DEA

[DEA] has also asked Adfero to create an interactive Web site that will include blogs and virtual tours of the museum. Right now, the only Web site that exists is a page about the museum on the DEA Web site. Plans to include a blog and a speaker's bureau are also under discussion.

A DEA Blog, huh? Sounds just awesome. Let's hope it's more interesting than the compost pile that passes for a blog over at ONDCP. I wanna see candid posts like "If Potent Pot Doesn't Kill These Hippies, We Will," or "Top 10 Sick People We Don't Care About."

So far the only thing we know about this blog is that it will be completely devoid of any intellectual value. They're already prepared to promise us that much:

The group's strategy going forward is to take its slogan, "Hope through education," and "take the debate about drugs out of the realm of statistics and policy and move it into the realm of personal stories," says Battle.

This is just bizarre. I swear, every time I think I'm on the verge of understanding what motivates these people, they find increasingly strange ways to waste our money:

Cooking methamphetamine takes only a few hours and requires simple household ingredients, like striker plates from matchbooks, the guts of lithium batteries, drain cleaner.

"It's pretty gross," said Matt Leland, who works in career services at the University of Northern Colorado and who recently helped cook the drug in a lab. "If someone was truly interested in manufacturing meth, it would not be that hard."

The Drug Enforcement Administration invited Leland and other citizens - such as software engineers, a teacher, a pastor and a school principal - to make methamphetamine last week in a lab at Metropolitan State College of Denver. [Denver Post]

Ok. We understand that DEA is teaching private citizens how to manufacture meth, but why? Why the hell would they do that?

The class was held as part of the DEA's first Citizens Academy in order to give the public a close-up view of what the agency does to keep drugs off the street.

That's interesting, and I'm eager to attend, but it doesn't answer the question because cooking meth isn’t part of DEA's job at all. Their job is, of course, to stop people from cooking meth, which has now become the precise opposite of what they're doing.

The whole thing is mindlessly indulgent when you consider that no one really needs a chemistry lesson to infer that the constant explosions at their crazy neighbor's house might explain why he has so many strange visitors.

If you're gonna teach meth-cooking, teach it to immigrant store clerks before you arrest them for naively selling household items to undercover narcs.

According to the DEA, people absolutely love working for the DEA (links added for irony):

DEA significantly exceeded ratings of other Government agencies in many measures of “Performance Culture,” including:

• employees feel personally empowered;
• creativity and innovation are rewarded along with providing high-quality products and services;
• promotions are based on merit;
• performance appraisals are a fair reflection of performance;
• poor performers are dealt with; and
• complaints and grievances are fairly resolved.

Heck I might enjoy working there too if I weren't so knowledgeable about drug policy. But it comes as no surprise that these folks enjoy waging war on their fellow citizens with no performance measures or accountability. In 34 years DEA has exhausted untold sums at our expense while failing to make a dent in America's drug problem.

…But at least they're having a really great time.

Juan Medina has an IQ of 77. Suffice to say he ain't no rocket scientist. Medina's limited mental capacity precludes many potential employment opportunities, but it was good enough for the DEA, which made him a secret agent. It didn't work out very well.

From The New York Times:

Mr. Medina, who had no previous criminal record, said he became involved with the D.E.A. in the fall of 2004, a few months after his father was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison on drug conspiracy charges. He said he was told that if he helped the agency, his father might win an early release.
...

Mr. Medina said he signed a contract even though he told agents he knew little about his father’s criminal associates.

Despite his limitations and the "unremarkable life" he'd led, Medina managed to infiltrate a gang of drug dealers in Brooklyn. Things took a turn for the worse when Medina's criminal associates took him along on a robbery. He claims to have notified DEA of their plans and even waited around for police after the heist went down. To his surprise, no one at DEA would corroborate his story.

The D.E.A. has acknowledged that Mr. Medina, 24, was under contract as an informant. But the agency has not come to his aid, and is, in fact, helping prosecute him on charges of burglary, robbery and criminal possession of a weapon stemming from the robbery at a Bronx apartment. If convicted, he could be sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Whether or not the DEA knew about the robbery, as Medina claims, they bear full responsibility for his actions. They took a man with a limited mental capacity, exploited his love for his father, and sent him on dangerous missions. Their assistance in his prosecution is a rather transparent attempt to cover up their mistake.

This is a perfect example of the reckless abandon with which the DEA operates. Their insatiable greed compels them to create crime and confiscate the proceeds. Sadly, innocent people like Juan Medina are the easiest prey.