Good News Round -Up for Week Two of February 2018

by Nomad

In an endless search of positive news, I scoured the Internet, hunting high and low. and I managed to find these four stories for all my glum Nomads. 

Super Beans for Human Beings

Let's talk beans. Specifically, super beans. 

Developed by scientists at the National Agricultural Research Organisation of Uganda, in collaboration with the Colombia-based International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), the Nabe 15 bean is better than your average bean. It's a fast-maturing, high-yield variety that drought-resistant. 

California and Jeff Sessions' Big Marijuana Legalization Hang-up

by Nomad

I produced this short film about a surprising moment in California history and the man who would like to see that history reverse itself.

Last week, recreational use for cannabis became legal - at least, in some areas- for the first time since the state officially declared marijuana illegal in 1913.

It was a high point in the state's history, you might say.

Bust: How Republicans Lost the War on Drugs 3/5

by Nomad

In past installments in this series on America's war on drugs, we examined Nixon and Ford. Now we turn to the Democratic president Jimmy Carter.
Deeply entrenched distrust for the president within the CIA would prove to be an insurmountable obstacle.

Part 3. Where the Rational Met Reality

Carter's Way

The 70s were a time of reformation after the hectic and often frightening social shakeups of the 60s. Watergate and the subsequent Church Senate Committee Investigations had opened up the heart of the political system and most Americans were appalled at the grimy business of running the country and managing the world.

What was needed was a complete overhaul starting at the top. Jimmy Carter, a born-again Christian, peanut farmer with the down-home Georgian accent seemed to be the style of leadership the country demanded.
And so in 1976, against all expectations, The Waltons moved into the White House.

The white middle class conservative values of "dominant social order" were being re-evaluated, questioned and challenged in a variety of ways.

The extreme conservative opinion, typified by white frustration, tainted with bigotry and, simplistic, backward views of the world,  was being mocked weekly on television shows like All in the Family and other programs. It is no surprise then that the failed drug policy should once again come under greater scrutiny.

In some ways, President Carter did, in fact, pick up where President Ford had left off. And as we mentioned in the previous post, that new direction had already been sabotaged. While marijuana was now being considered harmless and non-addictive, cocaine was added to the same category. (We should take a closer look at the possible reason for this.) In any case, this coupling, for whatever reasons, proved to be a major blunder.

Both, under President Ford's directive, were now to receive far less attention from law enforcement. Meanwhile the focus was concentrated on the heroin trade. 

Progress combating the illegal import of heroin too was hampered. That had much to do with the CIA and its antagonism toward Carter and all he represented. 

It was common knowledge that high level intelligence officials in the agency had no great love for Carter. Perhaps it was to be expected since President Carter had campaigned as an outsider who was coming to Washington to clean the mess that the Church Committee had revealed.

Bust: How the Republicans Lost the War on Drugs 2/5

by Nomad

In Part 1 of this series we examined how  and why President Nixon declared his war on illegal drugs. However, the public learned the moral crusade was being led by a president with dubious moral qualifications.

In the second part of the series we carry on the story with the Ford Administration's efforts to make sense of Nixon's policy.  

That wasn't going to be easy.

Part 2. The Flaw and the Irony 

Ford's Challenge 

In 1974, with a hearty arm wave from the doors of a helicopter, disgraced President Richard Nixon bid farewell to power. The anti-drug warrior was immediately replaced on August 9, by America's first and only unelected president, Gerald Ford. (In less than a year, Ford had gone from congressman  to vice-president to president.)

The Watergate investigation- as it turned out- was just the beginning of the government's distress. If the new president was calling for a "Time of Healing" it was soon clear that some people were not going to let the house cleaning end with Nixon. 

In January 1975, the Church committee, an independent investigation was established by Senate and continued the post-Watergate housecleaning. The target was no longer the president and his staff but CIA and claims of grievous misconduct, The committee's investigation pulled back  the cover on such things as assassination attempts against foreign leaders, covert attempts to subvert foreign governments and the FBI and CIA’s efforts to infiltrate and disrupt organizations here at home. (That's just the short list.) 

Senator Church, after reviewing the evidence of widespread abuse by the FBI, CIA, IRS and NSA, called the intelligence agencies "rogue elephants."

The investigation dragged on throughout most of Ford's time in office, and involved testimony from highest levels in the intelligence community. 

Under those circumstances, any attempt to restore the stability of the nation was going to be a challenge. Nixon's drug war was just another example of the general chaos in government of that time. And much of the problem, the confusion, centered on the policy stance on marijuana.

Bust: How the Republicans Lost the War on Drugs 1/5

by Nomad

Starting with President Nixon, the War on Drugs has been a series of costly mistakes. Sadly, most of the misjudgements might have been avoided if only officials had listened to the experts and to the people most affected.

Part 1. Nixon, Drugs and the Hippie Removal Scheme

Nixon and the Mandate of the Silent Majority 

To understand what went wrong with America's War on Drugs, we have to go back to the days of President Nixon and the time before Watergate. In this turbulent moment in US history, there was a fundamental difference of opinions about the causes of the upheaval in the 60s.

Taking a look at the nation in turmoil at colleges and universities, President Richard Nixon not long after taking office, said:

It's not too strong a statement to declare that this is the way civilizations begin to die... The process is altogether to familiar to those who would survey the wreckage of history. assault and counterassault, one extreme leading to the opposite extreme; the voices of reason and calm discredited.

(As it turned out, it was a oddly accurate assessment and it is even more true today than then.) 

At the time many people, especially conservatives, considered the liberal policies of the 1960s, particularly, domestic programs of the Great Society, to be a failure. The Supreme Court decisions, on abortion and civil rights, combined with liberal idealism had opened a Pandora's box. That was what a lot of middle class people across the country genuinely believed.   

The rebellious counter-culture, which included the hippies, the yippies, the anti-war protesters, the bra burners, the liberationists, the anarchists, the Communists,  was fueled not by resentment or by anger at injustice. Drugs had to be behind it all. What else could make kids from well-off backgrounds, drop out of society, throw away all of the material advantages and live like gypsies? What else could make them so wild and violent?
That view was both widespread and often propagated by the mainstream news media. The conventional wisdom said that the widespread use of illegal drugs was just another example of the general breakdown of law and order.