia and Fernando Henrique Cardoso from Brazil, as well as former UK drug czar Mike Trace. The leaders of the major drug policy reform organizations in the world are there too, from LEAP founder Jack Cole, to Judge Jim Gray, Ethan Nadelmann, or Steve Rolles from UK-based Transform Drug Policy Foundation (TDPF). Speakers come all the way from Australia, Switzerland, Netherland, and include of course many Mexican experts.

The live stream of the forum, as well as recorded sessions, are available on ArgosTV.

Wednesday saw a passionate intervention by former Colombian president Cesar Gaviria, that you can listen on these links: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/20468121 and http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/20469180. To hear a former president of one of the countries that has been the most affected by the war on drugs talk with such passion about the hopelessness of prohibitionism was heartening. Even politician can have epiphanies! Why do they wait to retire though, to truly speak up their mind? This, by the way, is the whole idea behind my own Calderon-Santos initiative: trying to convince the two key Latin American leaders to fully come out of the war-on-drugs closet and lead a coalition of the willing to legalize.

Steve Rolles gave a no-nonsense preview of a post-prohibition world, that bears a lot of similarities to my own roadmap at the conclusion of World War-D. If you want to find out how the rest of the world is looking at the war on drugs, I strongly encourage you to browse through the videos of the event.

The drug policy reform movement seems to be reaching a turning point with heads of states ready to jump onboard. This is indeed an important development. Up to now, only retired heads of states were vocal against the war on drugs. The coalition that I was calling for can now emerge. We all can accelerate the movement by expressing our support. The time has come for an international public opinion campaign to get behind those joining the reformist camp.

Some background on recent developments in drug policy reform

I have reported on this blog some of the major developments and will just recap here and refer you to previous posts.

The first clear indication of the emergence of a regional coalition for drug legalization came on December 6^th, 2011, during a meeting of Latin Americans and Caribbean leaders in what is known as the Tuxtla System for Dialogue. http://www.world-war-d.com/2012/02/04/will-global-drug-policy-reform-start-in-latin-america/

Guatemalan president Otto Perez Molina started talking about drug policy reform 4 days after taking office on January 14^th, 2012. He went much further on February 11^th, announcing that he will propose drug legalization in Central America at the next meeting of regional leaders. The US promptly fired back that it would be a terrible idea, but Perez Molina stuck to his guns and briefly gained to his cause Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes on Monday the 13^th. President Funes backpedalled shortly after getting back to Salvador, but it would of course be twisted to allege the effect of US pressure.

http://www.world-war-d.com/2012/02/12/guatemalan-president-perez-molina-to-propose-drugs-legalization-in-central-america-at-next-meeting-of-regional-leaders/

Guatemalan president Pérez Molina to propose drugs legalization in Central America at next meeting of regional leaders

Guatemalan president Pérez Molina announced today Saturday February 11, 2012 that he will propose drugs legalization in Central America, including legalization of transport of drugs in the upcoming meeting of regional leaders.

Pérez Molina said the war on drugs and all the money and technology received from the US has not diminished drug trafficking in the area. “Con toda la tecnología y los recursos y millones de dólares que dio Estados Unidos el problema no ha disminuido. Se habló del éxito del Plan Colombia pero lo único que hicieron los grandes carteles fue neutralizarlo”.

Drug policy reform may be on its way. Public support could make a huge difference. Now is the time to support the Calderon-Santos initiative.

http://www.cmi.com.co/?n=76562

http://www.njherald.com/story/16913887/guatemala-prez-to-propose-legalizing-drugs

A thinly-veiled call for drug policy reform at the XIII Tuxtla System for Dialogue

Last December 6th, 2011, the countries from the Tuxtla System for Dialogue met in Merida, Mexico, to discuss, among others, the security situation in the region, focusing on organized crime and narco-trafficking.

The Summit was attended by the presidents of Guatemala, Álvaro Colom; Honduras, Porfirio Lobo; Mexico, Felipe Calderón; Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega; Panama, Ricardo Martinelli; Dominican Republic, Leonel Fernández; and First Vice-President of Costa Rica, Alfio Piva and the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Belize, Wilfred Elrington; Colombia, María Ángela Holguín; and El Salvador, Hugo Martínez. On this occasion, President of Chile Sebastián Piñera also attended in his capacity as Special Guest.

They published a one-page joint declaration that expresses the growing frustration with the global war on drugs within the Central American region, and his the clearest regional call for drug policy reform to date. (Declaracion conjunta sobre crimen-organizado y narcotrafico) – http://www.presidencia.gob.mx/2011/12/declaracion-conjunta-sobre-crimen-organizado-y-narcotrafico/

Here, is the key paragraph of the declaration:

“Senalaron que Lo deseable sería una sensible reducción de la demanda de drogas ilegales. Sin embargo, si ello no es posible, como lo demuestra la experiencia reciente, las autoridades de los países consumidores deben entonces explorar todas las alternativas posibles para eliminar las ganancias exorbitantes de los criminales incluyendo opciones regulatorias o de mercado orientadas a ese propósito. Así se evitaría que el trasiego de sustancias siga provocando altos niveles de crimen y violencia en naciones latinoamericanas y caribeñas”.

or in plain English:

“They indicated that What would be desirable, would be a significant reduction in the demand for illegal drugs. Nevertheless, if that is not possible, as recent experience demonstrates, the authorities of the consuming countries ought then to explore the possible alternatives to eliminate the exorbitant profits of the criminals, including regulatory or market oriented options to this end. Thus, the transit of substances that continue provoking high levels of crime and violence in Latin American and Caribbean nations will be avoided.”

The declaration uses almost verbatim previous declarations made by President Calderon and clearly bear his mark. It was largely ignored by the US medias, even though it represents a dramatic shift in attitude within the Central American and Caribbean region. Let’s hope that this new attitude will translate into a deliberate shift toward drug policy reform!

Will global drug policy reform start in Latin America?

Drug policy reform cannot take place unilaterally; any country trying this route would be clobbered by the prohibitionist camp led by the US, and nobody will dare to venture on the reform path on his own. But what if a coalition was to emerge? My own geopolitical analysis leads me to believe that Latin America is the only place where such a coalition can initiate, and in fact, we might be witnessing the early signs of its formation.

Let’s go over recent developments:

President Santos of Colombia has repeatedly said that he is in favor of legalization, with a strong caveat, though: if the rest of the world agrees. Which is not going to happen anytime soon.

Meanwhile, President Calderon of Mexico, who launched a bloody battle against the drug cartels in 2006, seems to come to come to the realization that Mexico is getting the rotten end of the War on Drugs. He was especially incensed by the “fast and furious” debacle. Calderon started talking about seeking out “all possible options, including market alternatives” in his declaration following the August 25^th, 2011 Monterey massacre: “If … they are resigned to consuming drugs, then they need to find alternatives … and establish clear points of access different from the border with Mexico, but this situation can’t keep going on like this.” He repeated similar assertions in various interviews and speeches throughout the fall of 2011, most notably during a speech to the Americas Society and Council of the Americas in New York. Such position was then adopted by the Tuxtla Dialogue and Agreement Mechanism in Mérida in its December 5^th meeting. The Summit was attended by the presidents of Guatemala, Álvaro Colom; Honduras, Porfirio Lobo; Mexico, Felipe Calderón; Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega; Panama, Ricardo Martinelli; Dominican Republic, Leonel Fernández; and First Vice-President of Costa Rica, Alfio Piva and the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Belize, Wilfred Elrington; Colombia, María Ángela Holguín; and El Salvador, Hugo Martínez. President of Chile Sebastián Piñera also attended in his capacity as Special Guest. The Joint Statement on Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking, issued at the end of the meeting clearly bears Calderon’s mark, declaring:

In one of his first speeches after taking office, Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina called for a regional strategy for decriminalization.

So, where does this leave us?

Painfully aware of the failure of current prohibitionist policies and the high price they are paying for it, Latin American leaders seem to be testing the water, but nobody has dared crossing the line yet. For a movement to coalesce, leaders need to emerge. Presidents Calderon and Santos clearly stand out. No other heads of state can lead and unite a coalition of the willing with the credibility and the stature of these two heads of state. For Calderon, who pretty much bet his presidency on the Mexican drug war, the reversal must be particularly painful.

What will it take for Calderon and Santos to step up and lead, in defiance of their over-bearish Northern neighbors? 2011 clearly demonstrated the power of popular expression to move things forward and force the hand of history. I am convinced that popular support can tip the balance, but it won’t happen without massive mobilization. To that effect, I wrote the Calderon-Santos Initiative, calling on Presidents Calderon of Mexico and President Santos of Colombia to take the lead of a global coalition for legalization and control of currently illicit drugs. (see http://calderon-santos.org/). I invite you to help promote this initiative and move forward global drug policy reform.

Sources and further readings:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44282514/ns/world_news-americas/t/mexico-president-blasts-us-after-casino-massacre/

http://af.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idAFTRE78J0KL20110920

http://www.presidencia.gob.mx/2011/12/declaracion-conjunta-sobre-crimen-organizado-y-narcotrafico/

http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2012/01/18/guatemalas-otto-perez-molina-calls-for-drug-decriminalization/

http://www.colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/21878-us-respects-but-does-not-support-colombian-call-for-drug-legalization-debate.html

10 goals for controlled re-legalization

As the drug policy reform movement gains traction around the world, it is critical that it reaches beyond its activist core and constructively address the legitimate concerns of the general public, as without its support, we are doomed to failure. The burden of proof is clearly on the drug-reformists side, as they need to overcome 100 years of official propaganda, moral panicking, fear mongering and brain washing. It is critical to be well informed, realistic and pragmatic, with clear objectives. This is one of the purposes of “World War-D”.

Therefore, I propose the following hierarchy of goals for controlled re-legalization:

To greatly reduce, dismantle and if possible eliminate the illegal drug market. To reduce the presence and influence of organized crime. To reduce drug-related crime. The dismantling and elimination of the illegal drug market requires the dismantling of the prohibition system that created it in the first place.
To reduce harm to existing users through safe and controlled legal access. To reduce the number of abusers/addicts; to reduce drug related deaths; to improve the health of remaining users/addicts; to improve their social integration.
To reduce or eliminate the financial burden placed on taxpayers by the consequences of drug use and drug prohibition. To achieve taxpayer neutrality.
To reduce initiation, especially among minors. Long-term improvements are predicated on substantially curbing initiation.
To control and greatly minimize access to minors; eliminating access to minors altogether might be a laudable goal, but it is about as realistic as absolute sexual abstinence to reduce teen pregnancy.
To reduce harm caused by problematic users to their proximate environment and to society at large.
To prevent as much as possible moderate, responsible users from becoming problem users.
To place reasonable access restrictions to the most damaging substances for new users and casual users.
To acknowledge the legitimacy of the non-medical use of psychoactive substances and the potential danger of their abuse.
To respect the civil liberties and lifestyle choices of informed, consenting adults as long as these choices do not intentionally endanger others. To end discrimination against users of psychoactive substances.

I believe these are realistic and attainable goals provided that the right policies are put in place. Unlike the fairly rigid prohibitionist model, there should be a lot of flexibility in the application of drug reform to allow for experimentation and adaptation to local realities. It should be obvious by now that those who wish to use psychoactive substances will go to great lengths to satisfy their desire, and it is far more advantageous for society to satisfy their need than to let the black market take care of it. The guiding concern shouldn’t be whether it is moral or immoral to provide psychoactive substances to those consenting adults who which to use them, but what is the least harmful way to do it.

Modes of administration – evolutionary adaptive gaps

Humans are (so far) the most evolved species within the ecosystem of planet Earth, and the end result of a long evolutionary process going back to the primordial soup, out of which, as the dominant theory goes, all forms of life differentiated and evolved. It is increasingly apparent that the competition-driven Darwinian model is incomplete and that evolution is driven just as much by cooperative interaction as by competition, the yin and yang of evolution. Cooperation as a major force of evolution may have escaped evolutionists because of its ubiquity: for billions of years, life on our planet consisted of unicellular organisms that eventually congregated to form unicellular systems and then multicellular organisms. Interactive cooperation allowed the division of labor and the creation of specialized cells that eventually congregated in organs, allowing further specialization and differentiation, thus speeding up the evolutionary process. Just imagine survival of the fittest ruling the cells of your brain or your liver! Likewise, the major driving force of social systems, whether in the animal or human kingdom, is not competition, but interactive cooperation.

All life forms co-evolved interdependently in competitive symbiosis in which the vegetal kingdom plays a critical and distinctive role in the evolution of the animal kingdom. The vegetal kingdom provides directly or indirectly to the animal kingdom not only its food, but also its medicine, as well as substances that affect its mind, and may have been key to some critical evolutionary steps. This is indeed one of the great wonders and mysteries of life, and a powerful testimony to the prevalence of cooperation in the evolutionary process. The affinity between plants like poppy and cannabis and some of the most fundamental systems of brain activity, the dopaminergic and the cannabinoid system, both found in even the most primitive animal species, is nothing short of remarkable. Likewise, alcohol, as we will see in the chapter dedicated to that substance, is not only present in interstellar space, it was most likely one of the ingredients of the primordial soup theorized to be at the origin of life.

Humans co-evolved with psychoactive substances of natural origin in symbiosis with the vegetal kingdom. However, concentrates and extracts, such as distilled alcohol, heroin, cocaine, or amphetamines, or purely synthetic drugs, as well as direct routes of administration such as injection or inhalation, are novel features of our environment. As such, they create an evolutionary adaptive gap and are inherently pathogenic, although their use may be safe and warranted in some circumstances.[1]

Psychoactive substances can cross the blood-brain barriers and can be absorbed via various pathways. The digestive system, via the oral route, is the overly prevalent channel of administration of food and other substances in the animal kingdom, and is set up to withstand a wide variety of ingests. Furthermore, substances absorbed through the digestive system take a relatively long time to reach the brain as they are partly metabolized within the digestive system and the liver before they can reach the brain, which they do gradually. Therefore, ingestion is always the least dangerous and least addictive form of administration for a given substance.[2] The digestive administration process can be modulated to a certain extent. Thus, substances taken on an empty stomach reach the brain much faster than when they are taken with a meal.

The lungs, on the other hand, were designed to absorb air, and not much else. Even the smell of roses and other olfactory environmental signals are meant for the olfactory system located within the nose cavity, and not for the lungs. The lungs having a fractal structure, their total surface area is about the size of a tennis court, allowing fast and efficient oxygenation of the blood. Absorption through the lungs is extremely fast and powerful. Substances than can be absorbed through the lung tissue promptly reach the brain. Smoked heroin, cocaine or methamphetamine reach the brain within seconds of inhalation and peak within minutes. However, as we will see in a further chapter, cannabinoids and THC are different as they are strongly lipophilic. Their access to the brain is delayed upon inhalation, and the maximum “high” of cannabis is reached within 15 to 30 minutes.

As for veins, they were never designed to be punctured. Thus, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that intravenous injection is the fastest, most powerful and most damaging form of administration. Nasal absorption is notably slower than inhalation but still quite powerful and fast acting. Still, the nasal tissue is not meant to absorb anything more than infinitesimal doses of subtle and not so subtle aromatic substances ranging from utterly repulsive to sublime, from skunks to roses. Sublingual absorption is another fast track to the brain that is about on a par with nasal absorption. Chewing, such as chewing coca leaves or tobacco, involves a substantial amount of absorption through sublingual and other buccal mucosae.

Recreational drug users are motivated by the hedonistic reward provided by the substance. For most psychoactives except psychedelics, the intensity of the hedonistic reward depends in large part on the acuity of the peak intensity and the speed to reach this peak. A gradual rise of psychoactive concentration in the brain allows it to somewhat adapt to the substance and to modulate its effects to a certain extent, smoothing out its most damaging effects. A steep peak, on the other hand, doesn’t allow any adaptation; the more intense the peak, the more acute its effect. The most acute peaks create a surge of pleasurable sensation, the “rush” described by many injecting addicts, that they crave intensely. The steeper the peak, the more intense the rush, the more acute and disruptive will be the effects on the brain, causing a homeostatic imbalance which results in chronic dysregulation of the brain reward mechanisms and the brain’s neurotransmission in general.

Routes of administration that result in the rapid entry of a substance into the brain and/or faster rates of delivery have a greater effect on the neurotransmission systems in the brain, especially the reward systems, producing sensitization. Hard liquors are more damaging than beer or wine, especially on an empty stomach. Smoked opium reaches the brain faster and is more addictive than ingested opium. Injection and inhalation of active ingredients such as amphetamine, heroin or cocaine have the quickest entry and fastest rates of delivery. Therefore, they represent the most drastic evolutionary gap and have the most damaging effects.

Set and setting, expectation and intentionality affect the neuronal epigenetic environment. As such, they may influence the effects of particular substances. Thus, ritualistic use of tobacco where the plant is used with veneration and respect is vastly different from chain smoking of industrial cigarettes. Likewise, chronic pain sufferers under long-term opiate medication can usually discontinue without much problem once their medication is not needed anymore.[3] The absence of secondary reinforcers in the case of pain medication probably plays a critical role in preventing addiction. Nowhere is the set and setting more important than in the use of psychedelics.

[1] Randolph M. Nesse* and Kent C. Berridge, “Psychoactive Drug Use in Evolutionary Perspective,” Science 278, 63, 1997.

[2] Cannabis is somewhat an exception as ingested cannabis has stronger psychoactive effects than smoked cannabis (see Chapter 10).

[3] http://www.nida.nih.gov/researchreports/heroin/heroin3.html.

A good video introduction to the endocannabinoid system

I highly recommend this short video Visualization of the endocannabinoid signaling system

Leanne does a great job at explaining how the endocannabinoid system operates as a retrograde signaling system. This is why cannabinoids act quite differently from other psychoactive substances. It may be why cannabinoids do not create physical dependance (as opiates or alcohol).

Call for a global convention on psychoactive drugs

Call for a global convention on psychoactive drugs – a coalition of the willing to re-legalize and control

The entire war on drugs and drug prohibition are a US fabrication. Drug prohibition was imposed to the rest of the world when it was forcibly attached to the 1919 Treaty of Versailles at the end of WWI.

Decriminalization wouldn’t do much to solve the biggest issues created by prohibitionism in the big world: the violence, corruption and destabilization brought about by narco-trafficking, which is itself the unavoidable consequence of prohibition. While the US is not likely to re-legalize any time soon, Latin American countries are becoming increasingly restive as the time of blind obedience to US diktats is fading into memory. I, for one, am pushing for a coalition of the willing, led by Presidents Calderon and Santos, and regrouping Latin-American, European and Asian countries, to initiate controlled legalization of production and trade of all psychoactive substances. The principal objective of such a convention should be to remove the production and commerce of currently illicit drugs from the control of organized crime, and to bring it back under the control of legitimate international and national organizations. The secondary objective should be to reduce harm throughout the entire supply chain, from the producers to the users.

I do not think that such a coalition is as far-fetched as most American would like to believe. The American century is over; it ended under G.W. Bush. The world is now a vastly different place.

A growing number of retired heads of state and high-level officials are denouncing the failure of the War on Drugs and calling for a paradigm shift in drug policy. But we need heads of states and high-level officials to take a stand while in office and actually initiate profound and real drug policy reform while they are still in office.

No other heads of state on the world scene can lead and unite a coalition of the willing with the credibility and the stature of a potential Calderon-Santos alliance. Both presidents have repeatedly expressed their support for alternatives to the current highly disruptive policies.

But neither President Calderon nor President Santos are likely to make a move without strong popular support behind them.

Thus, I invite all of you to support and diffuse the Calderon-Santos Initiative, calling for Presidents Calderon of Mexico and President Santos of Colombia to take the lead of a global coalition for legalization and control of currently illicit drugs. Check http://calderon-santos.org/, as well as the attached files. Sign the open letter to Presidents Calderon and Santos, spread the word.