NAACP president: American drug war’s toll on liberty greater than apartheid (via Raw Story ) Ben Jealous, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, appeared on Current TV’s “Viewpoint” Tuesday night to explain why he and 174 other celebrities and activists signed an open letter sent to President Barack Obama this
WASHINGTON (FinalCall.com) - At the same time civil rights leaders convened here April 4, to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., another group of activists gathered, reflecting their growing discontent with President Barack Obama’s failure to directly address issues of vital concern to Black people. Many in the group
Filmmaker Eugene Jarecki addressed the California Senate for 40 minutes on Monday, describing the war on drugs as an “abject failure” and urging the lawmakers to show “Christian compassion” by ending it. He warned that imprisoning young Americans for drug offenses was increasing crime rather than reducing it. Jarecki said tough drug laws were “actually
JORGE CABRERA / REUTERS A police officer stands guard as confiscated drugs are being incinerated on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, Honduras on July 4, 2012. The headlines in Nicaragua these days have a familiar echo. In what feels like a 30-year high school reunion, the reanimated socialist Sandinista Front, led by president Daniel Ortega, is
WASHINGTON (FinalCall.com) - At the same time civil rights leaders convened here April 4, to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., another group of activists gathered, reflecting their growing discontent with President Barack Obama’s failure to directly address issues of vital concern to Black people.
Many in the group of social justice, drug policy and criminal justice reform advocates were ex-offenders and they intensified their call for an end to the War on Drugs, and to demand increased government investment in jobs, economic development and social programs to combat the “state of emergency in the dark ghettos” of Black America. The War on Drugs they declared has failed to eradicate the drug menace but instead has turned out to be a war on Black and Brown youth, turning millions into felons for behavior that should be treated as a medical problem, not a criminal problem.
“Millions of Black people know the truth, the War on Drugs is a War on Us,” Dr. Ron Daniels, president of the Institute of the Black World 21st Century told reporters. “The War on Drugs is a racially biased policy—the ‘New Jim Crow’—which has disrupted and devastated Black communities across the country.
In a June 5 2012 photo, police arrest a suspect in Chicago. The CPD narcotics division had been conducting undercover investigations in order to move in on suspected drug dealers in parts of Chicago’s South and West sides.
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“We have come today to proclaim that we have suffered long enough. It’s time to bring an end to an ill-conceived and destructive policy,” he said, insisting that since the initiative was begun by an executive order issued by President Richard Nixon, President Obama could do away with the failed strategy without needing congressional approval…
Filmmaker Eugene Jarecki addressed the California Senate for 40 minutes on Monday, describing the war on drugs as an “abject failure” and urging the lawmakers to show “Christian compassion” by ending it.
He warned that imprisoning young Americans for drug offenses was increasing crime rather than reducing it. Jarecki said tough drug laws were “actually working backward and making more crime, making our communities less safe.”
Noting that figures such as anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, televangelist Pat Robertson, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) all opposed the war on drugs, he told the Democrat-led state Senate that reforming drug laws had become a common ground between liberals and conservatives.
Jarecki explained that the nation’s harsh drug policies had a disproportionally negative impact on minorities and alienated law enforcement from communities. He condemned the war on drugs as a campaign “not based in human dignity and redemption” and a “self-perpetuating monster.”
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A police officer stands guard as confiscated drugs are being incinerated on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, Honduras on July 4, 2012.
The headlines in Nicaragua these days have a familiar echo. In what feels like a 30-year high school reunion, the reanimated socialist Sandinista Front, led by president Daniel Ortega, is rekindling its old revolutionary romance with Russia, which has promised its former tovarishch millions of dollars in weapons, uniforms, helicopters, armored vehicles and training.
But this time, the Russian arms will be targeted at drug traffickers, not political insurgents. And the U.S., which spent billions of dollars to stop the expansion of Soviet influence in Central America in the 1980s, is welcoming its former cold war nemesis backinto the neighborhood.
“The truth is that we want collaboration, and if the collaboration comes from Russia in our hemisphere or if it’s the United States in Russia’s hemisphere, then I think that is positive,” Assistant Secretary of State William Brownfield, the Obama Administration’s point man on Central America’s drug war, said in response to Russian drug czar Victor Ivanov’s recent visit to Nicaragua.
(MORE: Caribbean Crisis: Can Nicaragua Navigate Waters It Won from Colombia?)
While Russian involvement in Central America is still cause for concern in some Washington circles, the U.S. has much bigger problems in the region. In Guatemala and Honduras, two of the most violent countries on earth, the U.S.-led drug war has become an increasingly difficult endeavor. Success, according to Brownfield, may mean pushing the drug trade elsewhere and beginning the battle anew.
In Honduras, which gets $36 million of the $85 million in annual U.S. aid for anti-drug efforts in Central America, rampant corruption has led the U.S. to bypass the normal chain of police command to work with specialized units of agents “selected for their honesty and lack of corruption,” according to Brownfield. The U.S. refuses to work with Honduran Police Chief Juan Carlos Bonilla, whom U.S. officials are investigating for extrajudicial killings and other accusations ofrights abuses, and 20 top police commissioners under his command.
Brownfield, who recently visited Honduras, says the U.S. will maintain a policy of “two degrees of separation” from the country’s tarnished police commanders until the whole force is “purified” of corruption — a process he thinks will take five to 10 years.
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By JAMES NYE
As the brutal drug war which has claimed over 80,000 lives still rages, one anonymous blogger has been providing Mexicans with something they can’t get elsewhere – an inside view of their country’s debilitating narcotics battle.
With over three million hits a week and over 120,000 followers on Twitter, Blog del Narco is renowned for its fearless coverage at a time when mainstream media are feeling pressure and are frightened away by the nation’s deadly cartels.
The identity of the courageous reporter, who lives under the constant and real fear of a violent and gruesome death, has long been a mystery, as many postings include graphic imagery and depict crime scenes accessible only to military or the police.
An anonymous, twentysomething blogger is giving Mexicans what they can’t get elsewhere ¿ an inside view of their country’s raging drug war
Writing what no one else dares to: The fearless blogger refuses to bow to the violent threats from the cartel
However, a new investigation by The Houston Observer has revealed that, in fact, the author is a young, single woman in her twenties, with no children and only a deep love of her country and the belief that her blog helps draw back the veil on her nations vicious fight against drug barons.
‘I don’t think people ever imagined it was a woman doing this,’ said the blogger to Rory Carroll who works for the British newspaper The Guardian in Los Angeles.
From Twitter-land…
NAACP president: American drug war’s toll on liberty greater than apartheid
Ben Jealous, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, appeared on Current TV’s “Viewpoint” Tuesday night to explain why he and 174 other celebrities and activists signed an open letter sent to President Barack Obama this week urging him to take decisive action…
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