[Lnc-business] UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs trying to hide crumbling consensus behind global Prohibition

Wed Mar 15 09:26:44 EDT 2017

Thank you, Starchild, for your thoughtful analysis of the issues behind our
LNC motion on the Cannabis issue. 

In a nutshell, we Libertarians have not one but two Cannabis issues that we
must come to grips with:

1.	Prohibition laws do not work, have never worked and are almost
universally ignored. Prohibition along with healthcare and education are the
three pillars of our out-of-control economic system that is on the fast
track to national bankruptcy. The financial and societal costs of
prohibition are staggering in terms of overburdened law enforcement,
overtaxed citizens, out-of-control economy, exacerbated health issues,
fostering of criminal cartels, the highest incarceration rate in the world
and the increasing threat of a police state to allegedly enforce the war on
drugs laws. Ending the war on drugs is an obvious no-brainer unless we
Libertarians cave in to the timid temptation expressed in the following
issue number 2.

2.	The Cannabis motion exposes the divisive tug-of-war between those
who prefer to make a bold statement of principle embedded in an effective
Libertarian solution to point number 1 above (end the war on drugs) and
those who are afraid of alienating voters and prefer a timid position to
help win elections today. Those who prefer the timid unprincipled approach
to prohibition are in for a rude awaking as experienced by the Libertarian
ticket in the first post-convention ticket town hall fiasco. Even your
enemies will respect you if you clearly state your principles. By contrast,
all sides will have contempt for you if you do not stand up for what you
believe in.

Starchild has pointed out the unmistakable worldwide trend toward
recognizing the evil of prohibition for what it is. Now we Libertarians must
choose. Are we going to sacrifice our principles to get a few more votes
today at the expense of our moral leadership in the future? For me, this
"present goods versus future goods" choice is a no-brainer. We must invest
in the future by taking a principled position today if we truly intend to
move the needle toward freedom.

Thoughts?

~David

Omaha Libertarian Strategy & Family Fun Un-Convention

Celebrate Life, Set the Bar High and LIVE FREE

~David Pratt Demarest

LNC Region 6 Representative (IA, IL, MN, MO, ND, NE, WI)

Secretary, LPNE State Central Committee

Cell:      402-981-6469

Home: 402-493-0873

From: Lnc-business [mailto:lnc-business-bounces at hq.lp.org] On Behalf Of
Starchild
Sent: Wednesday, March 15, 2017 4:22 AM
To: Libertarian National Committee list <lnc-business at hq.lp.org>
Cc: ghardy at ialp.com; International Society for Individual Liberty
<isil at isil.org>
Subject: [Lnc-business] UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs trying to hide
crumbling consensus behind global Prohibition

            A paper by Harry Levine of the libertarian Independent Institute
in the early 2000s points out that few people realize that 100% of the
countries in the world (well, presumably meaning 100% of those recognized by
the United Nations) have drug prohibition:

"For much of its history, global drug prohibition has had very few critics.
Even today, despite the impressive growth of the harm-reduction movement and
of drug policy reform activities in many countries, the regime of worldwide
drug prohibition still has very few explicit opponents. One reason for the
lack of organized opposition to global drug prohibition is that very few
people actually know that it exists. In effect, global drug prohibition has
operated for many years as a kind of official secret. Its existence was on a
'need to know basis,' and most people, it seems, did not need to know.
Hence, for most of its history, drug prohibition rarely has been called by
that name. This nonuse of the phrase drug prohibition has occurred even
though (and perhaps because) alcohol prohibition was always called
prohibition, especially by the people in favor of it. Sometimes this
prohibition on the use of the phrase drug prohibition has been enforced by
prominent publications and government agencies as they tell contributors and
grant recipients that they may not use the term. Because hardly anybody
knows that global drug prohibition exists, hardly anybody opposes it.
Furthermore, even fewer people currently understand that by ending or even
modifying the Single Convention of 1961, the question of national drug
policy can be returned to individual countries and then to local governments
to do with as they wished."

( http://www.independent.org/pdf/tir/tir_07_2_levine.pdf )

            But the tide is clearly shifting. Dozens of countries have been
moving toward decriminalization, and last year, over a dozen former
presidents and prime ministers of various countries (including Jimmy Carter
of the United States) along with many other prominent individuals, over
1,000 international leaders in all, signed an open letter to UN Secretary
General Ban Ki-Moon, stating in part, 

"A growing number of city, state and national governments no longer treat
drug use and possession as crimes.  Some are beginning to legally regulate
cannabis for medical and even non-medical purposes. Many more recognize the
need to make essential medicines readily available, especially for pain and
palliative care in lower income countries.  But far greater and more
systemic reforms are essential." 

( http://www.drugpolicy.org/ungass2016 )

            Today March 14, an anti-prohibitionist ally at the Drug Policy
Foundation, Doug McVay, has reported that those controlling the UN
Commission on Narcotic Drugs meeting taking place in Vienna this week are
resorting to increased secrecy in an effort to keep word from getting out
about the proceedings, both because prohibitionist policies are increasingly
under fire, and also because representatives of governments seeking to
maintain these policies are making absurd and discredited arguments that
would be widely mocked if publicized:

From: "Doug McVay (dougmcvay[at]gmail.com <http://gmail.com/> )"
<owner-dpfca at drugsense.org <mailto:owner-dpfca at drugsense.org> >
Date: March 14, 2017 at 8:00:25 PM PDT
Subject: DPFCA: To folks at the Commission on Narcotic Drugs meeting in
Vienna

Hello Friends,
I used to gripe about UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs only doing a live
webcast of the first 3 days of its annual meeting. Not this year. This year
CND only did a webcast of the first day. Still only available live, copies
are not archived.

This is an outrage. It's 2017. CND is a UN commission based in Vienna, it
has the technology and resources. They choose to not make an archive
available.

Apparently CND wants to go about its business without interference from
public or press outside of Vienna. CND sucks.

There are member nations calling for reform, voicing dissent at the highest
levels. CND would rather that people outside the UN Center in Vienna not
hear -- literally -- that dissent, because that's evidence that the
institution of prohibition is crumbling. There are other nations trying to
prop up prohibition with arguments that were discredited years ago. CND
also wants to prevent people outside Vienna from hearing that dreck because
if they do then people will mock it, and deservedly so.

Most reformers know that. Some of us have been involved directly in
international efforts and have first-hand experience, and those people and
organizations have reported on that progress so some in the public are
aware of it. Thanks to a handful of activists and journalists, there are
some video and audio recordings to prove those facts to that part of the
public who won't just take my or DPA's or Open Society Foundation's word
for something. (It's one thing to have heard about the emperor's new
clothes, it's another to see the evidence.)

So, to my friends and associates who are there in Vienna this week
attending CND: please, get as much audio and video as you can of the
proceedings and the side events. It's more important this year than ever.

Use your smartphones, your tablets, your laptops, your cameras. Document
everything. If you have Facebook you can probably even stream it live.
Coordinate with Hungarian Civil Liberties Union - HCLU/ Drugreporter to be
sure and cover anything they can't get to. (And it's even okeh to make a
redundant copy -- think of it as a backup.) And please share those copies
widely. I can definitely help with distribution. We cannot allow the
official record of this week-long series of meetings to be only what CND
dictates.

Thanks. Safe travels, everyone.

Cheers,
Doug

-- 
Doug McVay
Editor, Drug War Facts
Board Member, Common Sense for Drug Policy
Advisory Council Member, Students for Sensible Drug Policy
Host/Producer, Century Of Lies
Host/Producer, Free Culture Radio
www.drugwarfacts.org <http://www.drugwarfacts.org/> 
www.drugtruth.net/cms/views/latest_col
<http://www.drugtruth.net/cms/views/latest_col> 
www.kboo.fm/freeculture <http://www.kboo.fm/freeculture> 
cel: 717.940.2154
twitter: @dougmcvay and @drugpolicyfacts
skype: dougmcvay

"Until we are all free, we are none of us free."
-- Emma Lazarus

            This growing sentiment to end the global "War on Drugs" foisted
on the rest of the world by the U.S. government, as more and more people
recognize that drug abuse is a health issue, not a criminal issue, is cause
for optimism and redoubling our efforts as major reform is within reach.
Libertarians have long championed the freedom of people to control what goes
into their own bodies. With the facade of global Prohibition showing cracks,
now is the time to drive home the libertarian message that the persecution
of people for the peaceful manufacture, transportation, sale, or use of any
drug must end.

Love & Liberty,

                                 ((( starchild )))

At-Large Representative, Libertarian National Committee

                               (415) 625-FREE

                                 @StarchildSF

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