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DrugSense FOCUS Alert: John Walters Caught Lying - Again

[Courtesy of DrugSense] One of the U.S. government's most persistently dishonest appointed officials - John Walters, the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) - has been caught in yet another outright lie to the North American media. His office's first major press release of 2008 made a disturbing announcement. According to Drug Czar Walters, there is a "dangerous new drug threat coming from Canada." The drug? - so called "Extreme Ecstasy." In a news release distributed in the U.S. and Canada, Walters warned that the use of ecstasy is being fueled by Canadian producers smuggling the illegal designer drug -- which is increasingly laced with crystal meth -- into the U.S. "Historic progress against ecstasy availability and use is in jeopardy of being rolled back by Canadian criminal organizations," Walters said in the release. Scott Burns, the primary spokesperson for Walters' ONDCP office, echoed the alarming cry with "They are remarketing and packaging it and trying to glamorize it." Certainly gives the guise of being important information for Americans - especially parents of teenagers, right? Unfortunately, it seems that John Walters and the ONDCP created "extreme ecstasy" out of their own imaginations. The U.S. Drug Czar has been caught lying - again. And this time, the direct rebuttal of his lies comes from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Less than two weeks after the January 4th ONDCP press release, the head of the RCMP's national drug branch sternly rebuked the ONDCP claims. Supt. Paul Nadeau said he doesn't know why Walters would make such fictional statements without checking facts with Canadian officials. He added that he himself has never heard of "extreme Ecstasy.... it would appear that it's a term that somebody came up with in a boardroom in Washington, D.C." Please write a letter to newspapers that carry coverage of the false claims. Let your local and state or provincial media know that the United States Drug Czar is a very unreliable and frankly dishonest source of accurate information.

ENCOD Statement to Commission on Narcotic Drugs

ONE YEAR LEFT Dear delegates, On behalf of the European Coalition for Just and Effective Drug Policies, a platform of more than 150 citizens’ association from around Europe, we wish to ask your attention for the following.

Ecstasy found to Help Alleviate PTSD among Military Veterans

Researchers are gaining ground in the combat against posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in an unlikely way.  Touted as “the party drug,” ecstasy, or MDMA, may just be the saving grace for hundreds of thousands of veterans suffering from PTSD.

According to a study by the Rand Corporation, in 2008 one in five soldiers returning home from Afghanistan or Iraq showed symptoms of PTSD. All in all, nearly 300,000 returning soldiers were affected. Letting individuals with PTSD go untreated is detrimental to both the individual and to society as a whole, as it has been linked to higher incidences of depression, health issues, violence, marital problems, drug use, unemployment, homelessness and suicide among veterans. And although each active military service member is provided with $400,000 in military life insurance coverage, that provides little comfort to families of a PTSD-afflicted veterans.

Europe: Czech Government Announces Decriminalization Quantities; Law Goes Into Effect on New Year’s Day

The Czech cabinet Monday approved a Justice Ministry proposal that sets personal use quantity limits for illicit drugs under a penal code revision that decriminalizes drug possession in the Czech Republic. The law and its quantity limits will take effect on January 1. The Czech government had approved the decriminalization law late last year, but failed to set precise quantities covered by it, instead leaving it to police and prosecutors to determine what constituted a “larger than small” amount of drugs. The resulting confusion--and the prosecution of some small-scale marijuana growers as drug traffickers--led the government to adopt more precise criteria. Under the new law, possession of less than the following amounts of illicit drugs will not be a criminal offense: Marijuana 15 grams (or five plants) Hashish 5 grams Magic mushrooms 40 pieces Peyote 5 plants LSD 5 tablets Ecstasy 4 tablets Amphetamine 2 grams Methamphetamine 2 grams Heroin 1.5 grams Coca 5 plants Cocaine 1 gram Possession of “larger than a small amount” of marijuana can result in a jail sentence of up to one year. For other illicit drugs, the sentence is two years. Trafficking offenses carry stiffer sentences. Justice Minister Daniela Kovarova said that the ministry had originally proposed decriminalizing the possession of up to two grams of hard drugs, but decided that limits being imposed by courts this year were appropriate. "The government finally decided that it would stick to the current court practice and drafted a table based on these limits," Kovarova said. The Czech Republic now joins Portugal as a European country that has decriminalized drug possession.
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