The newz is rife with heroin stories....

[tod evans]

The list goes on and on....

Causes me to wonder exactly what the propaganda machine is laying the groundwork for?




http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/31/justice/new-york-heroin-bust/index.html?hpt=ju_c2

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/29/justice/mcdonalds-happy-meals-heroin/index.html?hpt=ju_c2

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/30/justice/pennsylvania-heroin-deaths/index.html?hpt=ju_c2

http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2014-01-31/health/bs-hs-heroin-fentanyl-20140131_1_heroin-and-fentanyl-drug-combination-drug-agents

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/01/31/heroin-epidemic-plagues-ny-suburbs/5096813/

http://www.kansascity.com/2014/02/01/4791994/heroin-is-tightening-its-grip.html

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/alleged-heroin-kingpin-helped-russia-win-olympics-sochi/story?id=22295531

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/01/30/us-usa-florida-heroin-idUSBREA0T24D20140130

[Origanalist]

They seem to have lost the battle to scare people about reefer madness, maybe they're afraid they will lose the whole war.

[tod evans]

They seem to have lost the battle to scare people about reefer madness, maybe they're afraid they will lose the whole war.

That was one thought that crossed my mind, another is the push to keep the undeclared wars going over in Sandville....

Or it could be another push to expand the current WOD?

[Origanalist]

That was one thought that crossed my mind, another is the push to keep the undeclared wars going over in Sandville....

Or it could be another push to expand the current WOD?

Well they are going somewhere with this, I doubt they will keep us in suspense too long.

[tod evans]

Well they are going somewhere with this, I doubt they will keep us in suspense too long.

Something tells me that whatever it is they have up their sleeve it's going to cost lots of FRN's and involve armed/masked men and loss of liberty...:o

[Origanalist]

Something tells me that whatever it is they have up their sleeve it's going to cost lots of FRN's and involve armed/masked men and loss of liberty...:o

You're a modern day Nostradamus!

[tod evans]

You're a modern day Nostradamus!

Ka-plooie!

(That's a lunger hitting the sidewalk)

[FindLiberty]

There is no spoon for that newz propaganda. (No TV, no drugs.)

Yet another reason to end the WO(some)D.

[tod evans]

There is no spoon for that newz propaganda. (No TV, no drugs.)

Yet another reason to end the WO(some)D.

You're typing on the same spoon I extracted the info. in the OP from....

[CaptUSA]

The WOD industrial complex is afraid their budgets may be cut. They do what every business does when they fear they may be losing business... PR campaign to maintain or grow their industry.

[jkob]

To be fair, it does seem that heroin is becoming a bigger problem but I'm pretty young so maybe it was always this way but I've lost friends because of it. I think prescription drug abuse is to blame mostly, most of these friends I knew started out that way before moving on to heroin. Now is it any coincidence that the US controls the world's opium supply while this supposed epidemic is happening?

[roho76]

Well DEA controls the cocaine market coming from south america might as well control the heroin trade, wait…….we already do. Nvrmd. We might as well control the huge gun trafficking ring going to criminal enterprises while we're at it. Oh yeah, we control that too.

With a government like this who needs evil empires to fight?

[jonhowe]

So... no one thinks it's just an adulterated batch of heroin being sold?


It seems like it's just that...

[tod evans]

So... no one thinks it's just an adulterated batch of heroin being sold?


It seems like it's just that...

That's just one of the plethora of heroin stories being foisted on the public this past week...

[Zippyjuan]

They have always been there (the stories). Maybe you are just paying more attention to them. Did you notice that there are more silver cars on the road today? (there aren't but if you think about that then you will notice more of them so it will seem like more).

[Origanalist]

They have always been there (the stories). Maybe you are just paying more attention to them. Did you notice that there are more silver cars on the road today? (there aren't but if you think about that then you will notice more of them so it will seem like more).

LOL, wut?

[jkr]

they will "legalize" cannabis and then start asking us if we have any smack on us and kick in doors for that instead?

[AuH20]

There are some substances man shouldn't be foiling with on a regular basis. And this is a human being problem. If you want solve the drug problem, you're going to have kill everyone. Heh.

[parocks]

http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/02/showbiz/philip-seymour-hoffman-obit/

Sources: Philip Seymour Hoffman dead of apparent drug overdose

[CPUd]

So... no one thinks it's just an adulterated batch of heroin being sold?


It seems like it's just that...

May not even have to be adulterated, just something with a much higher purity.

[tod evans]

May not even have to be adulterated, just something with a much higher purity.

A couple of the stories I linked to talk about how there's some cut with fentanyl but that's not the majority of 'em....

[devil21]

http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/02/showbiz/philip-seymour-hoffman-obit/

Sources: Philip Seymour Hoffman dead of apparent drug overdose

Nice catch! Both you and tod evans. Very likely related.

[Valli6]

Recently I've been made aware that there's been an increased number of young people dying in my area due to a bad mix of heroin that's been around. Someone's been cutting it with such a large quantity of anesthesia - supposedly fentanyl - that it stops the heart/breathing before the user even gets the chance to pull the needle back out of their arm.

All of these people are being found the same way - alone - and usually still holding the needle. I'm aware of one person that managed to survive the ordeal, only because they were almost immediately discovered by someone with experience using resuscitation techniques (CPR & such). It was bad.

Something to really piss me off more -

Heroin has become easily available to middle-class high school kids and young people around NY, NJ and surrounding areas. Fearful of being randomly drug-tested for marijuana - which stays in the system for quite some time, kids are skipping pot smoking altogether, turning instead to more dangerous and addictive stuff to get high!

Furthermore, allowing so much illegal immigration for so long, means that plenty of cartel-connected people have positioned themselves for business in ordinary neighborhoods where heroin was never particularly sought after before. For the longest time, in order to obtain heroin it was necessary to travel into the most dangerous parts of "the city" and wait for some scummy guy that hates you to show up. On a good day, the dealer had people positioned around the area to make sure you didn't get mugged of your purchase as you were leaving the area (bad for business). If you've ever listened to Lou Reed's "Waitin' for my man", it's an accurate description of what you had to be willing to put up with, until apparently pretty recently.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kla_Jd7EyT4&noredirect=1

So, thanks to the drug war, some kids are using heroin rather than smoking pot and risking a failed drug test! :mad:

And thanks to unrestrained illegal immigration and sanctuary cities, heroin is plentiful and easy to obtain in lots of "nice" places, where it never was before!

Anyone els seeing increased heroin use and deaths - I would be interested to hear which part of the country you are from.

[Acala]

Shooting heroin is a bad idea but prohibition makes it dramatically worse for several reasons. But y'all already know this.

[kcchiefs6465]

Recently I've been made aware that there's been an increased number of young people dying in my area due to a bad mix of heroin that's been around. Someone's been cutting it with such a large quantity of anesthesia - supposedly fentanyl - that it stops the heart/breathing before the user even gets the chance to pull the needle back out of their arm.

All of these people are being found the same way - alone - and usually still holding the needle. I'm aware of one person that managed to survive the ordeal, only because they were almost immediately discovered by someone with experience using resuscitation techniques (CPR & such). It was bad.

Something to really piss me off more -

Heroin has become easily available to middle-class high school kids and young people around NY, NJ and surrounding areas. Fearful of being randomly drug-tested for marijuana - which stays in the system for quite some time, kids are skipping pot smoking altogether, turning instead to more dangerous and addictive stuff to get high!

Furthermore, allowing so much illegal immigration for so long, means that plenty of cartel-connected people have positioned themselves for business in ordinary neighborhoods where heroin was never particularly sought after before. For the longest time, in order to obtain heroin it was necessary to travel into the most dangerous parts of "the city" and wait for some scummy guy that hates you to show up. On a good day, the dealer had people positioned around the area to make sure you didn't get mugged of your purchase as you were leaving the area (bad for business). If you've ever listened to Lou Reed's "Waitin' for my man", it's an accurate description of what you had to be willing to put up with, until apparently pretty recently.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kla_Jd7EyT4&noredirect=1

So, thanks to the drug war, some kids are using heroin rather than smoking pot and risking a failed drug test! :mad:

And thanks to unrestrained illegal immigration and sanctuary cities, heroin is plentiful and easy to obtain in lots of "nice" places, where it never was before!

Anyone els seeing increased heroin use and deaths - I would be interested to hear which part of the country you are from.
You can thank the CIA and their secret armies for the influx of heroin and its availability. You can thank the DEA and the drug laws for the adulterated bullshit being peddled. They do that on purpose though, as macabre as it sounds. That is, "they" (fucked up people) release batches to purposely overdose a few people. Then the addicts flock to that particular name. Needless to say a lot of the problem is simply manifestations of policy. Opiates are easily available, they snort a few pills, then they realize heroin is cheap. Some do not get addicted or never do it again, many do, and the state profits. And they profit from multiple aspects. Illegal immigration? Perhaps, a variable. Most heroin is not coming from the South. Most certainly cargo ships and the ports of New York, or CIA connected assets are involved. Whether they are involved in securing the product, guarding the poppy fields, or actually bringing it in. That doesn't exclude the possibility that cartel connected persons are at the receiving end for the product. Most probably not. I'm sure some kingpins in America have developed associations with a connect. Speaking strictly of the higher ups, they are often times granted sanction by the DEA for being "informants" (though they hardly inform on anything "worthwhile") or CIA assets. I believe the politically correct term, as used by Washington is, "unsavories."

Mainly people need to talk to their children though. I knew what heroin was when I practically knee high. And I was shown the junkies as a warning. These policies lack compassion though. A real fuck up, even with the consideration that they are government policies.

[oyarde]

[QUOTE=tod evans;5399797]The list goes on and on....

Causes me to wonder exactly what the propaganda machine is laying the groundwork for?


I dunno , it is though kind of immune to the economy , probably still costs today what it did in the 70's or 80's , use probably dropped off with all the new designer recreational drugs , probably picking up due to cost .

[jonhowe]

Can anything happen in this country without it being a CIA plot? Jesus!

[FindLiberty]

Can anything happen in this country without it being a CIA plot? Jesus!

I'd have to answer yes* to that specific question.

Chicago, IL is experiencing colder air temps and more snow this year compared to average winters over the past decade.

+++

*You never know for sure if the cia has anything to do with anything, including the weather. I can ask around if you like...

[donnay]

Can anything happen in this country without it being a CIA plot? Jesus!

Read some books like:

Compromised - By: Terry Reed
Dark Alliance - By: Gary Webb

That may help you understand what many people here are talking about.

[mosquitobite]

never forget in 2001, the Taliban had all but destroyed the opium production in Afghanistan. But I'm sure it was just a coincidence. Surely.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articlePictures/jiggens.JPG

[donnay]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUATfLDiwVA

[tod evans]

Authorities say heroin dealers flood NYC with drug

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/02/09/authorities-say-heroin-dealers-flood-nyc-with-drug/?intcmp=latestnews

NEW YORK – In a major drug bust that drew little attention just a week before Philip Seymour Hoffman's death, authorities found a sophisticated heroin packaging and distribution operation in an apartment in the Bronx.

There, workers with coffee grinders, scoops and scales toiled around the clock to break down bricks of the drug into thousands of tiny, hit-size baggies, bearing such stamped brands as "Government Shutdown" and, in a nod to the Super Bowl, "NFL."

The seizure of $8 million worth of heroin was the result of the latest raid on heroin mills located behind the doors of New York homes, which authorities say are a sign of a well-oiled distribution network that caters to more mainstream, middle- and upper-class customers like the Oscar-winning Hoffman.

Heroin dealers want to find customers with ready cash "who are going to be with them until they die," said city Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan. "That's the attitude."

Tests are continuing to try to pinpoint how Hoffman died, but his body was found with a syringe in his arm and dozens of packets of heroin nearby. Where he got his drugs remains uncertain, but the arrests of drug suspects identified during the investigation suggest he might have visited a lower Manhattan apartment building where a supplier lived.

There's no evidence that the Bronx operation provided any heroin Hoffman might have bought. But New York has long been known as the nation's capital of smack, regularly accounting for about 20 percent of the heroin the federal Drug Enforcement Administration seizes every year.

Those seizures have grown by 67 percent in the state over the last five years, a trend Brennan attributes in part to high-volume heroin mills invisible to most New Yorkers but capable of churning out hundreds of thousands of packets within days after a big shipment arrives.

The pipeline starts in Mexico, where cartels traffic Colombian-produced heroin by the kilogram. The wholesalers smuggle the drugs into the United States concealed in trucks, through tunnels dug under the southwest border and, in one recent case, by molding and coloring the heroin to look like coffee beans and shipping it via UPS to a private postal box in Queens.

In the Northeast, the cartels have increasingly supplied Dominican middlemen who rely on a business model for heroin mills that emphasizes discipline, quality control and an absence of violence.

The retailers favor residential settings in safe neighborhoods as a means of cover. Raids by Brennan's office and the DEA in recent years have found them in a newly renovated apartment in midtown Manhattan that rented for $3,800 a month and in a two-story, red-brick home in the New York City suburb of Fort Lee, N.J.

A mill found in an 18th-floor apartment in upper Manhattan had a sign that read, "Clean Up After Yourselves - The Management." At another discovered across the street from Manhattan College in a Bronx, immigrant workers wore school sweatshirts to try to blend in.

Workers can make up to $5,000 a week. They're also given meals and toiletries to help make it through 12-hour shifts.

The mill operators and workers go out of their way not to disturb neighbors, who might report them to police, or to draw the attention of other criminals who want to rob them. They leave the apartments empty when not working, and sometimes change locations long before their leases are up as a cost of doing business, said James J. Hunt, the acting head of the DEA's New York office.

"Drug dealers are very wary," Hunt said. "They wouldn't want word to get out on the street about a mill. They want anonymity."

The economics are addictive: The heroin flooding the region carries an average wholesale price of about $60,000 per kilo. The retailers can cut a kilo to a 50 percent purity level using powdered vitamin B or other nontoxic substances. That provides enough drugs to fill 25,000 single-dose glassine envelopes that would be sold for $5 each to street-level dealers, who in turn charge customers $10 to $15. After subtracting the cost of the kilo, wages and other expenses, the mill operator would turn a $70,000 profit per kilo.

In the Bronx takedown on Jan. 30, investigators conducting surveillance at a building there stopped a man making an apparent delivery of drugs before seeing another man try to flee out the fire escape of a fifth-floor apartment. Inside, they found 33 pounds of heroin, 18 coffee grinders used to cut the heroin with baking soda, folding tables and chairs where it was packaged and stamps with various brand names.

Once exposed, mills like the Bronx one can be a touchy subject for property owners and their tenants.

There was no response to a phone message left with the landlord of the building. Linda Johnson, who lived in a one-bedroom apartment there until a few months ago, said she never noticed anything suspicious.

"I saw people coming and going in the elevator and nobody bothered me," said Johnson, 61. "If it was happening, you'd know it, right?"

Separate operations distribute the drugs to users in the city and beyond. New York City brands have turned up in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and smaller cities in Connecticut, Hunt said.

The distributors offer customer service intended to remove the fear and stigma from bygone eras. In one case, a dealer riding a three-wheeled motorcycle and a helmet emblazoned with the heroin brand name "Sin City" would direct customers to an exact block in a middle-class Brooklyn neighborhood — code-named "the office" — then pull up alongside their cars and exchange glassines for cash.

Dealers and users in New York and elsewhere often connect on social media sites with a degree of anonymity, authorities say. Phone numbers are exchanged and meeting spots are arranged through texting. Sometimes there's home delivery.

Elizabeth Thompson, a recovering addict who got hooked on heroin and relied on home delivery while going to law school in Philadelphia, described the delivery men who came to her door at an apartment building there as prompt and courteous.

"I never felt unsafe with them," said the 30-year-old Thompson, now policy coordinator with the New Jersey Drug Policy Alliance. "They wanted the business. And I was a good customer for a long time."

Downstream, "it's hand to hand — the dealer's hands to the buyer's hands," Brennan said. "That has to go on no matter what. There's no anonymity at that point."

[tod evans]

Boogity-boogity now the "mob" is getting involved..:rolleyes:

Italy, US crack down on mafia drug smuggling

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/02/12/italy-us-crack-down-on-mafia-drug-smuggling/

U.S. and Italian authorities said Tuesday they had broken up a new heroin-and cocaine-trafficking ring coordinated by Italy's powerful 'ndrangheta organized crime syndicate and New York City's Gambino crime family. Seventeen people were arrested in Italy and another seven in New York, officials said.

The investigation underscored how `ndrangheta is spreading its operations beyond Italy's borders as it consolidates its position as one of the world's most powerful drug traffickers, officials said. It also laid bare how the `ndrangheta, based in the southern region of Calabria, is encroaching on territory once occupied by the Sicilian-based Cosa Nostra, since the Gambinos were the Sicilian Mafia's U.S. branch.

Italian anti-Mafia police said the "New Bridge" operation targeted a new cocaine trafficking route from South America to the southern Italian port of Gioia Tauro that united the Gambinos with the `ndrangheta. In exchange, the Italians were to provide heroin to the American market.

The aim was to "build a bridge of criminality and corruption to stretch from South America to Italy and back to New York," said Marshall Miller, a top prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn.

Using wiretaps and an undercover agent named "Jimmy" who infiltrated the Brooklyn-based mob, officials said they thwarted the delivery to Italy of some 500 kilograms of pure cocaine that was to have been hidden in shipments of canned coconuts and pineapples being shipped from Guyana to Gioia Tauro.

"The `ndrangheta can and has to be considered one of the most powerful organizations in the world for handling of international drug-trafficking," said Raffaele Grassi, head of the Italian police's central operative service unit. "The `ndrangheta has left its territory of origin: beyond occupying areas of our country and infiltrating itself in northern Italy, the `ndrangheta is looking for criminals beyond the borders, invading new markets to make profit."

FBI agents worked alongside Italian police in Italy and vice versa, and Miller and other officials from the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn were on hand in Rome for the press conference announcing the arrests. The Italian suspects are accused of mafia association and drug trafficking, among other charges. Miller said one of the U.S.-based suspects was accused of laundering money through a Brooklyn-based bank and that several hundred thousand dollars was seized.

[Suzanimal]

It's an epidemic...:rolleyes:


ATLANTA —

A growing epidemic of addiction to opiates is taking hold in metro Atlanta.

A Channel 2 Action News investigation found a soaring number of heroin-related overdose deaths and reports of increased trafficking of the drug in the suburbs.

....

The Echols family is just one of many families grieving for a loved killed by a heroin overdose. Several major metro Atlanta counties report a spike in heroin-related deaths. In DeKalb County, heroin deaths doubled, increasing from 5 to 10 between 2012 and 2013. In Gwinnett County, deaths rose from 2 in 2012 to 7 in 2013. Cobb County saw heroin related deaths surge from 9 in 2011 to 16 in 2012, although deaths declined to 8 in the first nine months of 2014.

Fulton County, which includes Atlanta, has seen the biggest increase in total numbers. Heroin deaths rose from 24 to 31 from 2012 to 2013. Since 2011, the county medical examiner reports there have been 73 deaths caused by the drug.

In rural Georgia, 13 heroin-related deaths were reported in the first nine months of 2013. Georgia Medical Examiner Dr. Kris Sperry said while deaths related to prescription medication are the main cause in drug related deaths, heroin deaths will continue to rise.

....

DEA Special Agent-in-Charge Harry Sommers revealed a startling account of how organized crime planned to take advantage of the prescription pill epidemic, essentially to turn it into a heroin epidemic.
http://www.wsbtv.com/news/news/local/heroin-addiction-plagues-georgia-suburbs/ndGzy/

[Weston White]

Can anything happen in this country without it being a CIA plot? Jesus!

Nope, not really, ever:


"Heroin is a multibillion dollar business supported by powerful interests, which requires a steady and secure commodity flow. One of the “hidden” objectives of the war was precisely to restore the CIA sponsored drug trade to its historical levels and exert direct control over the drug routes."

"The revenues generated from the CIA sponsored Afghan drug trade are sizeable. The Afghan trade in opiates constitutes a large share of the worldwide annual turnover of narcotics, which was estimated by the United Nations to be of the order of $400-500 billion."

Source A: http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-spoils-of-war-afghanistan-s-multibillion-dollar-heroin-trade/91
Source B (Yes, those are U.S. Military personnel guarding the poppy fields): http://www.thelibertybeacon.com/2014/01/22/the-spoils-of-war-afghanistans-multibillion-dollar-heroin-trade/

[tod evans]

Government doing the only thing it does well;

Growing.


I think that's what all the hype is about, a larger and more intrusive government.




For the children you know..

[tod evans]

This weeks installment of heroin propaganda has a scary picture included;



Heroin overdoses pose 'urgent public health crisis,' US attorney general says

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/03/10/heroin-overdoses-pose-urgent-public-health-crisis-us-attorney-general-says/?intcmp=latestnews



http://a57.foxnews.com/global.fncstatic.com/static/managed/img/Health/660/371/istock_heroin.jpg?ve=1&tl=1
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said his agency was stepping up efforts to stem sharp increases in deadly heroin overdoses, trafficking in the drug and abuse of prescription narcotics at the root of what he called an "urgent public health crisis."

As part of that campaign, Holder reiterated the Obama administration's call for more law enforcement agencies to train and equip personnel with an overdose-reversal medication called naloxone.

The director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy issued a similar plea to police and fire departments last month.

Holder said 17 states and the District of Columbia have amended their laws to increase access to naloxone, a blocking agent that can reverse the effects of an overdose and help restore breathing.

He said emergency use of naloxone had resulted in more than 10,000 overdose reversals since 2001.

Still, fatal heroin overdoses have increased 45 percent from 2006 to 2010, with 3,038 such deaths reported that year, and the numbers are believed to still be on the rise, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

The rising level of heroin use in recent years stems from a corresponding epidemic in the abuse of prescription opiate-based painkillers, such as oxycodone, DEA officials say. Deaths from overdoses of such drugs numbered more than 16,600 in 2010.

Many individuals who start out abusing oxycodone turn eventually to heroin as they build up a tolerance to the pain pills and find that they can buy heroin far more cheaply than prescription medications on the black market, experts say.

Meanwhile, trafficking in heroin, the bulk of it smuggled into the United States from Mexico, has climbed in conjunction with increasing demand.

"When confronting the problem of substance abuse, it makes sense to focus attention on the most dangerous types of drugs. And right now, few substances are more lethal than prescription opiates and heroin," Holder said in a video message posted on Monday on the Justice Department's website.

Holder said the DEA was leading a federal enforcement crackdown, and cited a 320 percent increase in the amount of heroin seized by U.S. authorities along the U.S.-Mexico border between 2008 and 2013.

The federal government also is enlisting the help of physicians, teachers, police and community leaders to boost support for substance abuse education, prevention and treatment, Holder said.

He said the DEA was focusing such efforts in regions experiencing a particularly high incidence of heroin abuse, such as in northern Ohio, where numbers of heroin-related deaths had recently jumped four-fold.

National attention on heroin abuse was riveted by the case of acclaimed actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, who was found dead from an accidental drug overdose in his Manhattan apartment last month, a needle still in his arm.

An autopsy determined the performer succumbed to acute intoxication from a mixture of heroin, cocaine and other drugs in his system.

[phill4paul]

This weeks installment of heroin propaganda has a scary picture included;



Heroin overdoses pose 'urgent public health crisis,' US attorney general says

Sounds like manufacturers will get a much needed shot in the arm.


Shortage and Pricing[edit]

Naloxone has been periodically under FDA shortage designation since 2001 and was recently re-verified as being in shortage due to a manufacturing delay.[39] Twenty-one out of 48 naloxone prescription programs surveyed in 2010 reported they had experienced challenges in obtaining naloxone in the months leading up to the survey, mainly due either to cost increases that outstripped allocated funding or the suppliers’ inability to fill orders.[18] The approximate cost of a 1 ml ampoule of naloxone in the United States is estimated to be significantly higher than in most Western countries; on average, the price for naloxone supply has increased precipitously in recent years.[21]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naloxone

[acptulsa]

Did you notice that there are more silver cars on the road today? (there aren't but if you think about that then you will notice more of them so it will seem like more).

Actually there are a lot more silver cars on the road today.

It's a color people always liked on cars, but used to be afraid of because silver paint would fall off prematurely. There are now much better silver paints on the market which tend to last as long as paints of other colors, so no one sees the paint falling off all the five year old silver cars any more and are no longer leery of it. Add to that the fact that nearly all the car interiors are now gray, and you have a recipe for a massive influx of pewtermobiles.

Look up the stats, Zippy. You'll see you were wrong again.

[tod evans]

Big-gov has a "solution".......If you'll rat out your friend or family member then you too may have access to a drug that might save their life if you happen to have it with you if/when they overdose..

What could possibly go wrong?

FDA approves easy-to-use heroin overdose antidote

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/04/03/fda-approves-easy-to-use-heroin-overdose-antidote/?intcmp=latestnews


The government is taking a step to let friends or loved ones treat someone they suspect has overdosed on heroin or powerful painkillers called opioids, while they're waiting for medical care.

The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday approved an overdose antidote that doctors could prescribe for family members or caregivers to keep on hand, in a pocket or a medicine cabinet. Called Evzio, it's a device that automatically injects the right dose of the drug naloxone, a long-used antidote for opioid overdoses.

Naloxone is usually administered by syringe in ambulances or emergency rooms. But with the rise in drug overdose deaths, there has been a growing push to equip more people with the protection.

The FDA said Evzio's design makes it easy for anyone to administer. Once Evzio is turned on, it provides verbal instructions, much like defibrillators that laymen frequently use to help people who collapse with cardiac arrest.

The antidote is not a substitute for immediate medical care, the FDA said, as anyone who has overdosed will need additional treatment.

FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said in a statement that 16,000 people die every year due to opioid-related overdoses, and that drug overdose deaths are now the leading cause of injury death in the United States, surpassing motor vehicle crashes. She said the increase in overdose deaths has largely been driven by prescription drug overdoses.

"While the larger goal is to reduce the need for products like these by preventing opioid addiction and abuse, they are extremely important innovations that will help to save lives," Hamburg said.

[Cap]

They have always been there (the stories). Maybe you are just paying more attention to them. Did you notice that there are more silver cars on the road today? (there aren't but if you think about that then you will notice more of them so it will seem like more).Zip have you been smokin again?:D

[tod evans]

Zip have you been smokin again?:D

Chasing the dragon maybe..........:eek:

[tod evans]

This months installment from Drudge;

Heroin a growing threat across USA, police say

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/04/16/heroin-overdose-addiction-threat/7785549/

Heroin and other opiate addiction is now claiming more lives in many communities than violent crime and car crashes, say America's top law enforcement officials who gathered here Wednesday to discuss the increasing devastation caused by the drug.

From Burlington, Vt., and New York to Philadelphia and Knoxville, local and federal officials said the surge, especially in heroin's availability and purity, is having stunningly lethal consequences. It's also cheaper than prescription opiods, costing from about $4 a bag in some places to $20 in others, making it an attractive drug of choice.

In New York City, the 730 drug overdose fatalities in 2012 — with half of those estimated to be related to heroin and prescription opiates — were nearly double the number of homicides.

Knoxville Police Chief David Rausch said overdose deaths, driven by the same combination of heroin and opiate abuse, outnumbered homicides last year by 52 to 19.

Separately, a yet-to-be released National Drug Threat Assessment rated heroin as the second-greatest drug risk, after the abuse of methamphetamine.

Between 2009 and 2013, according to the assessment produced by the government's National Drug Intelligence Center, heroin seizures increased 87%. The average size of those seizures increased 81% during the same time.

"The consciousness of the nation has not really focused on the problem,'' Attorney General Eric Holder told the conference of more than 200 officials organized by the Police Executive Research Forum, a D.C.-based think tank.

Eric Holder
U. S. Attorney General Eric Holder addresses the Police Executive Research Forum's National Summit in Washington. He cited the rising number of overdose deaths from heroin and other dangerous opioids while talking about the Justice Department's effort to fight the crisis.(Photo: Chip Somodevilla, Getty Images)
"People saw this more as a state and local problem. …This is truly a national problem. Standing by itself, the heroin problem is worthy of our national attention.''

Holder's comments came just a month after he urged police and other first responders to carry the drug naloxone, more commonly known as narcan, that helps resuscitate victims from potentially deadly overdoses.

The attorney general reasserted that guidance Wednesday as a potentially lifesaving tool for police to consider when responding to overdose calls.

"This kind of sneaked up on us,'' Holder said, referring to heroin's resurgence after its former popularity in the '50s and '60s.

Holder was joined Wednesday by FBI Director James Comey, Drug Enforcement Administration chief Michele Leonhart and Michael Botticelli, acting director of the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, in the first national summit of its kind on the issue.

"Every place I've visited, I've heard about heroin,'' Comey told the group, referring to recent visits to 25 FBI field divisions during his first seven months on the job. "It's an everywhere, everyplace kind of thing. A place we have to make a tackle is on this problem.''

Much of the discussion, however, was generated by small-town police officials with troubling accounts of how their communities have been inundated with the highly addictive drug.

Burlington Police Chief Michael Schirling said it is no longer unusual to find 10,000 bags per heroin seizure.

Police officials from Rutland, Vt., and the Massachusetts communities of Taunton and Fall River described similar problems where non-fatal and fatal overdoses are the norm.

"It's penetrating our entire society,'' Taunton Police Chief Edward Walsh said. "It's everywhere in our community.''

[Jingles]

Increased heroin use is more of a result of the policy of the Obama administration to "crack down" on prescription drug abuse. All this really did was shorten supply and now people who truly need opiates (like you know people with horrible chronic pain) have a bitch of a time getting them. So they suffer. All in the name of, "HELPING THE CHILDREN!"

So people that need/want opiates who once stuck to "prescription" opioids go to heroin because it they cannot obtain their opiate supply "legally" anymore. Oddly, heroin prices are cheaper than prescription opioids so there is a benefit to it in that sense. I have some things to say about heroin use (considering I was a user for years on and off), but meh. A lot of positive. Not much negative, but a healthy understanding of it. This results in really a neutral personal view of drug use.

All I'm saying is this is BECAUSE of the war on drugs and government control over all drugs. What is the correct market amount of opiates? Who knows... The state won't let the market deal with this issue (i.e. peaceful voluntary actions). All I can say is without the state in this mess heroin itself would be about 100x cheaper than it currently is which is amazing. Higher price of addictive substance = more theft. Lower the price via the market. Stop treating these people like criminals (theft for anything isn't justifiable, but that doesn't mean ALL ADDICTS STEAL. It is about decreasing incentives for one to do so).

[FloralScent]

To be fair, it does seem that heroin is becoming a bigger problem but I'm pretty young so maybe it was always this way but I've lost friends because of it. I think prescription drug abuse is to blame mostly, most of these friends I knew started out that way before moving on to heroin. Now is it any coincidence that the US controls the world's opium supply while this supposed epidemic is happening?

No, I don't believe it's a coincidence. The British empire made sure the flow of opium remained uninterrupted by force of arms in the 19th century. In almost all ways we are he successor, or as I've come to believe, have been absorbed into her empire as a source of natural resources and cannon fodder. By "her empire" I mean the Rothschild's.

[LibForestPaul]

google trends heroine

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=%2Fm%2F03n5b

Sure looks like an uptick

[Jingles]

google trends heroine

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=%2Fm%2F03n5b

Sure looks like an uptick

Not to be stickler. But it's Heroin. Heroine refers to a female hero. It is just a common misspelling that bothers me =/

The drug itself is Diacetylmorphine/Diamorphine. Heroin was just the brand name given to it after its creation by Bayer. But the word is based on a German word for "heroic".

[tod evans]

Prostitute accused in yacht overdose death of Google executive, police say

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/07/09/police-high-end-prostitute-arrested-in-heroin-overdose-killing-on-yacht-at/?intcmp=latestnews

A high-end prostitute has been arrested on suspicion of murder after injecting heroin into a Google executive on his yacht in Santa Cruz and leaving him to die when he overdosed, according to police and a newspaper.

Surveillance footage from the yacht shows the suspect, Alix Tichelman, 26, gather her belongings, including the heroin and needles, step over the 51-year-old victim's body to finish a glass of wine and then lower a blind before leaving the boat, Santa Cruz police said Tuesday.

Authorities said Tichelman, of Folsom, did not provide first aid or call 911 as the man suffered medical complications and went unconscious during the November overdose. His body was discovered the next morning by the boat's captain, the Santa Cruz Sentinel reported.

"She showed no regard for him. She was just trying to cover her tracks," Santa Cruz Deputy Police Chief Steve Clark told the Sentinel.

Tichelman was arrested on July 4 after police said a detective lured her back to the Santa Cruz area by posing as a potential client and reaching agreement on a price of more than $1,000.

She was booked into Santa Cruz County Jail on suspicion of second-degree murder, destruction of evidence and transporting and providing narcotics. It was not immediately clear whether she had an attorney.

The Sentinel identified the victim as Forrest Timothy Hayes, a Google executive and father of five, and said the overdose occurred on his 50-foot yacht, Escape, at the Santa Cruz Small Craft Harbor.

Tichelman, who boasted she had more than 200 clients, met her clients through a website, police said.

[tod evans]

Illinois Lawmakers Study Heroin "Epidemic"

http://www.nbcchicago.com/investigations/Illinois-Lawmakers-Study-Heroin-Epidemic-266254021.html

Over the last three years there have been at least 900 heroin overdose deaths in Illinois.
It's a big number that State Representative Patti Bellock (R-Westmont) calls a “public health crisis of epic proportion.”
Now, two Illinois legislative committees are studying the growing use of heroin in Illinois and one of the more alarming findings of their studies is a trend twoard younger and younger users.

In Will County in 2000 there were just 5 cases of accidental heroin overdose deaths. By 2012 the number had skyrocketed to 46. The Will County Coronor's web site keeps updated overdose statistics.

Statistics can help understand part of the story but they can’t begin to describe the depths and consequences of a human being's dependency on this drug.

Or a community’s devastation.

In Naperville, an affluent community west of Chicago, 12 heroin deaths were reported between 2011 and 2013.

“Everybody thinks this is a charmed place to raise children, and it is a fabulous place to raise children, but there are still all these temptations,” said Diane Overgard.

Town leaders reacted and support groups like Kids Matter and Parents Matter Too began, providing answers to questions for teens and parents and making some progress.

“We have seen a decrease in the deaths and that’s terrific. But I know that heroin is still readily available,” said Overgard, who is a project manager for Parents Matter Too.

From suburban Naperville to rural Illinois the heroin epidemic ends with horrific consequences.

Two years ago, 27-year old Nicole Croissant became just one of the many faces of addiction when she first snorted heroin. It took only a couple of times ingesting the drug before she began using needle, sometimes twice a day. The cost was both physical----and financial.

“Anywhere from $20 to $300,” a day is what she says she spent on her addiction, buying her heroin on Chicago’s west side.

Like so many others, hers was a 200-mile round trip down the heroin highway, east on I-80, through rural Illinois to Chicago and back to her home in Spring Valley. Ultimately she was arrested for shoplifting to finance her habit. We met her in the Bureau County jail, in Princeton, Illinois, dressed in a blue and gray stripped jail jumpsuit one day before she was to head to a stay at a drug rehabilitation center.

We first came to Bureau County in 2005, courtesy of Tim Trevier. With piercings and a do-rag, he was an undercover officer attempting to combat a growing tide of heroin users in towns like Spring Valley and Princeton.

Today his appearance is dramatically different, in a shirt and tie, for his job as Chief Deputy.While Trevier’s appearance has changed dramatically, the issue really hasn’t. Asked if heroin use was still an epidemic his reply was, “Oh most definitely.”

Out of more than 200 heroin addicts Tim Trevier says he has to date encountered only three who have beaten their addiction.

“It is gruesome,” he said, adding “There is a chance but they’ve got to want it. They’ve got to want to change their life around.”

An attitude that applies not only to someone like Croissant, but also to an entire state.

“We didn’t try to hide it and I think that’s one of our greatest strengths, that we said yeah there is a real problem and we are going to pull together and create a real solution,” said Diane Overgard of Naperville.

[DamianTV]

Reinforcement of the Idea that we "need" Govt to protect us from anything they deem Illegal, including Drugs and Prostitution. Most of these heroin stories are MSM performing that exact task. MSM is the Dept of Propoganda that communicates the ideas of the Govt to the People. MSM does nothing more than promote Govt's efforts to validate its own existence with the constant "you need us", then providing some excuse.

Look at the way MSM handles Guns. All Non-Govt Guns are BAD, and you need to let Govt make all Non Govt Guns illegal, for your own safety! They report on every time a Gun is used to infringe on the Rights of others, but make every effort to remain silent when Guns are used for Self Defense. Why? When a gun is used to infringe on the rights of others (murder, robbery, rape, gang shooting), it promotes dependancy on Govt. However, using a gun in Self Defense would reinforce the idea that Govt is not needed, thus, it is not mentioned.

Concept here: "You need the DEA to protect you from all those evil gun toting drug lords and prostitutes".

[presence]

Illinois Lawmakers Study Heroin "Epidemic"

Anywhere from $20 to $300,” a day

If it wasn't illegal heroin would cost 50 cents a dose; people would v cut poppies in their own back yard and anyone in pain would resort to home grown opium rather than more refined and dangerous black market smack and big pharma alternatives.

Most of these people are dying from fentanyl overdoses not heroin. Its cut into the heroin supply because its cheaper to steal from big pharma than it is to import illicit poppy. Sadly the lethal/effective dose ratio (LD50) of this big pharma solution is orders of magnitude less forgiving than clean street smack.

[tod evans]

From Drudge;

Heroin’s Death Toll Rising in New York, Amid a Shift in Who Uses It

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/28/nyregion/heroins-death-toll-rising-in-new-york-amid-a-shift-in-who-uses-it.html?_r=1

A heroin crisis gripping communities across the country deepened in New York last year, with more people in the city dying in overdoses from the drug than in any year since 2003.

In all, 420 people fatally overdosed on heroin in 2013 out of a total of 782 drug overdoses, rising to a level not seen in a decade in both absolute numbers and as a population-adjusted rate, according to preliminary year-end data from the city’s health department.

The death toll from heroin has more than doubled over the last three years, presenting a growing challenge to city officials who have so far been unable to reverse the rise. By contrast, amid a concerted effort to stem prescription pill abuse, especially on Staten Island, overdoses from opioid pills leveled off during the same time period, with 215 deaths recorded in 2013.

The data, to be released on Thursday, track the spread of heroin into new areas of the city, hitting hardest among white and higher-income New Yorkers but also spiking with older Hispanic users in the Bronx.

In New York City, deaths from heroin overdoses were higher last year than they have been since 2003. The rise over the last four years was most pronounced in the Hispanic population. Deaths from overdoses of opioid painkillers such as hydrocodone have also risen.

The biggest jump was in Queens, where 81 people died last year compared with 53 the year before, an increase attributed by the health department primarily to a rising use among young white men. That trend is most pronounced on Staten Island, where all but two of the 32 residents who fatally overdosed on heroin were white.

The profile of an average user has shifted in the last 10 years, said Dr. Andrew Kolodny, an addiction specialist who was at the health department in 2003, when heroin overdoses last rose above 400.

“It was almost exclusively central Brooklyn, South Bronx, east Harlem and overlapped with New York City’s highest-need neighborhoods,” said Dr. Kolodny, now the chief medical officer at the Phoenix House Foundation, a drug-treatment center. “The rest of the city — Staten Island, Queens, most of Manhattan — close to nothing.”

Even before the latest data became available, the scope of the heroin problem was apparent on the streets, in treatment centers and at police precincts.

Seizures of heroin spiked as the city became a hub for trafficking along the East Coast. Overdose victims turned up in neighborhoods from East Tremont in the Bronx to Tottenville in southern Staten Island, prompting the New York Police Department to begin outfitting officers this year with naloxone, a medication that reverses the effects of an overdose from both heroin and opioid pills.

In an interview on Wednesday, Dr. Mary T. Bassett, the city health commissioner, celebrated the effectiveness of naloxone, which has been used to reverse well over 500 overdoses since 2010, when the city began an aggressive effort to get it into the hands of those closest to drug abusers.

She also noted a significant downturn in overdoses from prescription pills and a modest dip in deaths from heroin on Staten Island, saying that door-to-door outreach to doctors and education about heroin abuse had helped reverse the trend in that borough.

“We’re going to be turning attention to using some of these strategies in the Bronx,” Dr. Bassett said.

From 2003 to 2010, overdoses from heroin declined in the city as older users died or found treatment and the drug fell out of favor in communities ravaged during the last epidemic, in the 1970s.

But older addicts have not vanished and, in fact, continue to make up a large percentage of users.

In the Bronx, Hispanic men in their late 40s and early 50s disproportionately fell victim to the drug last year, driving the high overdose rate in the borough, where 94 people died in 2013, one more than the year before. Across the city, Hispanic users showed the greatest increase in overdose deaths — to 146 last year, from 64 in 2010.

“We have a much older demographic,” said Deborah Witham, the chief program officer at VIP Community Services, a Bronx treatment center where most of the patients are on Medicaid. But, she added, younger users are increasingly in the mix, as are those coming to the center with mental health issues, which complicates their treatment.

Affluent areas of the north Bronx and eastern Queens have become hot spots as well, reflecting the heavy opioid pill abuse and heroin use in the surrounding suburbs in Westchester County and on Long Island.

“I think it’s going to get worse,” said Kathleen A. Riddle, the head of Outreach Project, which runs treatment centers in Brooklyn, in Queens and on Long Island.

It is a situation repeated across the country: A new generation of younger and often more affluent users begin by using prescription opioid pills that deliver the same effects as heroin and then shift to the illegal drug because it provides a better high for less money, sometimes as little as $5 a hit.

That grim progression characterized the growth in heroin abuse on Staten Island, where abuse of prescription pills was by far the highest in the city. In recent years, the authorities closed many rogue pain clinics, where young users could obtain illicit prescriptions, and arrested pill dealers who sold on the street.

Those efforts coincided with the introduction last August of increased monitoring of prescriptions. By drying up the supply of pills, many treatment experts predicted a rise in heroin abuse as dependent addicts moved into the black market.

“People who are used to getting high are not going to stop cold turkey,” said William A. Fusco, the director of Dynamic Youth Community, a drug-treatment center in Brooklyn where many young addicts from Staten Island end up.

“The drugs that you use are the drugs that you find.”

[tod evans]

Ohio's largest county records 90 heroin deaths

http://www.wfmj.com/story/26388431/ohios-largest-county-records-90-heroin-deaths

CLEVELAND (AP) - The medical examiner in Ohio's largest county says 90 people died of heroin-related overdoses in the first half of the year, a slight decrease from the same time period a year ago.

Dr. Thomas Gilson says he's encouraged the numbers in Cuyahoga (ky-uh-HOH'-guh) County have dropped from 97 deaths during the first half of 2013 but remains concerned about the large number of young victims.

Data released by Gilson Tuesday show women accounted for about one in every five heroin-related deaths this year, the lowest level since 2010.

Gilson says eight of every ten victims were white, just under half lived in Cleveland and a quarter were ages 19 to 29.

Last year the county recorded 195 heroin-related deaths, shattering the previous record of 161 fatal overdoses in 2012.

[tod evans]

The pro-government propaganda in this'n reeks!



Locals, feds staying on top of heroin epidemic

http://www.dailyprogress.com/starexponent/news/locals-feds-staying-on-top-of-heroin-epidemic/article_92286842-2e27-11e4-935c-0017a43b2370.html

Culpeper law enforcement continues to combat the area's heroin epidemic in conjunction with federal forces.
Culpeper Police Lt. Tim Chilton with the department's street crimes unit told the Culpeper Town Council Public Safety Committee Tuesday that they had been "working a huge heroin case" the past two years that is going to land local dealers in federal prison.
"It will have a big impact after it's done," Chilton said. "We're hoping to put them away for the rest of their lives."
Culpeper County Commonwealth's Attorney Megan Frederick and Virginia State Police Special Agent Tom Murphy, head of the Blue Ridge Narcotics & Gang Task Force, also gave heroin-related presentations at the committee meeting, updating elected officials about the ongoing crisis impacting communities state and nationwide.
Chilton said the CPD street crimes unit would be merging with the VSP task force in coming months "hopefully to get closer to the root of the problem."
Like the town police and county prosecutor's office, the VSP has been working a lot of heroin cases, Murphy said, with most of the drugs coming into this area from Washington, D.C.
From coast to coast, it's an $88 billion a year industry, he said.
"That's what we are up against," he said.
The business is so big that marijuana growers in Mexico are burning the fields to replant opium, Murphy said.
One out of every four people who try heroin will get addicted for life, he said.
Area-wide, the most common quantity of heroin is one-tenth of a gram sold in white powder form in a $20 pack, according to Murphy. Since the beginning of the year, there have been 45 documented heroin overdoses in the five-county area, about one-third of those fatal, he said.
"We know it is so much more," Murphy said of unreported overdoses.
In a recent case in Madison County, he said, the task force seized about $60,000 worth, some 1,200 packets.
Frederick, speaking to the committee, said her solution to fighting the heroin epidemic as a prosecutor is to prosecute.
Seated beside the local prosecutor was a local mom, holding a portrait of her daughter, Ashley, who is currently battling heroin addiction and jailed in Pennsylvania.
"These are the people right here and they are really suffering," Frederick said.
Of the ongoing drug investigation with support from the feds, she said it's a big deal.
"Because these guys have been around 20 years doing whatever they want, running business how they want with us sort of smalltime hitting them," Frederick said of local dealers. "I wasn't going to do that and I had the support of the town police. We were able to join the federal government and a lot of these guys are going away and aren't ever coming back. I'm really proud of that. I can't say a lot about a lot of those cases, but that is going to happen. I have a couple who have pled to some serious time so that's a good thing."
Earlier this month, the U.S. Attorney's Office Western District of Virginia announced the indictments of several Culpeper men on federal drug charges related to heroin and cocaine distribution near a playground in Charlottesville.
Culpeper's first-term commonwealth's attorney, at Tuesday's committee meeting, went on to publicly question law enforcement's use of Narcan, a legal drug used to revive people who have overdosed on opiates like heroin. Frederick said using Narcan improperly can result in liability issues, and that it's also very expensive.
"The other issue with law enforcement carrying Narcan, where does it end? They are not medical personnel. If they are going to carry Narcan for drug addicts should they carry insulin for diabetics? I don't know the answer, but I think they are good questions that need to be answered before we just start issuing this stuff out," she said. "Equally important is the value of a life and how do we say it's not worth spending the money if it's your kid's life or my kid's life or Ashley."
Heroin use is very dangerous, Frederick added, saying April's armed robbery at the Culpeper Rite-Aid was directly related to the illegal and highly addictive drug. She said her office continues to work very closely with the U.S. Attorney's Office to fight the growing problem, resulting in heavy jail sentences.
"It takes highly trained, highly experienced law enforcement to really be able to get to the crux of this problem," Frederick said, urging the public safety committee to consider increasing the size of the Culpeper PD. "We have to be sure they are properly manned."
Frederick proposed what she felt was a larger solution to the heroin epidemic.
"The federal government needs to start buying the poppy fields [in Afghanistan] and burning them, but until they do that we have to combat it one drug addict and one drug dealer at a time," she said. You don't have to a have large amount, we don't care — we're going to prosecute all of them."
The planned merger of the CPD street crimes unit with the VSP task force would not result in fewer officers on the street, assured Culpeper Police Chief Chris Jenkins.
"We will have more folks on the streets here," he said. "Many of these cases starts with a traffic officer in a black and white car," Jenkins added, saying, "Law enforcement in the five counties is united in fighting this epidemic. We appreciate all of the efforts — the commonwealth's attorney's office is swamped, we all are swamped, but we are up to the task."
According to Murphy, the pooling of resources would result in "more boots on the ground," 18 to 21 people serving on the local task force, he said.
In conclusion, Frederick commended the Culpeper PD for maintaining its community feel, reacting to recent criticisms nationwide about local law enforcement using military tactics and equipment.
"They have not militarized in the town police. They are a local police department, they are polite, they have a good relationship with the public. They are in cars that you know — they are police officers. No one is hiding, no one is behind tinted windows," she said.
Last year, the Culpeper County Sheriff's Office obtained a bulletproof armored vehicle through the federal government's military surplus program for local law enforcement through the U.S. Dept. of Defense, a common practice for agencies nationwide. Last week, President Barack Obama ordered a review of the program out of concern about how military equipment was used during racial unrest in Ferguson, Missouri.
According to the Los Angeles Times, the Pentagon since 1995 has distributed $5.1 billion in surplus military equipment to U.S. police departments, including sleeping bags, office equipment, assault rifles, mine-resistant armored personnel carriers and helicopters.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said in a recent statement, "This equipment flowed to local police forces because they were increasingly being asked to assist in counter terrorism. But displays of force in response to mostly peaceful demonstrations can be counterproductive. It makes sense to take a look at whether military-style equipment is being acquired for the right purposes and whether there is proper training on when and how to deploy it."

[bolil]

Big documentary on addiction on HBO. Watched it last night. Can anyone guess what they were pushing as addiction treatment? Yup, drugs.

[tod evans]

In the fine tradition of impartial journalistic excellence Faux Newz provides carefully crafted propaganda intended to justify the war on drugs and legitimize big-pharm.....

From their front page this morning;



Delaware mother charged after 4-year-old brings heroin to daycare

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/10/07/delaware-mother-charged-after-4-year-old-brings-heroin-to-daycare/

Delaware State Police say they have arrested the mother of a 4-year-old girl after the child allegedly brought heroin to a daycare center and started to pass it out to other classmates.

Ashley Tull, 30, of Selbyville, Del., was charged with maintaining a drug property and three counts of endangering the welfare of a child.

Authorities told WTXF that troopers and medical personnel responded to the daycare shortly before noon Monday after workers saw some of the children with small bags of an unknown substance. Investigators said the substance was tested at the police station and determined to be heroin.

Police said the girl inadvertently brought the bags of heroin in a backpack that Tull had given her after the girl's regular backpack was ruined by a family pet Sunday night, according to police. Authorities said the child thought the packets were candy and began passing them out to other students

Several children were taken to area hospitals as a precautionary measure and were released after being examined. A total of 249 bags of heroin weighing 3.735 grams was located in the backpack, according to Delaware State Police.

Tull, who has a 9-year-old boy and an 11-year-old girl, that live with her in addition to the 4-year-old, was released on $6,000 bail. Authorities say a no contact order was issued, and the children are currently in the custody of a relative.


While they're on a roll..............



US heroin deaths double in link to prescription painkillers, says CDC

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/10/03/us-heroin-deaths-double-in-link-to-prescription-painkillers-says-cdc/

The over-prescribing of painkillers is fuelling nearly 17,000 annual deaths from overdoses in the United States as well as a rise in heroin use, according to a study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday.

The CDC reviewed 2010-2012 mortality data from 28 states to measure rising fatal heroin overdose rates and determine how the increases were tied to prescription painkillers.

The study found that the death rate from heroin overdoses doubled during that two-year span to from 1 to 2.1 deaths per 100,000 people, while deaths from prescription opioid drugs overdoses declined from 6 to 5.6 deaths per 100,000.

Despite the slight drop in prescription painkiller-related deaths, the Atlanta-based CDC said years of over-prescription of painkillers has led to the recent surge in heroin deaths.

"The rapid rise in heroin overdose deaths follows nearly two decades of increasing drug overdose deaths in the United States, primarily driven by (prescription painkiller) drug overdoses," the study found.

In a sample of heroin users in treatment programs, 75 percent who started using heroin after 2000 said they first abused prescription opioids. They said heroin was easier to get, cheaper and more potent than prescription drugs.

"In contrast, among those who began use in the 1960s, more than 80 percent indicated that they initiated their abuse with heroin," the study said.

The study also showed there has been a 74 percent increase in heroin use between 2009 and 2012, and that prescription painkiller overdose mortality declined among males, people under age 45, residents of Southern states and non-Hispanic whites.

A look at regions of the United States from 2010 to 2012 showed states in the Northeast recorded a 211 percent increase in heroin overdose deaths. Southern states were next with a 181 percent jump, while the West and Midwest reported rises of 62 and 91 percent, respectively.

Prescription painkiller death rates rose everywhere except for the South.

The switch from prescription painkillers to heroin poses a public health concern, in part because it indicates an increase in intravenous drug use, which can spread diseases.

To combat the rise of opioid deaths, the CDC suggested measures including drug screenings and the increased availability of naloxone, a drug that can rapidly halt an overdose.

[Suzanimal]

Barnabas Davis Arrested With 633 Packs Of 'Ebola'-branded Heroin

Accused drug dealer Barnabas Davis was apparently hoping to stand out from his competition by capitalizing on global paranoia.

When police in Toms River, New Jersey, arrested Davis, 47, on Monday, they allegedly discovered 633 wax folds of heroin as well as "trademark" stamps that marked the packets with the brand name "Ebola."

Investigators said they got a tip about drug dealing taking place in the rear suites of the Ramada Inn along Route 9 and executed a search warrant of Davis' room, NBC Philadelphia reports.


The Ebola-branded heroin doesn't actually contain the deadly virus. It's just a way for customers to ask for a specific type of heroin, according to Toms River police officer Ralph Stocco.

"Different dealers have different potencies and products. Many times they are labeled with catchy phrases," Stocco told the Daily News. "In the past we have had Bin Laden, Hello Kitty, D.O.A., Twin Towers, 911, gumball, pow, etc."

Davis -- known as "Hammer" by some -- was charged with possession of heroin, possession of heroin with intent to distribute, possession of crack cocaine and possession of crack cocaine with the intent to distribute, according to NJ.com.

He was taken to the Ocean County Jail in lieu of $300,000 bail.

Investigators say the Ramada Inn had no knowledge or involvement in Davis' alleged drug dealing and cooperated in the investigation, 6abc.com reports.



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/22/barnabas-davis-ebola-heroin_n_6031240.html?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592

[tod evans]

From Drudge;

Mexican opium farmers expand plots to supply US heroin boom

http://news.yahoo.com/mexican-opium-farmers-expand-plots-supply-us-heroin-145711238.html

Red and purple blossoms with fat, opium-filled bulbs blanket the remote creek sides and gorges of the Filo Mayor mountains in the southern state of Guerrero.

The multibillion-dollar Mexican opium trade starts here, with poppy farmers so poor they live in wood-plank, tin-roofed shacks with no indoor plumbing.

Mexican farmers from three villages interviewed by The Associated Press are feeding a growing addiction in the U.S., where heroin use has spread from back alleys to the cul-de-sacs of suburbia.

The heroin trade is a losing prospect for everyone except the Mexican cartels, who have found a new way to make money in the face of falling cocaine consumption and marijuana legalization in the United States. Once smaller-scale producers of low-grade black tar, Mexican drug traffickers are now refining opium paste into high-grade white heroin and flooding the world's largest market for illegal drugs, using the distribution routes they built for marijuana and cocaine.

It is a business that even the farmers don't like. In a rare interview with reporters, the villagers told The Associated Press that it's too difficult to ship farm products on roads so rough and close to the sky that cars are in constant danger of tumbling off the single-lane dirt roads that zig-zag up to the fields. They say the small plastic-wrapped bricks of gummy opium paste are the only thing that will guarantee them a cash income.

"Almost everyone thinks the people in these mountains are bad people, and that's not true," said Humberto Nava Reyna, the head of the Supreme Council of the Towns of the Filo Mayor, a group that promotes development projects in the mountains. "They can't stop planting poppies as long as there is demand, and the government doesn't provide any help."

Villagers granted the AP access to their farms and agreed to interviews only if they were not identified, fearing it could draw attention from government drug eradicators or vengeful traffickers.

Residents say there are no local users. They hate the taste of the bitter paste, which they sometimes rub into their gums to sooth an aching tooth.

It all goes for export, a lucrative business mostly run by the Sinaloa Cartel.

According to the DEA's 2014 National Drug Threat Assessment, Mexico produces nearly half of the heroin found in the United States, up from 39 percent in 2008. While Afganistan is by far the world's largest producer, it largely sends to markets in Europe and Asia.

Mexican government seizures of opium and eradication of poppy plantations have skyrocketed in recent years. The trends are consistent: Opium paste seizures in Mexico were up 500 percent between 2013 and 2014; poppy field eradications were up 47 percent; and seizures of the processed drug increased 42 percent. Along the U.S. border they are three times what they were in 2009.

Mexican heroin has become cheaper and more powerful at a time when Americans hooked on pharmaceutical opiates are looking for an affordable alternative. Combined with dangerous additives like fentanyl, a synthetic opiate also produced in Mexico, it is blamed for a wave of new addictions and overdoses in the U.S. Heroin deaths doubled from 2011 to 2013, while deaths from cocaine and prescription opiates remained steady, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

It used to be that Mexican cartels shipped brown heroin from Colombia along with their home-grown black tar. But all producers are making the high-grade white now, and Mexican criminal gangs have learned that they can increase their profits exponentially if they manage the whole production chain, as with methamphetamines, which they also control from precursor to user.

The Sinaloa cartel farms out most production of opium paste to smaller traffickers, according to growers, law enforcement and drug-trafficking experts interviewed by the AP. That kind of decentralized system is a recipe for setting Guerrero's small, feuding drug gangs, the Rojos, Pelones, Guerreros Unidos and others, against each other.

Since 2012, Guerrero has been Mexico's most violent state. But only recently has it gotten world attention, when 43 college students disappeared last September and are assumed murdered by the Guerreros Unidos, who had close ties to the mayor in the town of Iguala and reportedly viewed the students as a rival gang.

The growers won't say which gang buys the opium paste they produce on small plots. But a buyer affiliated with the local gang lives in almost every village, acting also as a lookout. Most can be identified by the short-wave radios they carry in a region far from telephone lines or cellular towers.

When the poppy plants finish flowering about three months into the winter growing season, a farmer armed with a razor-sharp, thumb-scorer and a metal scraping pan can collect 300 grams of opium paste, worth 4,000 pesos (more than $275 USD), in a single day.

The price for the relatively low-quality marijuana the farmers used to grow at lower elevations has fallen, possibly because of the legalization and medical use of higher-quality U.S. marijuana. Most law enforcement officials say it's still too early to document an impact. But the farmers see a change. They only get about 250 pesos (about $17 USD) per dried, pressed kilogram (2.2 pounds) of marijuana, compared to 13,000 pesos (nearly $900 USD) per kilo of opium paste.

One wiry farmer with a joking manner and a baseball cap noted that's more than he could make in a month at any legitimate job, if there were any legitimate jobs around. But they can lose a season's work in a few minutes to the government helicopters that spray powerful herbicides on any fields they find.

Towering pine and fir trees on the hillsides help shield the poppy fields from view, and some of the mountain villages that protect their forests from illegal logging do so to hide their fields.

But they are detectable to the experienced eye, rare spots of green in the winter, when most other crops have been harvested. Since they use gravity-fed irrigation systems from mountain streams, they are usually near creek beds, with black plastic tubing bringing the water down to drip or spray systems at each plant.

The herbicide kills both the poppies and anything around them. No one in these villages has been told what it is. And it can kill or damage local Ocote pine trees, allowing beetles to move and attack the weakened trees, and then neighboring trees, farmers said.

"The money the government spends on aerial spraying would better be spent on long-term development projects," Nava Reyna said.

When the buyer stocks enough opium paste from the farmers, he calls his cartel bosses to have it picked up and taken for processing at a lab.

From the Guerrero mountains, most of the opium paste is shipped to wholesale collection points like Iguala, a city at the crossroads of several highways, including the interstate from Acapulco on the Pacific Coast to Mexico City. There it is packed aboard passenger buses for "shotgun" smuggling to labs sometimes as far as the U.S. border. Once the paste becomes heroin, it is moved like any other drug in cars, trailers, buses, and mules across the border to the U.S. market.

There are no mega-labs for heroin, unlike those for meth. Though there are raids, they're generally small and they don't make news.

Many farmers say they would like to give up poppy cultivation and plant legitimate crops, in part because of the bloodshed the trade has brought.

Some growers are trying. In two of the three self-admitted opium growing villages the AP visited, residents have tried planting avocados, a crop that can bring cash income at similar altitudes in the neighboring state of Michoacan. They have also built trout ponds.

But the trout are small because of a lack of food, and avocados take at least seven years before they yield a viable amount of green, shiny fruit.

One farmer proudly showed off the 2- and 3-year old avocado trees he had planted on his steep hillside plot of about 20 acres. Because the trees can produce for four or five decades, he may someday have a plot his children and grandchildren can make a living from.

But cultivation is expensive. So meanwhile, the farmer walked further down his plot, into a narrow creek valley, where his "flower garden" grows. He waited to score his bulbs until noon, "because the sun draws the gum out."

"This," he said, pointing to the poppy bulb he has just scribed with a cutting tool to let the sap leak out, "is what finances that" he said, pointing uphill to the avocado trees.

[vita3]

Neighbor's kid died of Heroin overdose in January. Big health problem where I live & it's got nothing to do with media

[tod evans]

Another Boogity-boogity cycle begins...

DEA official: 'I've never seen' heroin use this bad

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/07/28/dea-official-ive-never-seen-heroin-use-this-bad/?intcmp=hplnws

Heroin deaths are spiking in the U.S., concerning lawmakers who proclaim it an epidemic and public health issue.

Between 2012-13, the number of U.S. drug overdose deaths resulting from heroin spiked from 5,900 to 8,200, said Michael Botticelli, director of the White House Office of National Drug Policy Center.

"I've been with [the] DEA almost 30 years, and I have to tell you, I've never seen it this bad," Jack Riley, acting deputy administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, said at a House judiciary subcommittee hearing Tuesday.

He offered more grim statistics. He told lawmakers that of the 120 drug overdose deaths seen per day in the U.S., more than half are from heroin and prescription painkillers.



This guy makes his living frightening people yet he lumps prescriptions and heroin into the closing sentence...

Wonder why?:rolleyes:

[HankRicther12]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

[tod evans]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

Where are you reading this?

[Todd]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.



Yep, because all heroin addicts are inherently violent. :rolleyes:

Like some of these laid back cool cats who could wail some hot licks.

http://www.var-veka.ru/assets/images/site-images/77233801-4156496-parker-3.jpghttp://www.jazzpla.net/foto/JohnColtranephoto0.jpghttp://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Observer/Columnist/Columnists/2013/12/19/1387452159158/Chet-Baker-001.jpg
http://assets.rollingstone.com/assets/images/artists/miles-davis.jpghttp://www.laut.de/bilder/wortlaut/artists/c/charles_ray/defimage1.jpg



Some of us remember before their was a drug war. Addiction is a terrible thing, but without the black market most drug addicts aren't inherently violent.

[AuH20]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

Bah, we're only dealing with alteration of one's brain chemistry. The stuff is harmless. [/s]

[tod evans]

Bah, we're only dealing with alteration of one's brain chemistry. The stuff is harmless. [/s]

All opiates "alter brain chemistry" that's how pain relief works, and coincidently what causes a physical addiction.

Most folks understand that about heroin, some understand about the plethora of synthetic opiates too.

But the MSM is using heroin as a tool to justify kops/courts and prisons preying on the ignorant or easily manipulated by fear mongering....

[HankRicther12]

Where are you reading this?

Obviously it was a bit of an exaggeration which I would think is obvious, I'm only trying to point out that while sure the media manipulates things I think it is silly to immediately jump into conspiracy land.


Yep, because all heroin addicts are inherently violent. :rolleyes:

Like some of these laid back cool cats who could wail some hot licks.

Some of us remember before their was a drug war. Addiction is a terrible thing, but without the black market most drug addicts aren't inherently violent.

Mmmmm, yeah, show me where I ever said anything remotely like that....oh, that's right, I didn't.

[Carlybee]

All opiates "alter brain chemistry" that's how pain relief works, and coincidently what causes a physical addiction.

Most folks understand that about heroin, some understand about the plethora of synthetic opiates too.

But the MSM is using heroin as a tool to justify kops/courts and prisons preying on the ignorant or easily manipulated by fear mongering....

While Big Pharma gets away with legally pushing meds that are just as addicting and debilitating as heroin.

[dannno]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

If drugs were legal, then they would be about 1/100th the cost and people wouldn't need to steal to obtain them. Some drug addicts will spend hundreds of dollars a week, others upwards of $1k or more a week on their habit. They could be spending $10 or less per week in a free market and this would reduce the need to steal upwards of thousands each month per addict.

[thajuggla]

Nope, not really, ever:



Source A: http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-spoils-of-war-afghanistan-s-multibillion-dollar-heroin-trade/91
Source B (Yes, those are U.S. Military personnel guarding the poppy fields): http://www.thelibertybeacon.com/2014/01/22/the-spoils-of-war-afghanistans-multibillion-dollar-heroin-trade/


Ohh come on! I mean, I know you are showing me PICTURES of our military guarding poppy fields, and there are graphs showing where Afghanistan seemed to blow up production of poppy after 2001, but are you sure that's not photo shopped by a conspiracy theorist?!?

How can you people think that government is all bad?!? They always just do things that are for our benefit, you know, like guarding poppy fields and spending our money trying to topple other governments that don't believe in blowing up people for freedom!

[tod evans]

While Big Pharma gets away with legally pushing meds that are just as addicting and debilitating as heroin.

This is where a lot of the older junkies come from...

The politically correct crowd chides doctors to curtail pain meds so they do.

Doesn't matter if the patient "needs" the medication for pain or a buzz the fact of the matter is he's been cut off.

If/when I ever get ill enough to need pain medication on a regular basis my intention is to start with opium and if/when that doesn't suffice I'll move up to heroin. The intention being to not deplete son's inheritance by giving any of it to the medical/pharmaceutical industrial complex.

[Christopher A. Brown]

Well DEA controls the cocaine market coming from south america might as well control the heroin trade, wait…….we already do. Nvrmd. We might as well control the huge gun trafficking ring going to criminal enterprises while we're at it. Oh yeah, we control that too.

With a government like this who needs evil empires to fight?

This should mean you support a lawful and peaceful revolution (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?471555-A-lawful-and-peaceful-revolution). That is unless your comment was to bump the thread rather than object to what heroin is doing to our populations.

If you do object to what heroin is doing, and the apparent fact that America is controlling its production in Afghanistan covertly, AND are a sincere American, then agreeing with these 2 questions and accepting constitutional intent as it can function for us will be easy.

Do you agree and accept that the framers of the founding documents intended for us to alter or abolish government destructive to our unalienable rights?

Do you agree and accept that the ultimate purpose of free speech is to enable the unity adequate to effectively alter or abolish?

[tod evans]

Here we go again, Boogity-boogity.

Exclusive: DEA chief says heroin ‘back with a vengeance,’ drugs a national security threat

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/09/04/exclusive-dea-chief-says-heroin-back-with-vengeance-drugs-national-security/?intcmp=hplnws

“Not much of a gambler,” Chuck Rosenberg says about himself, a tad sheepishly. Indeed, in the seven deadly sins department, the new chief of the Drug Enforcement Administration is something of a zero: He’s never smoked marijuana, doesn’t drink alcohol, and lists as his only vice an excessive intake of Diet Dr. Pepper.

Such abstemiousness may be a prized attribute in the head of the lead agency in the War on Drugs, which kicked off with the founding of DEA, under a measure signed by President Nixon, in July 1973. From his office headquarters in Northern Virginia, Rosenberg oversees nearly 5,000 federal agents in 220 U.S. cities and nearly 90 other locales around the world. These are some of America’s toughest and bravest uniformed – and undercover – officers, men and women who risk their lives to take down the most ruthless and heavily-armed narco-trafficking cartels.

The irony for the mild-mannered, bespectacled Rosenberg, a career federal prosecutor and former FBI official, is that someone so averse to gambling now spends his days grappling with the very thing gamblers court most assiduously. “We incur a lot of risk in our operations: legal risk, personal risk, all sorts of risk,” the DEA chief said at his agency’s headquarters. “And managing that risk in a smart way – figuring out where we ought to be and what we ought to be doing, prioritizing our work without stepping on the creativity and the passion of the men and women in the field – that’s a challenge.”

Foremost on Rosenberg’s agenda – the issue that every one of his 21 special agents in charge, fanned out across the country, cite as the number one problem in their respective jurisdictions – is the surge in heroin use in the United States over the past few years. The Centers for Disease Control reports that heroin usage or dependency surged by nearly 150 percent between 2007 and 2013, and that casualty rates from the drug nearly doubled in the last two years of that span.

“It’s back, and it’s back with a vengeance,” Rosenberg told Fox News in his first TV interview since taking the reins of the agency in May. “There's an enormous supply of heroin; it's cheap. In fact, it's a lot cheaper than prescription pills. If you take oxycodone and hydrocodone for a football injury and you get hooked, you're going to pay a dollar a milligram on the street for a pill – thirty milligrams, thirty dollars, give or take. Heroin is probably one-fifth the price, and because it has a similar chemical effect, a similar pharmacological reaction, folks make that transition.”

Asked if he sees substance abuse as a national security threat, Rosenberg at first demurred, seeking the reporter’s definition of a threat to national security. Encouraged to employ his own, Rosenberg replied: “Potentially. This is a multi-billion dollar industry. What are the bad guys doing with the money that Americans are paying for drugs? What's it funding overseas? I'm sure some of it's going to terrorist organizations; we've seen that. And so that worries me quite a bit.”

U.S. officials note that drug overdoses claim the lives of approximately 44,000 Americans each year – more than firearms or car accidents – and that half of those deaths are attributable to prescription pills. Asked if legal or illegal drugs pose the greater threat, Rosenberg said “both dimensions” are creating major problems for law enforcement and society in general. The acting administrator would not say outright that legal drugs are over-prescribed, but he hinted at his harboring such views, saying: “I’m not a doctor but I do know this … We’re about 5 percent of the world’s population. We use about 95 percent of the world’s hydrocodone. So draw your own conclusion.”

The recent decriminalization of marijuana usage in selected jurisdictions across the United States – Colorado and Washington state, most notably – has created a conflict between local law enforcement, sworn to uphold local laws, and federal law enforcement officers, for whom the federal statutes outlawing marijuana remain very much in effect. “I’ve been very clear to my special agents in charge: If you have a big marijuana case, if that in your jurisdiction is one of your biggest problems, then bring it,” Rosenberg said.

With new ballot measures on marijuana cropping up in almost every election cycle, and decriminalization appearing to be gaining broader support, Fox News asked Rosenberg about the continued inclusion of the drug in the federal government’s harshest category of narcotics:

ROSEN: Two of the last three presidents of the United States have acknowledged having used marijuana. Bill Clinton famously said that he didn't inhale. Barack Obama has written fairly extensively about his marijuana use, has been photographed with marijuana; and others have explicated on that subject even further. Isn't that itself – the fact that here we have two men who used marijuana, in varying degrees, and who then went on to become president of the United States – a kind of a prima facie argument that it is time to remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act?

ROSENBERG: Yeah, I don't think so.

ROSEN: Why not?

ROSENBERG: Marijuana is dangerous. It certainly is not as dangerous as other Schedule I controlled substances; it's not as dangerous as heroin, clearly, but it's still dangerous. It's not good for you. I wouldn't want my children smoking it. I wouldn't recommend that anyone do it. So I don't frankly see a reason to remove it. We, by the way, support, and have supported, a lot of legitimate research on marijuana, fully behind that; I think it's great. If we come up with a medical use for it, that would be wonderful. But we haven't.

When the questioning took a slightly different tack, he stood firm:

ROSEN: I’ve never seen two guys get thrown out of a bar because they started fist-fighting after smoking a joint. All right? But we’ve seen [that] every Friday and every Saturday night brings just such occasions as a result of the legal distribution of alcohol. Isn’t there some common-sense disparity, or irony, or disconnect in that?

ROSENBERG: Probably, yeah. Right? So I don’t know that you’re arguing that they’re both good; you may be arguing that they’re both bad. As I said earlier, marijuana is less dangerous – clearly less dangerous – than heroin. It’s easy to draw that line. But I’m not willing to say that it’s good for you, or that it ought to be legalized. I think it’s bad for you and that it ought to remain illegal.

ROSEN: From that answer, one might infer that you think alcohol should also be illegal.

ROSENBERG: No, I’m not going to say that. We – we tangled with that as a society in the 1930s. And we know how that went. That’s the law of the land; I get it. I choose not to drink alcohol but I’m not going to impose that on anyone else.

Since Mexico is a primary point of origin for illegal drugs consumed in the United States, including heroin, our neighbor to the south exercises an outsized claim on the attention of the DEA administrator. The brazen escape from a Mexican prison in July of the Sinaloa cartel druglord Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán, also known as “El Chapo” – one of the world’s most ruthless and dangerous criminal kingpins, now at large – underscored the challenges for U.S. law enforcement in collaborating with a nation-state where official corruption is so widespread. “Not that I can share with you,” Rosenberg answered when pressed on whether U.S. authorities have any better idea of El Guapo’s location today than the day after his escape.

Asked if there is a single sector of the Mexican state apparatus that is free of corruption, Rosenberg answered: “I don't know. I would hope so.” Later, he cited the Mexican agents who work with DEA task forces and called them “good and trusted allies,” their very existence evidence that “pockets” of integrity in the Mexican system exist.

With his cautious demeanor, Rosenberg shrewdly steers away from any question that smacks, or even faintly reeks, of controversy. Though he is perhaps in a better position than any other U.S. official to corroborate or refute the charge, he will not comment on Donald Trump’s recent assertion that the Mexican government is deliberately sending rapists and gang members across the U.S. border. Nor will Rosenberg say whether a “spiritual deficit” is partly to blame for the skyrocketing rates of heroin dependency. And he will not answer questions about his role in an epic controversy of the Bush-Cheney era: when an internal clash over reauthorization of a surveillance program critical to the War on Terror, in March 2004, nearly triggered mass resignations at the Department of Justice.

“Happy to talk about the Washington Nationals and their diminishing chances of making the playoffs this year,” he’ll say instead, with a sly smile.

Controversy, it turns out, is not one of the risks the DEA chief is willing to manage.

[tod evans]

//

[dannno]

“Not much of a gambler,” Chuck Rosenberg says about himself, a tad sheepishly. Indeed, in the seven deadly sins department, the new chief of the Drug Enforcement Administration is something of a zero: He’s never smoked marijuana, doesn’t drink alcohol, and lists as his only vice an excessive intake of Diet Dr. Pepper.


Honestly, Diet Dr. Pepper is probably worse for you than all the drugs they just listed... and maybe heroin too.

[tangent4ronpaul]

There is a epidemic of heroin use in this country right now. It's driven by the war on pot. Heroin is easier to smuggle and commands a higher markup. No brainer.

You could kill the profitability just by teaching the junkies to garden :D

-t

[JK/SEA]

yeah, well, its pretty clear he has a FINANCIAL interest in keeping the drug war going. Either way. He gets a paycheck, and might be a shareholder in a few prisons here and there...

this guy ain't foolin' anybody.

[tod evans]

Nearly 75 people reportedly overdose on laced heroin in 3-day span in Chicago

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2015/10/04/nearly-75-people-reportedly-overdose-on-laced-heroin-in-3-day-span-chicago/?intcmp=hplnws

Nearly 75 people reportedly overdosed on dangerous narcotics, possibly heroin laced with painkiller fentanyl, in Chicago over a three-day span, according to city health and fire officials.

The Chicago Tribune, citing hospital officials, reported by Friday afternoon at least 14 people were rushed to Mount Sinai Hospital in Chicago to be treated for possible heroin overdoses, and some patients still had needles in their arms.

Larry Langford, a spokesman for the Chicago Fire Department, told the Tribune that from Tuesday to Friday, emergency crews had responded to 74 cases.

Diane Hicks, a registered nurse and emergency room director at Mount Sinai, told the Tribune that some of the 14 patients at the hospital had collapsed as soon as they injected themselves with the deadly concoction.

"We suspect what is happening is the same thing that happened in 2006 when people were getting heroin that was cut with fentanyl, which is a very strong narcotic," she told the newspaper. “That’s what we think is happening.”

The Drug Enforcement Administration and Chicago police are teaming up to try and find the source of the batches.

Chief Mary Sheridan, head of the Fire Department’s emergency medical services division, said all the victims were stabilized with a single dose of Narcan, a heroin antidote carried by paramedics in the city, and then, transported to hospitals. However, fire officials say the victims needed more than one dose of Narcan.

"They're taking double and triple the doses of Narcan in order to bring them out of their stupor," Hincks told the newspaper.

Fentanyl-laced heroin has caused overdoes across the nation. The DEA issued a health alert in March.

Fentanyl is used for painful surgical operations, Dr. Steven Aks, chief toxicologist at Stronger Hospital, told the Tribune. The power painkiller adds a potent kick to heroin, making it attractive to buyers seeking better edge.

The last major outbreak of fentanyl-related deaths took place between 2005 and 2007. The outbreak killed more than 1,000 people across the country and dozens specifically in Chicago.

[vita3]

Kid on my lane died of Heroin overdose this winter & good friends nephew OD'd 2 weeks ago.

F yourself if you continue to think its all media & not a real problem.

[DevilsAdvocate]

I think sometimes Libertarians fail to understand that drugs are actually horrible.

[tod evans]

Drugs just are.

People misuse everything from hammers to heroin.

Blaming a chemical compound for how a human uses it points to how media has programmed the idiots.


F yourself if you continue to think its all media & not a real problem.

And a great big Sunday morning "Fuck you too" For not only repeating, but actually believing, that chemicals did the people not the other way around...Idiot!

[vita3]

You're an idiot & a gr8 example as why many solid folks see the "Ron Paul movement" as loons.

[tod evans]

You're an idiot & a gr8 example as why many solid folks see the "Ron Paul movement" as loons.

Because I type the truth or because you disagree with it?

It's a shame people you knew decided to consume drugs but it's even a bigger shame that you're ignorant enough to blame the drugs.

Educate yourself and maybe you can keep some of the other idiots in your circle from killing themselves.

Or you could continue to blame inanimate objects and cry for government to regulate them...Afterall people in your circle of influence are powerless to abstain from harmful behavior...:rolleyes:

[DevilsAdvocate]

Because I type the truth or because you disagree with it?

It's a shame people you knew decided to consume drugs but it's even a bigger shame that you're ignorant enough to blame the drugs.

Educate yourself and maybe you can keep some of the other idiots in your circle from killing themselves.

Or you could continue to blame inanimate objects and cry for government to regulate them...Afterall people in your circle of influence are powerless to abstain from harmful behavior...:rolleyes:

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.

[vita3]

There is plenty of blame to go around when a 20 something dies from Heroin. Certainly the foolish kids are main culprit

I don't call out to GOV to solve this so you can stuff that automatic response in your sock

I will agree with above posters that Libertarians are not on solid footing when they cant acknowledge the dangers of heavy drugs

[tod evans]

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.

Drugs do what they were designed to do, I don't view that as good or evil.

I can't speak for libertarians because I'm not one but I don't think repudiating drugs is the correct approach any more than repudiating the hammer that blackened your nail.

[TheTexan]

If drugs were legal, then they would be about 1/100th the cost and people wouldn't need to steal to obtain them. Some drug addicts will spend hundreds of dollars a week, others upwards of $1k or more a week on their habit. They could be spending $10 or less per week in a free market and this would reduce the need to steal upwards of thousands each month per addict.

It would probably also reduce the number of addicts, as they would die from OD quicker

[tod evans]

There is plenty of blame to go around when a 20 something dies from Heroin. Certainly the foolish kids are main culprit

I don't call out to GOV to solve this so you can stuff that automatic response in your sock

I will agree with above posters that Libertarians are not on solid footing when they cant acknowledge the dangers of heavy drugs

What is a "heavy drug"?

Is it a drug that's addictive? Physically or psychologically or both?

Is it a drug that can kill? Immediately or after prolonged use? What of "drugs" that only kill some people but not others, are they "heavy"?

Or does the MSM and the courts decide which drugs are "heavy"?

Pharmaceutical drugs kill more people every year than black market or naturally occurring substances, are they "heavy"?

People, kids and adults, have sought to alter their consciousness since recorded history but in modern societies infinite wisdom these people are now "evil" and need others to control their behavior...Which leads back to the reason for this thread; To point out how media justifies government and policing by demonizing drugs, heroin specifically.

[TheTexan]

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.

Yes, drugs are a blight on our great society, and drugs cause irreparable harm to one's both mental and physical health. Drugs are extremely bad and people should not do them recreationally ever.

I have a lot more to say on this subject but I need to grab another beer, be right back.

[Occam's Banana]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to tod evans again.


Yes, drugs are a blight on our great society, and drugs cause irreparable harm to one's both mental and physical health. Drugs are extremely bad and people should not do them recreationally ever.

I have a lot more to say on this subject but I need to grab another beer, be right back.

Just as long as you don't have any guns. :eek:

People die because of guns. :(

Guns are BAD! :mad:

Government shouldn't try to solve this, but libertarians who don't acknowledge that guns are horrible and awful are a bunch of loons ...

[tod evans]

Just as long as you don't have any guns. :eek:

People die because of guns. :(

Guns are BAD! :mad:

Government shouldn't try to solve this, but libertarians who don't acknowledge that guns are horrible and awful are a bunch of loons ...

Don't forget the damned hammers!

Hammers are evil! They hurt thumbs every day, don't you care about thumbs?

[dannno]

Kid on my lane died of Heroin overdose this winter & good friends nephew OD'd 2 weeks ago.

F yourself if you continue to think its all media & not a real problem.

The real problem seems to be the black market lacing the shit.

Can you verify that these overdoses would have occurred with pure, medical grade heroin?

Did heroin being illegal stop these overdoses from happening?

What, then, is the logical solution?

[dannno]

I think sometimes Libertarians fail to understand that drugs are actually horrible.

There are worse drugs being prescribed by doctors than the illegal drugs addicts are seeking.. but the addicts get laced drugs, which can be the most dangerous. A product of the black market.

[dannno]

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.


You are lumping all drugs into the category of laced black market heroin.. It is intellectually dishonest to treat all drugs the same, or say that everybody should absolutely stay away from all drugs. It confuses people who try certain drugs and then don't have a problem. They may move on to other drugs they have a problem with and go into it thinking it is perfectly safe. It's really best to be honest - and honestly you don't have any clue about drugs so you aren't the best person to espouse what everybody else should be doing.

Some drugs do damage, if done in certain amounts. Other drugs have benefits in some form or another and do little or no damage. Some drugs cure. Some drugs are highly addictive. Some drugs are completely non-addictive. Some drugs give people magical experiences that they will never forget and they have the time of their life. Some drugs give people hellish experiences and ruin their lives. Thus it isn't good to lump everything into the same category. There are different risks for different substances, it can be different for different people and people who are interested in imbibing should be aware of that. There are also risks in mountain climbing, and even hiking can be dangerous. There are also benefits to both. That's what life is, gauging risks and living to the fullest.

[tod evans]

In their struggle to terrify the public politicians pull the "Boogity-boogity" card because everyone knows the evils of heroin......


Don't they?



Heroin epidemic seizes bipartisan attention in 2016 race

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/11/27/heroin-epidemic-seizes-bipartisan-attention-in-2016-race.html?intcmp=hpbt2

America's heroin crisis has risen to levels that are demanding attention on the 2016 campaign trail as candidates from both sides of the aisle call for action, particularly in the first-in-the-nation primary state of New Hampshire where heroin overdoses have soared.

In town hall forums and diners, the candidates repeatedly are confronting the issue, even putting out campaign platforms on addiction. Even as the Paris terror attacks bring national security and foreign policy back to the forefront of the campaign, heroin addiction remains one of the biggest domestic issues in the vital New England primary state.

Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton admits the focus took her by surprise. "I never expected that substance abuse and mental health would be major issues in my campaign until I came to Keene on my very first trip," she said, speaking at the New Hampshire Democratic Party Convention earlier this fall. "And then I started listening."

Heroin addiction has affected New Hampshire in profound ways. On average, one person dies every day from a drug-related overdose in the state. The epidemic is growing at a staggering rate -- heroin-related emergency visits have increased by 76 percent this year.

Nationally, heroin use among young adults has more than doubled in the past decade. The CDC reports that heroin overdose deaths increased by 286 percent from 2002 to 2013. Presidential candidates have heard intimate stories from families who have been torn apart by drug addiction, and they are responding in kind.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush opened up about his own daughter's struggle.

"I've had the personal experience of dealing with the challenges of drug addiction and it wasn't easy," Bush said at a substance abuse roundtable in Manchester, N.H., in October. He echoed voters' concern, saying: "When people are addicted to painkillers and then resort to a lower-cost alternative and then die? I mean, there should be a little more outrage about what's going on."

Voters remain vigilant as they seek to raise candidates' awareness, fighting to take away the stigma associated with drug addiction.

'There should be a little more outrage about what's going on.'

- Jeb Bush
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has made advocacy and awareness his pledge. "I'm going to be the kind of president who is going to talk about this. Because I want to remove the stigma," he said at a recent town hall in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Christie's call for compassion and action was featured in a web video published by the Huffington Post that went viral, receiving over 8 million views. The issue hits close to home for the governor. "I've dealt with this personally with people in my life," he said at a substance abuse roundtable in New Hampshire earlier this month. "We have no tolerance for the dealing and the violence and all the rest ... [but] for those of you who become addicted we're going to do the best we can to get you treatment."

The issue is building common ground between parties as candidates search for solutions. Both Republicans and Democrats are calling for changes that would provide more treatment resources to communities. "I am glad that Republicans are acknowledging this issue and hope that we can work together to go forward," Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders told Fox News.

Sanders has been an outspoken advocate on the matter, telling voters at a local high school, "You're not going to be hanging out on street corners doing drugs." The Vermont senator is calling for criminal justice reform, arguing that treating addicts instead of incarcerating them is both ethical and economically sound. "You are not only going to save human lives by the thousands, you also save taxpayers' money," he said.

Candidates suggest they're not stumbling into the issue as a talking point but truly want to understand.

"I am not here as a candidate. I'm here to listen and learn," Bush told a gathering of first responders, law enforcement, and health care providers at a substance abuse roundtable in Manchester, N.H.

Similar roundtable discussions with advocates and activists are a priority on many presidential candidate itineraries. Clinton hosted a town hall entirely focused on substance abuse where she heard heartbreaking testimony from families and loved ones who felt powerless against the epidemic that has infested their community. Christie visited a treatment center where he met with recovering addicts who shared their stories.

The issue allows candidates to move past stump speeches and connect with voters in an intimate way. Christie spoke frankly at the town hall in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. "I'm sure there is no one in this room that has not made a decision in their life that they wouldn't want to take back," he said. "I'm just lucky that decision didn't involve drugs. Because I could very well be an addict."

The epidemic has gone beyond the Granite State. Maine Gov. Paul LePage has been on the frontlines combating the issue in his state, where the crisis has grown so large he has threatened to call the National Guard for assistance if lawmakers there don't step up and approve more agents.

[Anti Federalist]

I swear, only in Idiot AmeriKa, could people scream and raise hell over a drug problem, demanding more of the same failed 50 year old policies that have turned the country into a police/prison state, while at the same time going bankrupt funding a military/surveillance complex that protects the drug trade.

SMMFH...

[Anti Federalist]

The epidemic has gone beyond the Granite State. Maine Gov. Paul LePage has been on the frontlines combating the issue in his state, where the crisis has grown so large he has threatened to call the National Guard for assistance if lawmakers there don't step up and approve more agents.

Well, of course.

No matter what the problem is, the answer is always more cops, more laws, more control and less freedom.

[TheTexan]

Just need to make it more illegal, then problem solved

[Anti Federalist]

Just need to make it more illegal, then problem solved

We do this by voting harder, of course.

[Anti Federalist]

And, as always, it is important to keep in mind, who is behind the massive surge in heroin reaching the US market.



U.S. Occupation Leads to All-Time High Afghan Opium Production

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/11/us-drug-afgahnistan-opium.html

The U.S. military has allowed poppy cultivation to continue in order to appease farmers and government officials involved with the drug trade who might otherwise turn against the Afghan Karzai government in Kabul. Fueling both sides, in fact, the opium and heroin industry is both a product of the war and an essential source for continued conflict.



U.S. Troops Patrolling Poppy Fields In Afghanistan (Photos)

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2012/10/14066.html

Preface: As many have noted, the U.S. government has – at least at some times in some parts of the world – protected drug operations. (Big American banks also launder money for drug cartels. See this, this, this and this. Indeed, drug dealers kept the banking system afloat during the depths of the 2008 financial crisis. But that’s beyond the scope of this post.)

The U.S. military has openly said that it is protecting Afghani poppy fields.


Also, keep in mind, this is what Pat Tillman was going to come back home and speak out against.

Which is why he was killed by our own troops and the facts of his death attempted to be covered up.

[tod evans]

Funny thing is after X number of dollars spent and too many lives wasted in this "war" they've declared, the percentage of the population that consumes narcotics is close to what it was before government got involved.

[Zippyjuan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMteBoOKhVs

[Zippyjuan]

Funny thing is after X number of dollars spent and too many lives wasted in this "war" they've declared, the percentage of the population that consumes narcotics is close to what it was before government got involved.

Perhaps if we legalize it people will stop using it. Like alcohol.

[pcosmar]

You're an idiot & a gr8 example as why many solid folks see the "Ron Paul movement" as loons.


I think the federal war on drugs is a total failure. You can at least let sick people have marijuana because it's helpful, but compassionate conservatives say, well, we can't do this--the federal government's going in there and overriding state laws and putting people like that in prison. Why don't we handle the drugs like we handle alcohol? Alcohol is a deadly drug. The real deadly drugs are the prescription drugs. They kill a lot more people than the illegal drugs. The drug war is out of control. I fear the drug war because it undermines our civil liberties. It magnifies our problems on the borders. We spent, over the last 40 years, $1 trillion on this war. And believe me, the kids can still get the drugs. It just hasn't worked.

Ron Paul

The Dr. understands.

I had a niece killed by a hospital overdose of methadone,, and have another friend trying to kick methadone.
They nearly killed my step daughter last year,,

the war on drugs is as much a failure as socialized medicine, and just as deadly.

[tod evans]

Perhaps if we legalize it people will stop using it. Like alcohol.

"Legalizing" it like alcohol would only move government regulation from one agency to another, it's pretty unlikely Joe Junkie would notice any difference, neither would Harriot Homeowner or Tom Taxpayer...

Now making plants, herbs and their derivatives exempt from all regulations and taxes would serve everybody well, except government functionaries....


[edit]

Oh gosh!

Were you insinuating that governments job is to make people "stop using" things?

[tod evans]

Officials declare health emergency in Connecticut city after string of overdoses

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/06/24/officials-declare-health-emergency-in-connecticut-city-after-string-overdoses.html?intcmp=hpbt4

Officials in a Connecticut city said Thursday they are experiencing a major public health crisis after more than 20 overdoes were reported, including two fatal cases.

New Haven health officials told WTNH-TV that they activated the emergency notification system to warn residents about the tainted life-threatening heroin on the streets. According to the New Haven Independent the batches of heroin were laced with fentanyl.

Officials said by Thursday night there were about 22 overdoses and two deaths reported. Police said those numbers could rise.

“I don’t ever recall a day like this ever. I don’t think we’ve had this amount in a very, very long,” assistant Fire Chief Matt Marcarelli told the paper. “We have barely enough Narcan to get throughout the night. We’re hoping it calms down. We used up almost the whole supply of Narcan in the city.”

Naloxone, also known as Narcan, is administered to someone who is overdosing on heroin to reverse its effects. The fire department was working with the Yale-New Haven Hospital and AMR ambulance in Hartford to obtain more.

Paramedics started to respond to emergency calls at around 3:30 p.m. By then, at least six people had overdoes and were unconscious within three to four blocks of each other, the Independent reported.

Firefighters found two more men passed out in a car near a baseball field about three hours later. Marcarelli said the men showed “obvious” signs of an overdose.

By 9:30 p.m., at least 15 people had overdosed on heroin and the numbers continued to rise.

New Haven police Lt. Tony Reyes said law enforcement personnel plan to meet with the fire department Friday to assess the overdose deaths and plot a course forward with how to combat it. He also said police are working alongside the DEA to handle the overdose cases.

And just how in the Sam Hell are tax-ticks going to 'handle' overdose cases?
These idiots have one weapon in their arsenal, the courts........

[pcosmar]

I wonder,,, if like the Poisoned Alcohol distributed By the Government,,

are they are lacing Heroin deliberately for the same reasons ?


I would not be at all surprised.

[tod evans]

I wonder,,, if like the Poisoned Alcohol distributed By the Government,,

are they are lacing Heroin deliberately for the same reasons ?


I would not be at all surprised.

I'm thinking it's less trouble to make Fentanyl than to grow and process poppies....

[pcosmar]

Just a reminder,,
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2010/02/the_chemists_war.html

Frustrated that people continued to consume so much alcohol even after it was banned, federal officials had decided to try a different kind of enforcement. They ordered the poisoning of industrial alcohols manufactured in the United States, products regularly stolen by bootleggers and resold as drinkable spirits. The idea was to scare people into giving up illicit drinking. Instead, by the time Prohibition ended in 1933, the federal poisoning program, by some estimates, had killed at least 10,000 people.

Lather rinse repeat

[tod evans]

Just a reminder,,
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2010/02/the_chemists_war.html


Lather rinse repeat

It'd seem kind of silly to give junkies a product that was too potent in order to kill 'em off........

But whadda I know?

I've also got to wonder how many of these OD's are only consuming street dope because government curtailed their supply of 'approved' pills..........

[pcosmar]

It'd seem kind of silly to give junkies a product that was too potent in order to kill 'em off........

But whadda I know?

I've also got to wonder how many of these OD's are only consuming street dope because government curtailed their supply of 'approved' pills..........

Unless headlines were wanted,, and stir the muck for more bucks,,

I can't help think the free market would be better for all,,, (except for those that enjoy excessive profit)

Better for the consumer,, for society,
Safer cleaner and much less violent.

[tod evans]

Unless headlines were wanted,, and stir the muck for more bucks,,

I can't help think the free market would be better for all,,, (except for those that enjoy excessive profit)

Better for the consumer,, for society,
Safer cleaner and much less violent.

I'm in 100% agreement......

[afwjam]

I can't give any rep to people in this thread, stop being so right on.

[tod evans]

Here's a politician pushing more folks to use heroin..........

Pay attention to how this author slips between opioids, heroin, legal and illegal......In his mind it's all the same...

I'll wish oh........how about crones disease and shingles along with a HNP (slipped disc) all at once with no opiates available upon him...




Kasich Cracks Down On Opioid Prescriptions With Strict Limit

http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/31/kasich-cracks-down-on-opioid-prescriptions-with-strict-limit/

Ohio Republican Gov. John Kasich unveiled new rules for doctors Thursday that place strict limits on how long a patient can be prescribed opiate-based painkillers.

The order from the governor’s office, approved by the Ohio Board of Pharmacy, bars primary care physicians and dentists from prescribing opioids for more than seven days for adults and five days for children. Kasich is also enacting a plan for greater oversight of patients using opioids, requiring doctors to give a specific diagnosis before giving out the medication. The rules will not apply to patients with cancer or living in a hospice setting, reports NBC News.

Kasich is warning doctors throughout the state they will lose their medical license if they fail to comply with the new regulations. Ohio is suffering a high rate of heroin addiction linked to previous opioid abuse.

“You’re going to have to abide by these rules,” Kasich said Thursday, according to NBC News. “Health care providers can prescribe opiates in excess of the new limits only if they provide a specific reason in the patient’s medical record. By reducing the availability of unused prescription opiates, fewer Ohioans will be presented with opportunities to misuse these highly addictive medications.”


Ohio is being hit particularly hard by the national opioid epidemic, which claimed a record 33,000 lives in the U.S. in 2015. The opioid death rate in the state spiked 13 percent between 2014 and 2015, among the largest increases in the country. Heroin deaths increased by nearly 20 percent over the same period, claiming 1,444 lives.

The epidemic is posing risks to kids who are exposed to the drugs and other dangers by their parents. Officials in Ohio say opioids are the main driver of a 19 percent spike in the number of kids removed from parental custody to foster care since 2010.

Fatal overdoses from heroin quadrupled over the last five years nationally, according to data released by the National Center for Health Statistics Feb. 24. They say the massive increase in heroin and general opioid abuse in the U.S. since 2010 is driven by lower drug prices and ingredients with higher potency, like fentanyl.

Authors of the study noted in 2010 only 8 percent of all fatal drug overdoses stemmed from heroin. In 2015, roughly 25 percent of fatal drug overdoses were caused by heroin.

[Suzanimal]

Chris Christie-led opioid crisis panel urges Trump to declare ‘emergency’


The White House’s commission on combating the opioid epidemic in America has revealed in an interim draft letter to President Donald Trump that a federal state of emergency should be issued to deal with the crisis.

The White House’s commission on combating the opioid epidemic in America has called on President Donald Trump to declare a federal state of emergency to deal with the crisis.

In a letter to the president, the commission details recommendations that would bring millions of dollars in funding to help implement a national response to the US opioid crisis.

Arizona, Florida and Maryland have already declared a state of emergency in response to the national epidemic.

On Monday, the commission’s long awaited draft letter to Trump further outlines numerous ways to fight the opioid epidemic which has spread through almost every state in the US. The commission consists of five members which were chosen by the president in March after he signed an executive order to establish the group.

Their report is being prepared independently of the US Government’s Office of National Drug Control Policy, although the agency did submit a list of policy recommendations to the commission.

Leading the commission is Governor Chris Christie (R-New Jersey). He is joined by Governor Charlie Baker (R-Massachusetts), Governor Roy Cooper (D-North Carolina), former Congressman, Patrick Kennedy and Harvard University psychobiology professor, Dr. Bertha Madras. The delegation initially missed their first two deadlines for the report, which was supposed to be delivered June 27.

The goals of the commission are to study mechanisms to combat and treat the US opioid epidemic, which killed a record 33,000 people nationwide in 2015, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The members wrote to the president with urgent instructions to deal with the situation.

“The first and most urgent recommendation of this Commission is direct and completely within your control. Declare a national emergency under either the Public Health Service Act or the Stafford Act,” the committee wrote to Trump.

Their draft letter described what a declaration of this kind would mean for cabinet members and lawmakers alike. "Your declaration would empower your cabinet to take bold steps and would force Congress to focus on funding and empowering the Executive Branch even further to deal with this loss of life," the draft document stated.

They also suggest mandating prescriber education initiatives; providing model legislation for states to allow dispensing of naloxone, which is an opioid overdose reversal medication; and moreover, establishing and funding a federal incentive to enhance access to treatment.

Before the report was released, some legislators criticized the Office of National Drug Control Policy and the commission’s handling of the crisis thus far.

Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-South Carolina), who serves as the chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said the “ONDCP has failed to produce a formal national drug control strategy and a national drug control budget, which is supposed to be released no later than Feb. 1 each year,” during a hearing last week while discussing the government’s response to the situation.

Senator Joe Donnelly (D-Indiana) also expressed frustration with the commission’s response.

“We don’t really have time to wait on a commission from the White House that hopefully will produce something at some point,” he said, according to Stat News.

Congress approved nearly $1 billion last year to fund a response to the epidemic as part of the 21st Century Cures Act of 2016. A similar amount is expected to be approved next year.

https://www.rt.com/usa/398137-trump-commission-letter/

[tod evans]

It's all the rage to be anti-pain med too....:eek:



AG Sessions to address US opioid crisis in Ohio speech

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/08/02/ag-sessions-to-address-us-opioid-crisis-in-ohio-speech.html

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions is set to give a speech in Columbus, Ohio, on Wednesday on the impact of the nation’s growing opioid epidemic.

Sessions is scheduled to address law enforcement officials and families affected by the crisis in a state that sees about eight deaths per day from accidental overdoses.

More than 52,000 Americans died in 2015 from drug overdoses -- including 3,050 in Ohio.

In May, Sessions instructed federal prosecutors to pursue the most serious charges possible against most drug suspects, as a possible deterrent.

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions looks on during a news conference announcing the takedown of the dark web marketplace AlphaBay, at the Justice Department in Washington, U.S., July 20, 2017. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein - RTX3C8RUExpand / Collapse
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, seen in Washington, July 20, 2017, has instructed prosecutors to pursue the most serious charges in drug-related cases. (Reuters)
Wednesday’s scheduled speech comes just as President Trump received a report Monday from the administration’s drug commission, urging him to declare a national emergency to deal with the crisis, the BBC reported.

Doing so would allow the federal government to modify Medicaid and Medicare rules to make it easier for patients to seek treatment, FiveThirtyEight.com reported.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, appointed by Trump to head the team, has dedicated his final year in office to fighting the issue.

The recommendations made in Monday’s report coincide with a recent survey from the National Institute on Drug and Abuse
estimating that 92 million Americans used opioid drugs in 2015. That is roughly 1-in-3 Americans.

Researchers estimate that approximately 38 percent of adults in the U.S. were prescribed opioids in 2015.

Meanwhile, more than two-dozen state, city and county governments are suing the makers of prescription painkillers, claiming the industry misled physicians and the public about the
risks of addition.

A coalition of states is also considering a Big Tobacco-style lawsuit to help pay for the opioid epidemic, Fox News has reported.

“We’re very much at war here,” New Jersey state Attorney General Christopher Porrino said recently. His state saw 1,600 opioid-related deaths in 2015, Fox News reported.